11/8/11 Nourlangie Rock

To day we visited Nourlangie Rock with its famous aboriginal art sites and the adjoining beautiful Anbangbang wet land with its bird life and the fascinating rocky landscape at Nawurlandja Lookout where ancient river beds are exposed on the top of rock outcrops.

10/8/11 Ubirr

We watched the sun set across the flood plains from the rocks at Ubirr.  There were hundreds of other tourists there from Europe and Asia, many more than on our previous visit two years ago. We spent the night in Merl bush camp which is notorious for mosquitoes.  Our neighbouring caravaners gave us extra mosquito coils which we burnt all night, and which has the bedsheets and towels smell.

9/8/11 Shady Camp and Rockhole Billabong

Gerd has watched DVDs of people fishing for Barramundi at Shady Camp and wanted to visit.  It is an ugly camp site, and there were crocs sunning themselves along the river bank but there were a number of people fishing and we watched as they pulled in 60+cm catches

In the late afternoon we went on a boat ride at Rockhole Billabong.  It is a beautiful area full of red lotus lilies ...and crocs! They lie on the bank sunning themselves and gaze at you with their yellow eyes and toothy smiles.

We spent the night bush camping in nearby Couzens Lookout camping area.  We were the only ones there.  It was difficult to work out an appropriate address to put an on the census form we had picked up the previous day.

8/8/11 Jumping Crocodiles

After leaving Darwin we travelled to Fogg Dam to view the bird life in the wet land.

At the Adelaide River we went on the "Jumping Crocodiles" boat ride.  The crocs launch themselves out of the water to reach a piece of buffalo meat suspended on a string.  The prospect of swimming in that river had no attraction!

   

7/8/11 Around Darwin

Sunday in Darwin is market day.  First stop is  the market at Rapid Creek to buy fruit and vegetables, especially Asian greens and vegetables, which I cannot name, let alone cook. After that to the Nightcliff market to look at the crafts and clothing, and buy something to eat for lunch which is different to my home-style cooking. Finally late in the afternoon it is time to go to the Mindil Beach market to explore the crafts, and then select something exotic to eat while sitting on the beach watching the sunset.

In between markets we visited Aquascene  to feed bread to the wild fish, mainly large green milk fish, diamond scale mullet and catfish, that come in to this protected bay at the high tide.

Darwin has many reminders of WW2. We visited the structure that once housed a 9.2 inch gun intended to guard our northern shores.

The multicoloured sandstone of the  Dripstone Cliffs is one of Darwin's unadvertised delights for photographers.  They are best visited in the mid to late afternoon when the sun gives the red and yellow sandstone a special glow.

  

Mandorah, Cox Peninsular

This afternoon we drove to Mandorah on the Cox Peninsular which is across the bay from Darwin.  A ferry runs regularly between Mandorah and Darwin. 

We wanted to view the spectacularly coloured sandstone cliffs. The tide was low allowing access,  but because it was late in the afternoon the cliffs were in shadow they and were difficult to photograph, however the following pictures show the colours within individual rocks.

1/8/11 to 4/8/11 Litchfield National park

We spent 3 night in Litchfield National Park.  I enjoyed hiking around and taking photos.  Gerd enjoyed swimming in the pools. We camped about 250m away from Wangi Falls.  All night long we could hear the water pouring down the escarpment.

We viewed the spectacular Tolmer Falls from the lookout and walked around the top of the escarpment.

We visited Florence Falls but it was very crowded with tourists so we didn't stay for long.

My favourite area was the cascades.  It was closed when we visited Litchfield NP previously.  We hiked in twice and had a swim in the shallow rock pools.