We left Victoria River, and a couple of hours later saw us in Katherine, where we refuelled both car and bodies (read – coffee in Maccas) and pointed the car north on the Stuart Highway to find somewhere to stop for the night.
By chance we thought we’d have a look at Edith Falls (or
Leliyn, it’s Aboriginal name), just a half hour or so from Katherine. What a little gem of a place this turned out
to be. It was a beautiful grassy
campground, next to the Edith River, and a bit of a swim took you across the
river to the lovely waterfall at the bottom.
As we were arriving, we were met by a loud shout of “hello” from a
familiar face. We first met Murray and
Julia at Mornington several weeks ago, and had shared a drink or two with them
during our stay there. They’re a nice
couple from Perth who are doing a similar trip to us. Over the following weeks we have run into
them at about half a dozen different places, always unexpectedly, but it’s
always good to catch up with them and find out where they’ve been in the
meantime.
Edith Falls lies within the boundary of the Nitmiluk
National Park, which also boasts the famous Katherine Gorge, but its right up
on the northern boundary. Being so late
in the dry season, a lot of the top end is burning, with wildfires sending
plumes of smoke up right along the roads we have recently been travelling. The fires are not the devastating fires of
southern states, but rather they seem to lazily trickle across the landscape
and nobody seems tremendously bothered by them.
There was smoke as we entered the campground at Edith Falls from over
the next ridge, but the ranger didn’t seem worried, so we set up camp and went
off for a swim.
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| Smoke on the horizon at Edith Falls |
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| The upper pool, complete with smoke haze |
After dinner, as night fell, the smoke got thicker and
thicker, until you would swear a thick fog had descended on camp. It was warm, so all the windows had to be
open on the camper, but the smell of smoke made for a very uncomfortable night
and we woke with sore throats in the morning.
We were heading further north the next morning, but decided
to take in the lovely 3km walk to the upper falls before we left. We had thought about staying another day at
this lovely spot, but the smoke from the nearby fire changed our minds. We also
thought it was also a good idea to walk before the heat of the day really set
it. So we headed off early, and found
the track good going – not the rock scrambling of the walks we had done in the
Kimberley. Half way round the loop over
the top of the escarpment you could get a cooling swim in the top falls, before
making the walk back down. We got back
in time to pack up the camper, have a final swim in the river to cool down and
then we set off north again.
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| Cooling off in the Edith River |
We didn’t go too far, turning left and heading for the
Douglas Daly region, to investigate the Douglas Daly Hot Springs. We found the campground to be dry and dusty
so the caravan park outside the national park was home for the night, and it
also allowed us to celebrate our “almost anniversary” with a dinner of local
barramundi and a bottle of their “finest” wine.
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| Anniversary dinner at Douglas Daly |
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| Very popular apparently |
We were excited the next day to be heading to Litchfield
National Park, which was one of the places we were looking forward to
exploring. Coming from the Daly River
region, we entered the park from the southern boundary and followed the
Reynolds River Track north for 45km. The
original plan was to camp in one of the campsites in the southern section of
the park, but because it was late in the season, the park was quiet, so we took
ourselves up to camp at Wangi Falls.
Normally this place is heaving, but we were pleasantly surprised, and with
the lower waterfall at Surprise Creek just a trickle, we made good use of the
plunge pool at Wangi Falls.
The journey up the Reynolds Track was mostly an easy drive,
but there were a couple of river crossings that were interesting. One in particular was a bit deeper than we
thought (of course, you can’t get out to walk the crossing first cause the river
is full of big lizards with sharp teeth that would like to eat you). The crossing was also complicated by the exit
being round an “S” bend in the river, so we were driving through this crocodile
infested water, not really knowing how we were going to get out. We made it without a drama, but it had the
heart rate up a bit, I can tell you.
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| Crossing the Reynolds River - exit somewhere in the distance! |
The track up through the lower section of the park also gave
us plenty of opportunity to view the magnetic termite mounds that are
supposedly only found in this area. The clever
little creatures orientate their huge nests in a north-south direction so that
they are able to minimise the heat from the sun hitting the sides of the mound,
therefore controlling the internal temperature.
Nobody exactly knows how they know where north is, but all these
particular type of mounds that we saw were all facing the same direction.
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| Magnetic termite mounds |
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| A cathedral termite mound - there were bigger than this!! |
The next day we set off early (again to escape the worst of
the heat) to explore the Lost City. This
is an area in the park with rocky outcrops that have weathered over centuries,
to form towers, which look like towering buildings (if you use your
imagination). What a fascinating walk.
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| Doug lost in the Lost City |
After the Lost City, we felt in need of a cool down, so
headed off to explore Florence Falls.
The 1.5km walk into the falls was through beautiful, shady rainforest,
and walking was cool and easy along a formed pathway. When we got to the plunge pool at the bottom
of the falls we were blown away. We had
thought the pool at Wangi Falls was lovely, but this was even better. Although there were a few others there, the
place really wasn’t busy, and we quickly stripped off and jumped in. We tried to swim over to the falls, but the
force of the water coming down made for very strong currents, and swimming was
hard going, so we were content to float around in the beautiful blue-green
water and take in the view of the cliff towering above us.
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| Looking down at Florence Falls plunge pool |
Buley Rockhole was only a short drive up the road from
Florence Falls, and we headed there next.
It couldn’t be any better, could it?
Yes, it could. The river flowing
down in the wet season has, over time, created a series of rock pools, which in
the dry season, make wonderful places to cool off. Again, not that busy, so we got a pool to
ourselves to enjoy the cool, cascading waters.
This is my favourite spot in all of Litchfield. We drove out to the small town of Batchelor
after our swim and found a lovely little spot for lunch.
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| My favourite - Buley Rockhole |
Our next day at Litchfield saw us heading back down the
Reynolds River Track to visit Tjaynera Falls.
We took off early again, but not early enough to beat the swarms of
march flies that were waiting for us when we got out of the car. Thankfully we had some really good insect repellent
(made for horses, so it works a treat), so the little buggers enjoying flying
round us, but didn’t much like landing.
The 2.5km walk into the falls took us about half an hour, and we were
hot and sweaty when we arrived. Look
what we had to ourselves!!!
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| Tjaynera Falls all to ourselves |
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| I wish these march flies would bugger off! |
Peace was shattered after about half an hour though, as two
families arrived with their hundreds of kids, so we knew it was time to move
on. We visited Blyth Homestead on the
way back to camp, which was abandoned only as recently as 1951. They certainly did it tough then. The family had 13 children, who were all
expected to work on the property from an early age, which included working in
the tin mine, not far from the homestead.
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| Blyth Homestead |
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| Another arty-farty shot |
Our last afternoon at Litchfield was spent back at Wangi
Falls, alternately swimming and lying on the grass in the shade reading our
books. I know it’s hot and humid, and I
know the ground is dry and dusty, but the lack of crowds at places that we
expected to be busy almost makes up for it.
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| Wangi Falls - again all to ourselves early in the morning |
Pack up morning (Friday) came and as I do on pack up
mornings, I got excited about moving onto the next place. I was up early and busy getting things
stashed away. It is also easier to do
before the heat and humidity set in. We
were on the road by 8am, and heading up the back road towards Berry
Springs. We passed through this lovely
area, and before we knew it, we had arrived on the outskirts of Darwin.
There’s no bush camping anywhere in Darwin (as there’s not
in most capital cities I guess), so we set out to find a caravan park. Darwin, as we have found out, has the highest
cost of living of any city in Australia, and that extended to the cost of
caravan park sites. After trawling
through Wikicamps, and having a look at a few, we threw caution to the wind,
and chose the most expensive of the lot, but also the nicest. And we’ve enjoyed our time in this lovely
park, with shady trees, grass underfoot and a pool to cool off in if we need
it.
Darwin also meant that we could collect our anniversary gift
to ourselves (with a contribution from Doug’s mum and dad). We had decided along the tracks that we would
very much like a little Weber BBQ, and had phoned ahead and ordered one to
collect when we got to Darwin. We have
several friends with one, and they seem to be able to use it for all sorts of
things. So far, we’ve had three from
three successes with our experiments, and are very happy with our
purchase. There was a bit of rearranging
of our gear to fit it in, but all’s good.
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| Christening the Weber |
So we’ve had four lovely days in Darwin, and set about
ticking off all the things on the list that we wanted to see. The weather has been hot and humid, but it hasn’t
been too bad. The nights are warmer now
though, with temperatures not dropping below 20 degrees. The poor little 3-way fridge in the camper is
having a hard job, but still chugging away.
Darwin has fabulous markets, and we’ve taken in four of them
during our stay; from interesting fruit and veg markets with all sorts of
different looking produce, to arts and craft markets and the famous Mindle
Beach Sunset market. Love a good
market!!!
We’ve also visited the Military Museum, and learned about
the defence of Darwin during the WW2 bombings, and the cyclone Tracey exhibit
at the NT Museum was mind-blowing. We
were lucky enough, quite by chance, to be chatting to an old man who was born
in Darwin, and had seen the city destroyed twice in his life time – once by the
bombs of 1942 and again by Cyclone Tracey in 1974. The changes that he must have seen over time!
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| Now redundant guns defending Darwin |
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| Oil storage tunnels under Darwin |
Darwin is a quiet city by our standards. We were in the city centre this morning, at
8.30am, and it was relatively deserted.
Just a few people here and there – nothing like the grid-lock of a
Melbourne peak hour. And it’s a very
laid-back kind of place too. We found
that out today when our car was in at Landrover to get a couple of issues
looked at. Nothing moves fast in the
Territory – certainly not parts needed for a repair. Looks like we’re going to have to come back
next week after our visit to Kakadu.
So it’s 8pm now and it’s still 28 degrees. Pack up day tomorrow, and although I’m
excited to be moving on to somewhere new, this time I’m sorry to be leaving our
lovely caravan park. Never thought I
would say that!!!
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