Sunset Cruise on South Alligator River, Kakadu National Park

 The number one focus of this trip was to explore Kakadu National Park and, having now travelled almost four thousand kilometers, our anticipation heightened! After refuelling at Pine Creek we entered the National Park via the Kakadu Highway.

This was a very different National Park to those I had visited in other States and countries. Here the vegetation alongside the road was bare and blackened with fires still burning unattended in many places.  Burned black tree trunks with green heads standing on the bare sooty earth made a striking picture. The smell of bush smoke waved past our senses.  Even though this was only the beginning of the dry season, the grasses had a dry yellow hue giving a scorched appearance. I later learned that it is the practice to burn off the park in a mosaic pattern every three years. This minimises major spontaneous fires and also allows those plants that require fire for regeneration to thrive. We planned to try bush style camping instead of the commercial caravan parks so we were pleased to find that our chosen camp site was well away from any fires.

Mardugal Camp, Kakadu

Our first real camp proved to be the highlight camp of the whole trip! Mardugal is a non commercial  camp managed by the National Park Board and had bush luxuries such as showers with hot water -  thanks to the solar system. Trees provided shade and there were grassy areas where one could pick a spot and set up camp untroubled by close proximity to neighbouring campers. We loved the environment, meeting other travellers and also the Ranger's evening talks and walks in this woodland area.

South Alligator River, Cooinda

By early afternoon we had set up our camp, had lunch, chatted to a few other campers so we decided to take a drive to Cooinda to obtain our National Park passes. That done, we went for a drive to get a feel for the Park so that we could plan for our upcoming activities. 

Kakadu, and also the rest of the Northern Territory, proved to be full of surprises! One minute we were driving down flat dry sided roads when, suddenly, we found ourselves confronted by an amazing sight of water - either a river, billabong of a waterfall! We were soon out of the van and taking the boardwalk from the Yellow River cruise boat ramp. How still and quiet it was! And how beautiful!  We knew that we couldn't wait another day to take a cruise through this amazing place! Back we went to book our sunset cruise which would depart in little over an hour.

South Alligator River, Kakadu National Park

Sunset Cruise, Yellow Water

My photos do not do justice to the incredible number of different birds that are currently gathering here as the monsoonal waters recede.

Cormorant

Nankeen Night Heron

There were many egrets, lazily named small, medium or big.

Pied Cormorant

The calls of Whistling Ducks that have begun flying in as the water elsewhere in the Territory dries up accompanied us as we slowly floated downstream. In a few weeks their numbers will be in the tens of thousands.

The sun was going down with the smoke influenced light changing  colours minute by minute.

Yellow Water Sunset cruise

A lone male estuarine croc patrolled his territory. Top of the food chain, he guarded his many smaller females, daring us to come closer.

Male estuarine crocodile, South Alligator River

Come any closer and I'll let you know who is in control here was the message we received. We backed off!

A Four metre long saltwater crocodile

Male Estuarine Crocodile, South Alligator River

One of his harem wasn't that keen to see us either!

Female estuarine crocodile, Kakadu National Park

Female Saltwater Crocodile

This lady became decidedly cranky and suddenly turned, snarling, her awesome jaw letting us know to back right off!

Lotus on Yellow Water, Kakadu

Lotus

At the height of the wet season lotus flowers bloom thickly. There were still some vibrant patches left for us to enjoy.

As the sun slowly descended, allowing the crocodiles to hide in the darkened water our spectacular cruise came to an end!

Sunset on South Alligator River, Kakadu

What a great start to our Kakadu experience!

A Camping Road trip from Brisbane to Kakadu, Litchfield National Park, Katherine and Lake Argyle

Fifteen years  ago I planned an estimated year long road trip right around Australia but before we could get organised for departure a different adventure presented itself to us, the  Grandparent Adventure.  Now that our grandchildren [the two that live nearby] are older and going on an overseas family holiday adventure of their own, we will soon leave our home comforts for a brief life on the road, one a little less than of a couple of months instead of a year.

Fifteen years has made a difference in what we are able to achieve with activities such as mountain climbing and strenuous walking now definitely out of the plan. Coping with cold weather and very long days of driving now that only one of us drives will also now be a challenge as will being sure that we have more than enough of medicines needed for all contingencies. The circumnavigation of our country is just too hard so we have chosen just one part of this huge land to explore. The blue line on the map indicates our expected outward trip with a slight variation in green being the homeward  one.

Charlie, the Teardrop trailer

We are so lucky to have three great adult children who encourage us in our adventures. This time our son is to join us from Mount Isa to share the holiday with us and to assist with some of the driving. This would not be possible for him to do  without the love and support of our daughter by marriage who will be home alone with their very energetic and articulate two year old son while also working full time and dealing with the building of their new home. That's love and generosity in action.

Part of our preparation for this trip was to go down to Canberra to pick up Charlie, the "trailer." He was built by our son while he was living in America and is a comfortable large bedroom on wheels together with a compact kitchen under the back hatch. 

The drive from Canberra was my first ever towing experience so now I have a few kms under my belt, as they say. I haven't yet had to reverse it into a confined space so that challenge is to come!

For this trip we have to be able to be totally self sufficient if we are to be flexible and able to stop in interesting places and also to avoid long days of driving. This means carrying far more water than usual as well as a Porta Potty! As well as that we have extra spare wheels, fuses and so on. 

Charlie's kitchen

I have found www.caravancaravan.com.au a useful website for traveller reported information about the facilities and conditions of places where we may stop, either briefly or overnight. Other travellers' blogs have also been both fun to read as well as giving some useful tips. I am ready to try out the one mentioned to repel hovering mossies  by spraying Listerine mouthwash on the chairs! My travel plan is a book in its own right - a day by day journey in detail. Hopefully it will have all the information we need to travel comfortably!

Now that we have recovered from the bug that got us during the past two weeks [ Influenza B ?], have dealt with the insurance company after the break in, had the security door that was removed from its tracks attended to and cleaned up the mess left by the intruders, we will soon be on our way. 

[Any would-be crims please note that not a thing of value is now on our property and that a security company is engaged in surveillance. The Very Observant Neighbour has also returned from her own holiday and is also on surveillance duty, police number at the ready. The police will also be cruising around at least three times daily.]

We're almost ready to depart. Let the last of our camping adventures begin!