16 August - Yellow Waters Sunrise Cruise, Warradjan Aboriginal Cultural Centre, Mirral Lookout, Anbangbang Billabong and Nanguluwur Rock Art; Kakadu National Park

16 August 2016 – 182 785

Yellow Waters Sunrise Cruise, Warradjan Aboriginal Cultural Centre, Mirral Lookout, Anbangbang Billabong and Nanguluwur Rock Art; Kakadu National Park

This morning we woke early and headed to Yellow Waters for a Sunrise Cruise. https://parksaustralia.gov.au/kakadu/do/tours/yellow-water-cruises/ This was beautiful, both for scenery and wildlife.  This was a two-hour cruise and in addition to many many saltwater crocodiles (many females and one large male) we saw many different types of birds, a feral pig and an Indonesian water buffalo, as well as the various habitats that make up the South Alligator River and its floodplains.  This is difficult to adequately describe, like most spots in Kakadu there is just something grand and peaceful, timeless and special and humbling about it. We also were fortunate enough to see “Jesus bird” chicks that were about one week old – very cute! 

 

We discovered on the cruise that a buffet breakfast at Cooinda Lodge was included – so we had an unusually large and delicious morning tea, as by this time it was 9:30am and we had been up since 5:00.  http://www.kakadutourism.com/accommodation/cooinda-lodge/  

Next, we headed to Warradjan Aboriginal Cultural Centre to explore the displays there. http://www.kakadutourism.com/tours-activities/warradjan-cultural-centre/

Mirral Lookout was a solid walk uphill for 1km to reach a sheltered lookout that allowed us to look around through 360 degrees. https://parksaustralia.gov.au/kakadu/do/walks/mirrai-lookout-walk/ We then continued onto Anbangbang Billabong where we walked the 2.5km loop and again saw crocodiles.https://parksaustralia.gov.au/kakadu/do/walks/anbangbang-billabong-walk/  Last walk for the day was Nanguluwur Rock Art walk.  This was 1.7km walk each way along an old road and then a 200m climb up to the art area – the art was great!  This was an extremely hot walk.  To finish the day, we went into Jabiru and had a swim to cool ourselves down.  I think we were all exhausted, it had been a long and hot day – it was still 38 degrees at 5:45pm.

15 August - Nourlangie Region, Kakadu National Park

15 August 2016 – 182 666

Nourlangie Region, Kakadu National Park

We all settled in for a good night’s sleep, as there were very few bugs.  Unfortunately, another caravan pulled up extremely close to us just before dark – they came in so fast and close to our van, I thought Drew and I might lose our bed end. This female couple decided to have a screaming match (one screamed and the other whined and cried) at 2:30am in the morning, that escalated into domestic violence.  Drew phoned the police about 4:30am when things became physical and they hadn’t settled in response to his bellows, however they continued until they left at 7am.  After a very tiring and stressful night (with Hayden sharing our bed for our mutual reassurance), we headed for the Bowali Visitor Centre to find out about booking a Yellow Waters sunrise cruise. They do not do bookings, however the lady gave me the phone number and we were able to make a booking for tomorrow. 

Burrungkuy (Nourlangie) Rock Art Sight was our next stop for a Ranger- guided rock art talk.  These activities are included in the Kakadu Park Pass – this particular activity was scheduled for two hours but took closer to three and was amazing!!  Our Ranger guide was “Rachel” and she did the talk in three sections, one section on the escarpment and how this related to the dreaming creation stories, one section on the skin system (which has guaranteed no more than 1/64^th common blood between couples, and maintained the genetic variance in small groups), and one section on the archaeology done at a shelter site, showing continuous occupation in that particular shelter for 20 000 years (including three major climatic changes and one ice age).  This talk was great and worth the cost of the park pass on its own. 

We had planned after this to go to a session on traditional weaving, however we were all exhausted from our very early start.  After lunch, we all had a sleep and I had a great deal of difficulty waking up.  We spent some of the afternoon chatting to a Danish family camped near us, and the boys played Lego – the universal language of boys, that needs no translation.  I cooked up some dinner to have as a picnic and we headed to Namurlandja for another Ranger guided walk with Rachel – this time talking about Anbangbang Billabaong and its connection with the escarpment country. At the billabong, we saw Jabiru, magpie geese and a crocodile. The magpie geese are very noisy. We then climbed up onto a sandstone outlier to watch the sunset change the colours of the escarpment while we ate our picnic dinner.  The view was beautiful!