Sunrise over Kakadu

Julie booked a Yellow Water sunrise cruise. Sounded good at the time until we worked out that we needed to leave the caravan at 5.30am and drive in the dark for 50km of national park road. And the overnight low was 23 degrees so our sleep was far from restful. But the cruise itself was well worth the early start.

The cruise was aimed at people wanting to see the wildlife and there was so much birdlife, fish life and of course crocs. We saw so many different types of birds and the birdwatchers on board were quite excited at some of the more rare feathered friends. The best story was about the Whistling kite which is also referred to as the "burning stick kite". When the locals do burn-offs of undergrowth the kite picks up a burning stick and flys to a new patch of undergrowth and drops the stick to set the grass on fire. Then it waits for all the small animals to race out of the fire and catches them. Very bright bird.

We managed to get close to a lot of crocs too. Not as big as the ones yesterday at Cahills but the safety talk on the boat did mention that these ones are big enough to kill a human. The last death in this area was 4 years back when a guy was taken off the back of his tinny. So we of course kept our arms well inside our boat.

We stopped for breakfast at the Cooinda resort then decided we really needed to burn off that food by climbing 1km up a hill to a lookout. Temperature was close on 30 by then so we really struggled as the track was in direct sun. After getting safely back to the car we went and checked out the local aboriginal rock art area as well. This was pretty good and was shaded which helped. We always take extra water as we drink so much of it in this heat.

A heap of green ants decided to choose our car to feed off. These ants are quite large and bite. They also have the ability to stay on the windscreen during 110km/hr winds! They did finally leave by the time we got back to camp.

On the way back to the caravan it was the 3rd milkshake and frappe in 3 days from the supermarket. The lady at the checkout also commented that the heat in the last few days is even hard on the locals. She said the weather was like it is in the lead up to the first rain of the season. So October and November they all wait eagerly for the first rain in December when the humidity drops and it gets better for them. Back to camp for a swim and relax after such an early start.もっと詳しく