26 June to 24 July, 2025
Walk report compiled by Rob L.
In a previous life Denise and Gavin were professional tour guides and we were very fortunate that they offered to lead a club camp to the Kakadu and Litchfield National Parks in the Northern Territory. For some of the campers it was their first visit to the Territory and for others it was a revisit that included many features and sites they had not previously seen. We all met in Darwin to start the camp with a sunset dinner at the Darwin Trailer Boat Club overlooking Fanny Bay.
The drive to Jabiru in the Kakadu National Park is about 2.5hrs and so to break up the trip our Camp Leaders planned a number of stops to introduce us to the monsoon rainforest and wildlife of the Territory. While we think of the Top End having two seasons, wet and dry, the local indigenous groups identify six seasons based on storms, rains, dry, cool, cold and hot periods. At the first stop, Fogg Dam, we visited a bird hide where we could see hundreds of native birds on the wetlands that were drying out. In the distance we could see the smoke from numerous large fires lit by park rangers to burn off dense grass growth in the dry season.
We all stayed at accommodation in the town of Jabiru. Interesting fact, the name Jabiru is in fact a South American term and the famous local bird is actually a “Black-necked stork”.
We started the tour of the Kakadu with a cultural cruise along the East Alligator River led by a local indigenous guide named Roman. Within minutes of starting the cruise we saw our first 4m crocodile which seemed staged until you realise that there are a lot of crocs in the East Alligator River, many of them sunning themselves and resting after a busy night eating local fish and wildlife.
We were warned about the consequences of trailing your hands in the water and you can see we were all following his advice. As we cruised along the river Roman related stories to us of his ‘mob’ as he pointed out art on walls of overhanging rocks painted by his ancestors. The photos we took of the art from a distance don’t do them justice and we all wished we could have stopped there and have him provide us with more information.
The following pictures show an idyllic scene of a sand dune on the bank of the river. In actual fact this would have been a scene of a croc attack in the night as wallabies and pigs would have come down to drink but were caught by a waiting croc. Roman said the animal track seen is ‘one-way’ as the slope was too steep for them to escape.
We made a brief stop at Cahill’s Crossing famous for the pictures of people fishing on the causeway in close proximity to large salt water crocodiles. We watched a fisherman wrestle with a large barramundi finally landing it but not before he attracted the attention of a local croc who came over hoping to steal it. The croc missed out on lunch but the fisherman had to release the fish as it was over a metre in size and of breeding age. We saw a number of vehicles cross the causeway when the incoming tide was flowing hard but obviously these guys had done this before as they all made it safely despite most not having snorkels. The crocs just ignored them but it was exciting for the tourists.
We then visited the Ubirr art site which occupied us for a few hours taking dozens of photos of the incredible art. When I asked the campers for their photos at Ubirr I got very few shots with people. The image below shows their dedication to capturing all of the interesting art even to the extent of lying on the ground for the best shot.
There are multiple galleries at the Ubirr site and it seems that every overhang offering some protection from the elements had artwork. It will be impossible to do justice to all the different images we saw so I will only highlight a few here. The age of the wall art ranges from the 1960’s back possibly 20,000 years. It is of interest to note that indigenous artists paint over each other’s work over time but never touch-up an old artists painting that is fading with time. The end result are long galleries that appear totally painted.
Mimi art are the oldest figures, usually dark red in colour and seemingly fused with the sandstone rock through chemical reactions over time. Living indigenous people don’t know who painted these images and refer to them as being done by ancestral beings who created the earth.
Some of the more modern art is called ‘X-Ray art’ as the artist shows the internal organs and bones of fish, turtles and kangaroos. Such paintings are believed to both honour the food source and assist in ensuring a plentiful future catch.
Other images portray spirit figures who are used to send a message to the people about their ancestry (rainbow serpent), living good lives and acknowledging punishment for bad deeds.
Indigenous artists also painted images showing their contact with outsiders in the last 200 years. These included Makassan seamen who came to Australia’s coast to harvest trepang (sea-cucumber) and white men often displayed with their hats and guns.
You really get a sense of how long people have lived in these lands when you see paintings of Thylacines (Tasmanian Tigers) which are thought to have become extinct possibly 5000 years ago on mainland Australia.
The next day we visited the other large art gallery site in the Kakadu area – Nourlangie. This site, like Ubirr, has multiple galleries with spectacular examples of colourful X-Ray art some of which are quite recent (1960’s). There are also images of Namarrgon (Lightning Man) who creates lightning and thunder, a big part of the violent wet season storms. Namarrgon is supposed to live in the cliffs which we see as the Arnhem Land escarpment feature to the east. An image of a sailing ship from the 1800’s is interesting as the ocean is over 50kms to the north so the artist came a long way to pass on the knowledge (or warning) of the white man.
Nourlangie and nearby Nawurlandja lookouts gave us the opportunity to take some actual people shots.
The following day we had an early start to do a Yellow Waters Boat Cruise starting at sunrise. This was an amazing boat ride in the wetland getting up close to the wildlife (crocs), birds and vegetation. We watched a cormorant catch a fish and then a sea eagle come down hoping to steal it. At the end of the boat ride we finally caught up with “Brutus” the largest male croc living in these wetlands.
In the afternoon a number of us made the 6km trek across savannah woodlands, paperbark forests and monsoon thickets to Kubara Pools. Just before the pools we came across a croc trap used by Park Rangers to see if there are any crocs in the area at the end of the wet season before they allow tourists to venture into the pools.
The next day we left the Kakadu NP and headed east to the Litchfield NP staying in the nearby town of Batchelor. On the way we stopped at the Berry Springs pools for a swim.
On our first day in Litchfield we broke into two groups. One did short walks and visited an old abandoned tin mine. A small group set off to do the Tabletop Walk, 16kms from Walkers Creek to Florence Falls. The TableTop Walk takes you across a wide variety of terrains from rocky valleys to stands of silver cycads (endemic to this part of the world), bushes covered in green ants and then the real surprise – flowing creeks with lush vegetation. The flowing creeks were not expected as the terrain first appears bone dry. Our walk leader informed us that all of the creeks get their water from springs. The region gets over 2m of rain in the wet season soaking into the sandstone geology and emerging as springs in the dry season. For the hot and weary walkers these creeks were quite a reprieve. We rejoined our group at Florence Falls and shared the waterfalls and giant pool with dozens of tourists.
On our final day we made a number of stops at local landmarks including Tjateba Falls, Tolmar Falls, Termite Mounds and finally a swim at Wangi Falls. All the falls are impressive when you consider it hasn’t rained in months and all of the water comes from local springs. In the wet season I’m informed the falls are a huge sheet of water cascading down into the pools.
Two types of termites are at work in this area. One species lives above ground in the mounds all oriented in the same direction to minimize the effects of the hot sun. The other species lives in what is called a ‘cathedral’ mound and can move underground to escape the summer heat.
The camp ended with a group dinner in Batchelor. Thanks again to Denise and Gavin for leading this camp and keeping us occupied with activities each day. A final picture of two sisters whose smiles sum up how much we all enjoyed this camp.
