After a brief stop at the information centre (for water mainly!) we went to our first stop in Ubirr to do some croc spotting (LOADS at Cahills Crossing), bat waking (not on purpose), see some aboriginal wall paintings (strangely the first we’d seen!) and sunset viewing from the most Northerly point in Ubirr, great start.
The next day we set out early, literally a get-up and drive start to the day to join a bird watching tour (yes, bird watching!). It was free and a good way to see some things that we would otherwise miss and we are glad we did. It was not only the twitcher (someone well-known in the international bird watching world apparently!) taking us round but we were also accompanied by one of the parks interpretive rangers. For us, the birds were so-so – we didn’t have binos and didn’t really know what we were looking at (bird wise) but it was a nice walk. What really made it for us though were the talks from the ranger when we passed certain sites of interest.
He had a great knowledge of the land and aboriginal culture it was great to see and hear from someone so passionate and so obviously involved in the aboriginal community. He really made the walk for us.
The afternoon we headed to a swimming hole, and then headed out of Kakadu, to find our first free camping spot of the trip. This was at the turn-off to Edith Falls. It was basically a plot of land that people hole up in, great for what we wanted!
End thoughts on Kakadu: Nice NP, very big, but unless you have a 4wd the best spots are inaccessible, even some of the campgrounds are off limits which is a shame. On the plus side though, the crocs were great, the views of the billabongs were amazing, and the aboriginal artworks were well preserved. I think however it changes quite drastically in the wet season, less yellow and orange, and a lot more green! We preferred Litchfield (that we did on our first visit to Darwin last year) over Kakadu, as there was more to do with a 2wd, and there was a few more water holes that we could use there. But overall, Kakadu was nice and different!
