The incessant whine of mosquitoes started to get very annoying during the night, but at least they were on the other side of the tent mesh and we were safely out of their reach. They’d already had a good feed when we reached camp at Alligator Billabong last night and found that we had the place to ourselves, so stripped off and solar showered to cool down. Unfortunately we forget to take the mosquitoes into account and Anne managed to accumulate several dozen bites on her bum (let me know if I’m oversharing). However, I think we got off lightly yesterday as we’ve been swarmed tonight. I suppose we should have realised it would be bad, being as we’re camped right next to a tropical wetland, but we’ve never encountered such numbers before and our Bushman spray and 50% DEET stuff from the UK seem little deterrent. What was to be a refreshing shower at the camp ground after a sweltering day soon turned into a race to get covered before you collected too many more bites. Bring back the subzero temperature of the Red Centre.
Today we saw two of the things for which Kakadu is rightly famous, wetland and rock art. A viewing platform at Manukala allows you to look out over the floodplain of the South Alligator River, one of the three major waterways that drain the Kakadu basin. Even in the dry season the place is a lush oasis stretching out as far as the eye can see, with slender white water fowl picking their way amongst the lily pads
and flocks of “squawky birds” (Anne’s description, not mine) flying formation overhead.
A swamp hen sat in a tree a couple of feet away from the platform
and a guillemot came in to land and dry its wings. Twitcher heaven.
The second main attraction in the park is the Aboriginal rock art, and after completing the Bardedjilidji walk around some sandstone outcrops
we made our way to Ubirr, one of the two main sites (the other being Naurangie which we’ll visit tomorrow). The earliest art dates back as far as 50000 years and takes the form of direct prints of hands and objects, simple portrayals of animals and stick figures.
During the so called Estuarine Period (8000 to 2000 BP), x-ray art became established along with the Yam Figure Style (in which images of yams were incorporated into human forms) and a variety of other human figures were also drawn.
The Freshwater Period followed, reflecting the changing landscape and food availability as sediments choked the mangroves and allowed freshwater floodplains to develop.
Magpie geese were painted in X-ray style, and depictions of interactions with the first white traders and settlers also appeared. The last known painting was completed in 1986 as most new work is done on bark, paper or canvas rather than rock (the cynic would say they are easier to sell than a cliff face, but it’s probably more to do with ease, accessibility and security).
Climbing above the art sites at Ubirr brings you out on the top of the rocky outlier, with superb views over the brilliant green Nadab floodplain.
It’s a perfect spot to watch the sun set (as long as you ignore the hundred other tourists and their varied conversations, including the detailed reasons why Nigel, which seems a strange name for an Australian child, couldn’t climb down to the edge where we were sitting). SPOT
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