Roadtrip - Kakadu

It took us until after lunch to leave Darwin and with The other Spaz’s driving ability a little dodgy (blame the soccer mum car, not the driver) we somehow managed to miss the turn off to Kakadu …. so after going the long way around the first night was actually spent 20km from the entrance to Kakadu, oops.

View from the lookout at Ubirr

In Kakadu we explored, discovered and learned all about indigenous culture and art. We walked around ancient rock art, saw birds from hides in wetlands, experienced billabongs and saw many many many signs warning us that we couldn’t swim because there were crocodiles in the area. It is so unfair that it is so warm and that there are waterholes but that you can’t swim due to crocodiles :-( Some people neglected the warnings, they were eaten …  (two deaths whilst we were there). As much as The other Spaz didn’t want to drive at dawn or dusk fearing running into a large animal on the road we got up at 5am to do the Yellow River cruise on the Alligator river. This was stunning! Not only did we get to see the sunrise over the wetlands but we saw 25 crocodiles (largest was 3m long) and lots and lots of different birds and the breakfast provided afterwards was just awesome!

Rock art at Ubirr

Rock art of a hunter at Ubirr

A small croc on the Alligator River

A pile of rocks on the side of the road

Probably best that we didn't go swimming here

November is the start of the wet season in Kakadu. This means monsoon storms in the afternoons/evenings. After putting up the tent at Kakadu Lodge in Jabiru we experienced our first storm. We now fully appreciate the saying the calm before the storm as there was a surreal stillness before the storm hit and the air smelled so very clean. The rain fell hard for 20 minutes and in that time the temperature dropped 12 degrees. We stood in the camp kitchen area watching to see how well we put up the tent and whether it was going to blow away or not.

We also got the entertainment of watching the French campers near us run into their tent to hold it down, to then run to the car for refuge before dragging the tent into the car in the middle of the storm. The French then drove away, we thought that they might have gotten a cabin but no, they came back but decided to spend the night in the car instead. When we awoke their tent was out drying but they were still in the car. The bbq’s in the camp kitchen that we used to prepare dinner in the evenings were great. We ate kangaroo skewers and beef sausages with mushrooms and capsicums, yum!

Do I need to put the roof on?

Probably was a good idea to put the roof on :-)

Spaz hard at work