May 29th, 2016

Day 61: Kakadu

Our alarm went off at 4:45AM in the morning, as we had booked a sunrise cruise on the Yellow Water Billabong. Given our rain shower/mosquito adventure from the night before, we woke up exhausted, clammy, and itchy from the one damn mosquito we missed. We gathered up our damp tent, threw it in the car, and drove (carefully!) in the pre-dawn darkness to our meeting spot.

Even with red eyes (too dry & irritated for contacts), and discomfort from the high humidity and active mosquitoes (they didn’t stop at daylight!), we still enjoyed the cruise – the sunrise was so stunning, it completely distracted us. And the crocs! From almost the moment our boat shoved off, and huge male croc (named Max) started following our boat and seemed to stalk us for most of the trip. The tour guide told us a bit about croc behavior, and said crocs are very patient and observant hunters. Most likely Max was so used to people getting in and out of boats, he’s waiting for an opportunity when someone slips getting on or off.

Sunrise over the Yellow Water Billabong – home to Max the Saltwater Crocodile

Beautiful river scenery

This cruise was full of bird-lovers – other passengers kept pointing out “blue-breasted so-and-so” and “honey-eating something-or-other” even before the guide found them. This one’s a goose. That’s all I got.

Max the croc keeping close tabs on us all along the river

After the billabong cruise, we stopped over at the Bowali Visitor’s Center to finally pay our park entrance fee (AUD$40pp – not a cheap park!) and ask the ranger if there were any other camping spots in the park with a less viscous mosquitos population. She said no – due to all the billabongs, there are mosquitos everywhere and the only spray that seems to work is Bushman’s 80% DEET, but warned us that the spray would also peel the paint off of a truck. We picked up a bottle later that day, but decided to finish sigh-seeing and get the hell out of the park before sunset.

80% DEET. Death by mosquito, or death by cancer?

We passed by Jabiru and headed up to see the Aboriginal rock art at Ubirr. The rock art is very well preserved, and there were signs interpreting the Dreamtime Stories the figures depicted. After reading through several of them, we realized that the Aboriginal stories are all very harsh. In one story, a guy steals someone’s fish – he gets killed. In another story, a kid eats something during the wrong ceremonial time – he dies. It seems that no matter how petty the crime, in the Aboriginal stories the punishment is always DEATH. Either that, or the rock art just depicts a big animal some hunter bagged, and wants to brag about for eternity.

The punishment will always outweigh the crime. Moral of every story: don’t do anything bad or you will DIE

These guys just want to show off the big turtle they caught

Ubirr Rock Lookout – view of the floodplains, already dry for the season

We made one last quick stop at the Mamukala Wetlands where there is a hide for more birdwatching, before making the long trek down the Arnhem Highway toward Bachelor – the gateway to Litchfield National Park. We were closing in on sunset as we reached Bachelor, so we stopped at the Bachelor Holiday Park for our last night of camping. We couldn’t ask for a better campground – washer & dryer, a toaster, and even bird-feeding! We finished off our final avocados (on *toasted* bread – how fancy!) and a bottle of our favorite Chilean wine, and crawled into our tent for the last time. The sky was clear, the stars were bright overhead, so we once again ran the risk of sleeping without the fly. Remember that bit…it will be relevant for what happens next…