Our Travels

The falls at Gunlom were not very spectacular as there wasn’t a lot of water coming over them. There was a very steep, quite difficult climb to get to the top of the falls so Terry decided to do it. He took some photos and said the view was amazing. At the top there are a series of pools that are clear and good for swimming even though they can be tricky to get in and out of.

The water pools at the top of Gunlom Falls

The view from the top of Gunlom Falls was spectacular particularly when you are in the pool looking over the edge

I spent the time sewing and relaxing and we had lunch when he got back. We went down to the pool at the bottom of the falls for a swim later in the afternoon. Once again it was a quilt night – we even had a fire.

We hadn’t originally intended to go to Kakadu National Park because it involved a fair amount of back tracking but some people we spoke to at Katherine had highly recommended Gunlom Falls. On the way we stopped at Pine Creek for lunch and also Terry wanted to check out the Railway Museum there but it was a public holiday and it was closed. Before getting to Pine Creek we were slowed down by the road being partly closed as they tried to recover a truck with four trailers that had rolled onto its side in the ditch at the side of the road. Later, driving in to Gunlom we passed a Prado with a camper trailer being recovered. It had swerved to miss a buffalo and rolled over.

We arrived at Gunlom around 4.30pm and as it started to get dark the temperature dropped causing us to use the quilt on our bed – something we hadn’t needed to do until now.

Today we needed to catch up on some washing so decided to go down to the waterfront after lunch to spend some time in the wave pool before going on our sunset dinner cruise.

Wave Pool – Darwin Harbour

After about an hour in the wave pool we drove around to the wharf to go on our sunset dinner cruise. WOW! It was amazing.

Sunset Cruise – Darwin Harbour

We were at the back of the boat with a group of six people and we had a waiter between the eight of us. We had a four course meal, a bottle of wine and a magnificent sunset over the ocean. It was a perfect ending to the day.

Today we had to drop the car off to be serviced so we caught the bus into town. Once again we went walking to take in the sights we missed yesterday. We stopped at the tree of knowledge which is all that is left of what used to be Chinatown. The Chinese Temple and museum was very interesting and gave some insight into the contribution of the Chinese people to the development of Darwin. We walked the length of the Esplanade taking in places of interest along the way and then stopped for lunch. By this time we were hot and tired from a day and a half of walking so we took in a movie before catching a bus back to pick up the car.

We drove into Darwin and found a parking spot right in front of the ruins of the old town hall. We found a place for lunch and then went for a walk down to the waterfront. There is a wave pool, a small beach area, hotels and shops as well as the wharf from which you can get cruises. We walked around the harbour and saw the boat we booked for our sunset cruise on Saturday and then headed back to town. We walked past the WW11 oil storage tunnels and climbed the stairs to the survivors’ lookout. From there we looped around past Government House, Parliament House and the Supreme Court Building.

Parliament House – Darwin

Government House – Darwin

After inspecting a few other things around Darwin City within walking distance we took the car out to the Art Gallery and Museum.

We saw a stuffed crocodile named Sweetheart and watched a short video about him before exploring the rest of the museum. They have one section of the museum dedicated to stories and records of cyclone Tracy. It was very interesting.

From there we went to the Mindil Beach Sunset Markets. WOW! They are held every Thursday and Sunday night throughout the dry season. We have never seen so many people at a market. There must have been about 10,000 people at this market which had so many stalls selling all kinds of stuff.

Fire Juggling at Mindil Markets

Also there were people entertaining the crowds from musical groups, jugglers, whip crackers and aboriginal people playing and singing. The number of food vendors and the variety of foods available was also amazing.

Sunset at Mindil Beach Markets – Darwin

Terry went down onto the beach to take some sunset shots and said that the beach was just as crowded. It was certainly worth visiting.

Time to move on and head to the big smoke (actually Darwin quite small as cities go). We arrived just on lunch time but our first stop was a battery shop, the second battery in the trailer had died and the fridge was only running during the day on the solar panels. Battery World solved that problem and just down the road was a large shopping centre so it was HJs for lunch. After lunch it was time to find a caravan park to stay in, the guy at Battery world had suggested one at Lee Point, it turned out to be a fair way out of town towards the eastern side, so we were not keen and when we asked the rate we were even less keen ($55/night). Time to Google, there 2 not too far out of town near the Stuart Hwy which is the way we plan to leave town, one at $42 and the other at $45 both had no vacancies. This was a little concerning, they suggested another one in the same chain as the $45 one about 6kms further out of town. Nice large caravan park with quite a few spots available, again $55/night. Apparently it just for June & July so they can take advantage of all us southerners seeking a little warmth. We were able to talk them down to $48/night for 5 nights.

It’s taking a little to get use to the noise in a city again, we are about 800 mtrs of the highway but the traffic noise including many trucks is 24/7 then just to disrupt your sleep a little more we are around 6-7 kms from the airport and there is no curfew. Most nights we have about 3-4 large jets taking off and passing over the caravan park. Already we are looking forward to getting back into the bush to the peace and quiet.

Today we continued our exploration of Litchfield Park, there was a guided tour of an old tin mine scheduled for 10 am so we headed up to the northern end of the park to a place called Bamboo Creek. Again it was a clear demonstration of how tough the conditions were and how hard people worked to scrape out a living. They started in 1928 just by picking the tin ore off the surrounding hills, by the forties when demand picked up they started digging into the hills to follow the tin ore vein and built a crusher to process the ore on site.

Bamboo Creek Tin ore crusher

Every wet season they were totally isolated in very primitive conditions and most of the miners died in their 40s and early 50s from silicosis.

From there we went to a place called Walkers Creek, aptly named because there were 7 campsites there and each campsite was suitable for 1 or 2 tents and they ranged from 600 mtrs to 1.7 kms from the car park. You had to walk into your campsite carrying all you required.

Walkers Creek

We only checked the first site but it appeared that all campsites were at places where you could swim and the last one had what they call a plunge pool (a deep pool at the base of a waterfall).

The next place to check was the magnetic termites; all of their mounds are quite narrow and are aligned exactly north – south. They are only found in Australia and only live on the water logged black soils. Jacky thought they looked like grave stones. The largest mounds are made by the cathedral termites and their mounds grow over 5 mtrs.

Termite Mounds

It was getting pretty warm, certainly over 30⁰C and it was time for a swim. The first place we called at was Buley Rockhole, the sign in the car park was certainly an indicator, it said “If the car park is full, then the rock pool is overcrowded, try somewhere else”. There were a few spaces in the car park so we had a look, another magic spot, the creek flows down over a series of stepped waterfalls and into a smallish pool that was 4-5 mtrs deep and crystal clear.

Buley Rockhole

It was a little crowded so we headed off to Florence Falls. It was pretty hot and despite the 135 steps down to the waterfall Jacky was not about to back out.

Florence falls – Litchfield NP

Plunge pool below Florence Falls

Again another beautiful deep pool below two waterfalls, it was rockier than the others and a little difficult to get in and out of but the water was beautiful. After we cooled off and took a few photos we headed back to Wangi Falls for another swim and then to camp for tea. I tell you its hard work being on holidays in a place like this.

Our neighbours at Litchfield

A couple of the locals checking out our tea

Today was for exploring the park; we headed off down the Reynolds 4WD track which I had considered using as a route into the park but decided not to because of time constraints. This turned out to be a good decision because the 40 km track was closed 9 kms from the park end. We checked out the old Blyth homestead, though calling it a homestead was a little stretch on the imagination, it was a single room for both sleeping, eating and anything else.

Blyth Homestead – 1928

Apparently it was used by the eldest sons of the family that ran a nearby station for cattle mustering and tin mining when there was no cattle work. It certainly gave you an idea of the hardships endured to just to survive in this country in the 1930s & 40s.

From there we continued down to Sandy Creek falls (PC: Tjaynera Falls) and there was a 1.7 km hike to the falls, it took a little convincing to get Jacky into her bathers and onto the track. It was 11:45 and Jacky is regularly complaining that I attempt to initiate walks in the middle of the day. Anyway we headed off down this track looking for the falls and a place to swim, the track was like a goat track, we had to stop and step off the track at one point to allow another couple to pass. We finally reached the falls and what a sight, a massive pool with beautiful clear water and a huge 80 mtr waterfall into the pool.

Sandy Creek Falls – Litchfield NP

We swam right over to the falls and looked up to see the water cascading down. The water was cool and very refreshing and we would have stayed there nearly 2 hrs, in fact while I was busy taking photos Jacky just stayed in the water and even when it came time to go it was difficult to get Jacky out of the water.

Jacky at Sandy Creek Falls (Its time to go!!)

Sandy Creek Falls – note the young lady enjoying the afternoon sun to the right of the falls

By the time we got back on the road we were running out of time to do much more, we went to another falls that was just a lookout and then we decided to head back to camp to Wangi Falls for another swim, I just can’t seem to keep this lady out of the water. Who would have thought, Jacky wanting to swim in June.

Another pack up and travel day and we headed off into Katherine for a few supplies and then off up the Stuart Highway. Lunch was at Pine Creek, which offered a lot of historical interest but we were a little behind schedule so we made a note to call in on the way back from Darwin. Our destination was Wangi Falls in Litchfield National Park and I knew it was on the other side of the park from the highway about 60 kms from Batchelor. Driving into Litchfield National Park was a bit of an eye opener, I knew it was reasonably close to Darwin and quite popular but I did not expect bitumen roads 60 kms right into the actual camp ground. We arrived about 4:30 and were very fortunate to get the second last campsite available. Initially we were not too happy about it, they were compacted crushed stone and it was near impossible to drive pegs into the ground, however an hour or so later camp was set up and we headed down to the falls.

Wangi Falls Litchfield NP

The big advantage of the Wangi campgrounds is that they are about 500 mtrs from the falls and a swim in this big freshwater pool with the falls cascading in quickly made us forget about the rocky campsite

Yesterday while on the boat cruise they pointed out a lookout from where you can see the river and the gorge, it was still pretty warm when we got off the boat and Jacky was not keen so she agreed to do it first thing today. I think she may have been regretting that decision halfway up these steps

Climbing the stairs to the lookout

Mug shots at Katherine Gorge from the lookout

The view was pretty good although today was cloudy unlike yesterday

After that little bit of exercise we went into Katherine to check out the highlights, the Museum certainly was worthwhile, there was hours of information to be gained by reading all the history of the early pioneers and the World War II years. I certainly was not aware that the Katherine airport at the time was bombed by the Japanese.

Some thing you notice a lot up in the northern parts is the number of kites (bird of prey) there are 4 species of which the whistling kite is the most common. If there is road kill on the road its not crows having a feed, its kites. They are also attracted to any smoke small or large, they just circle waiting for small animals to run from the fire. The local story is that they are known to pick up burning embers, sticks etc and drop them in unburnt areas to flush out prey.

Kites circling the fire in Katherine

We did the circuit of town, we checked out the early crossing of the Katherine River (Knotts Crossing), from there we went out to Springvale Homestead, one of the more successful pioneer stations in Katherine but it was closed to the public and looked like it had been closed for some time. From there we crossed the Low Bridge, the first bridge over the river that is under water each wet season and back into town.

With not much else to see, we head back to camp and into the pool. About 5:30 I headed over for my lesson in Photoshop. They were in one of the small chalets and I left Jacky on the porch chatting with his wife while we sat in air-conditioned comfort and compared photos and went through the basics of Photoshop. There was one ground rule established early and that was the lesson ended at 7:00 sharp as that was when the footy started and he was a very passionate Essendon supporter and rarely missed a game.