Kakadu

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One of the highlights of our trip to Australia was the Kakadu National Park. It is the biggest national park of Australia and at just under 20,000 km2 is 2/3 the size of Belgium.

Amazing nature in Kakadu

We rented a camper van, another first, for the 4 nights/5 days we were going to spend in Kakadu and Litchfield.

Lunch outside our Camper Van

Back in Belgium it seemed a very good idea, but as we were getting all the explanations about the camper an it all sounded complicated: recharge auxiliary battery, waste water, toilet outlet, awning cover, etc etc... How were we going to remember all of this? 

Anyway we took this leap of faith and drive off into the Australian wilderness. First stop was Cooinda where we parked our van and set everything up. 

The nest morning we woke up at 6am to be on time for the Yellow River sunrise cruise. It was superb. We cruised down the billabong and river and saw a dozen crocodiles (all salties*) and hundreds of birds. 

A large "saltie" swimming next to our boat
The ranger was fantastic delivering precise explanations with a lot of humour too. After the cruise we went back to our camp where a solid breakfast awaited. 

Then later we set off towards Jabiru. After setting ourselves up we drove to Ubirr to see some spectacular rock art. Kakadu national park has more than 5000 rock art sites and Ubirr is a major one. 

Spectacular view of the park from atop this rock

The aboriginal or original land owners or First Nation people in Australia are thought to have walked from Papua New Guinea some 65,000 years ago when sea level were lower. 

They are quite possibly the oldest continually surviving culture in the world. 

Again the explanations from the ranger were top notch. Then we climbed up to the top of a huge rock formation overlooking park and made ourselves comfortable for sunset. It was awesome. 

The following day we went to another cruise on East Alligator river. There were no alligators as this animal only resides in the Americas! But we saw many crocodiles, more than 30 of them. The guide said that they had surveyed close to 3,000 of them last in that river!

A concert in our camp site

After all this we went to Litchfield which is smaller and less grand as compared to Kakadu. The main attraction there were the water holes. But considering we were all nursing colds, and the fact that we still didn't want to encounter The odd crocodile we skipped those water holes. Instead we went to berry springs where the water was warmer and where we hoped the risk of swimming with those reptiles was close to non existent. 

We drove back to drop our camper van, grateful that nothing happened and our heads full with lifetime souvenirs.



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