Emugalan

We are staying at 'The Rapids' in Katherine.

‘The Rapids’ is a camping ground on a 600-acre private property/hobby farm, which has its boundary on the Katherine River. Camping is $15 per night unpowered. Campsites are spread out, but unlike Curraghmore Station, they are not actually on the river.

We set up camp, then walked to what the owners call ‘The Beach’. The Katherine River is a huge river which floods every year, and it was a long walk down a hill, through overhanging bushes and dunes and sandy tracks to get to the water.

The river was not fast flowing in this section and looked a bit dark and crocy and not at all appealing, so I don’t think we will be swimming here, although apparently it is safe to swim and the owners swim there. There was the standard crocodile warning sign on the gate at the property.

The campground has Happy Hour at 5pm every night, so we drove the 3 and a half kms to the house and chatted to other campers around the campfire before coming back for dinner.

Sunday was a rest and relaxation day. Did 3 loads of washing which dried within the hour. Theo did a maintenance job on the car, then we drove further down on the property to look at the rapids, after which the property was named. This is a much nicer section of the river, but the water was flowing too fast to swim.

Sunday Happy Hour is a shared a camp oven/damper dinner which owner Alysia and her husband Marcus put on for the guests. Cost is $20 per person. There were about 18 people there. Alysia cooked 2 huge camp ovens, one of pork and the other curried sausages plus some rice and damper and there was plenty for everyone and heaps left over.

Marcus is a songwriter/poet and plays the guitar. He sang a few songs and told some stories of his earlier days in the area. He is 60 and a builder, Alysia is 40 a teacher with School of the Air in Katherine, and they have 2 kids 17 and 14. They have been advertising their property on WikiCamps for 3 years and have been getting great reviews.

Monday morning, we decided to drive back to Beswick (also known as Wugularr) on the Central Arnhem Road to look at the art gallery. It took us about an hour and a half, about 118kms to get there, all on good, sealed road, although there were a couple of sections with road works which held us up. Beswick is the end of the bitumen road before the dirt and corrugations begin. It is a small community of about 500 people.

We were just in time for a guided tour by Travis (aka ‘Long Grass’) of the art gallery, with some beautiful pieces of art on the wall. It even has the didgeridoo that was played for Queen Elizabeth when she visited.

We then went to the shop where local art is for sale. Our tour guide, Travis had a small painting and also some painted clapping sticks that he had done. His art mentor, an elder called Tango had painted a didgeridoo, and we got him to explain the pictures to us and he allowed us to take his photo.

Dave, the overseer of the art gallery and shop played a short piece on the didgeridoo for us, as Tango, the maker of the didgeridoo does not 'blow', which is the word used for playing the instrument. Women are not allowed to use or touch the didgeridoo, but what we do once we pay for it is our business.

We were pleased that we had purchased some art directly from the artists of Arnhem Land. It was bubble wrapped for safe travel, and now we will find a safe place to transport them home.Read more