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Showing posts with label Top End Tour. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Top End Tour. Show all posts
Saturday 5 May 2007
Burning the Bush
When driving around the topend we've notice lots of bush fires. Interestingly these aren't wild fires but set very deliberately. Aboriginies have burnt the bust each year for thousands of years to make the land more passable, make hunting easier, and prevent wild fires at a later stage. The Australians continue this practice now in the top end.
Uranium Mines
In the northeast of Kakadu is a large uranium mine. It's got some of the largest deposits of uranium in the world. The radiation effects of the uranium in ore form are not so obvious unless several generations of people end up living here. We went to see some rock art at Nourlangie Rock in Kakadu and interestingly some of the paintings showed people with swolen joints - one of the symptoms of the radiation poisioning here!
Tuesday 1 May 2007
Didgeridoos
We all got to try out some Didgeridoos on our last morning in Kakadu. It was tricky to get the right sound out of it. Harder still was getting the hang of "circular breathing" - breathing out with your mouth and in through your nose at the same time. It allows you to keep making the sound without taking a break. I didn't quite get the hang of it yet, but I had fun trying.
Aboriginal Spears
The campsite we stayed in on our last night was run by an Aboriginal man called Johnny - Although he has now gotten himself the nickname of "Hollywood" because of his recent appearances on Animal Planet. He was quite a character and a great story teller. He spent some time showing us how to throw an aboriginal spear. Slightly different to a normal spear, it has an extra bit at the throwing end similar to a sling - it allows you get more power into it. Here's Nici trying to throw under Johnny's instruction ...
"The Castle"
We did a nice hill climb in Kakadu up a hill they call "The Castle". There's nothing particularly amazing about it, but at the same time I really liked it. Kakadu is full of places like this. I think you could spend years in the park exploring. There was also some rock art on the way up.
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| From Australia, To... |
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| From Australia, To... |
Rock Art
The Aborigines have been in Australia for 20,000 years and they've been painting for just as long. We were shown a few rock art sites. The ones at Nourlangie rock were particularly nice. Some were used for decoration, some tell stories, but interestingly they were also used for education. Some of the pictures of the Kangaroos for example so their insides and colour code their muscles to show what the tastiest parts were.
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Beware of Croc Signs
The beware of crocodile signs are everywhere now in Kakadu. Ever since a German woman was taken by a saltwater crocodile in 2002 the rangers decided to put these signs everywhere regardless of whether it was possible for a croc to come into the pool or not. We simply took the advice of our guide as to whether to swim or not. It felt pretty adventurous swimming in a pool with a "Beware of Crocodiles" sign beside it.
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Katherine Gorge
This was a little bit of a disappointment. Katherine gorge is marked as a "Must See" in Australia, but it didn't seem that way. We got ferried down 2 of the 12 (?) gorges over the course of 2 hours. It was okay. It think if I was back there I'd like to do the 66km gorge walk that takes you through all the gorges along the rim on foot. Still, despite my complaining it did look nice in parts.
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Rock Holes
Every day we'd find a rock hole to go swimming in. Our guide knew all the good, safe rock holes. They're were a really welcome break from the heat here. Most had a waterfall too. There was one where you'd swim over to the waterfall and sit under it - the water was so strong you'd get a lovely massage.
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| From Australia, To... |
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Termite Mounds
You'll see termite mounds everywhere here in norther territory. Some grow to be over twice my height. The "Magnetic Mounds" all line up in a north south direction in order to avoid the hottest sun. They're quite a strange sight to see.
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Croc Cruise
One of our first stops on our top end tour was to Adelaide river to see the saltwater crocodiles that they had there. The saltwater crocs are the dangerous ones and there's over 4000 in this river. The guide drove around the river feeding them for us to see. Pretty amazing to see how agressive they get sometimes, and these were only the female crocs. The two male crocs in this stretch of river didn't come out for us, but they're supposed to be way bigger. (One of them is called Hannibal, I found it quite funny). Here's just a few shots of them below ...
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| From Australia, To... |
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| From Australia, To... |
Top end Touring 21st-24th April 2007
After a few days of settling into Australia we headed off on a tour of Litchfield, Katherine and Kakadu. Plenty of climbing, swimming, crocs, Aboriginal culture, etc. There was a group of 9 plus a tour guide - lots of fun :-)
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