2006/06 Australia trip - Muirella Park, Kakadu |
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Saturday June 24th
Our intention was to go and see the areas of Kakadu that we’d missed on our last trip. The waterfalls, for
example, had dried upwhen we were there in November, at the very end of the dry season. But, there were a few areas we wanted to see again, likeYellow Waters, a swampy area often packed with birds and sometimes with crocs. This time, we saw lots of geese, herons,and egrets, but most of the trails there had been closed as they were still under water from the Wet season. We met a snake on our walk, a harmless small python.
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Yellow Waters (4.19) |
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We had lunch on a hot and very steamy afternoon at Anbangbang Billabong, a scenic spot with the backdrop of Nourlangie Rock. This is another good place for seeing birds, including the jabiru, a large black and white stork, ugly on the ground, but stylish in flight. There is a good walk around the billabong, but most of it was 
closed because of the high water.
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Anbangbang Billabong (3.11) |
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We’d been to see the aborigine artwork on Nourlangie Rock before, but it seemed a shame to pass it by, so we walked the circuit under the great overhanging cliffs. These cliffs and those at Ubirr house the two most published collections of their art, so you’ll have probably seen some of my pictures before, particularly Nabulwinjbulwinj, the eater of females, and Namarrgon the lightning man, who strikes his axes on the ground and brings the great thunderstorms to Kakadu every summer.
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Another “must” for us was Jim Jim Falls, which had been dry on our last trip. The falls are at the far end of a long
4wd track. Yes, that was closed too, for “seasonal reasons”. We’d hoped to camp at Sandy Billabong, but, yes, the track to that was closed too. A ranger at headquarters showed us the list of closings. She said that the summer had been quite dry until Cyclone Monica came through at the end of April and dumped many inches of rain across the Top End. The hard rock on the escarpment drains all of its rain into the low lands, so the rivers were still many feet above normal. In most years all the roads would be open by this time, but the ranger had a long list of closings. She recommended camping at Muirella Park, partway to Sandy Billabong, and taking the aborigine’s Nighttime Cruise on the billabong. That sounded pretty safe as there was obviously enough water for it! However when we got there we found that they were still cleaning up from Monica and weren’t starting the cruise for a few days!
We had another hot and steamy night in a well-filled and very noisy campground. Some of the parties were from the adventure tour buses. I wonder what the usually youthful members of these adventure tours think when they turn up at these “wilderness safari camps” and find that the camps are full of people like us, the “grey nomads”, traveling around Australia in our 4wd vehicles and carrying our walking sticks.