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We left Darwin on Friday morning at 9.30am and it as already 28', 118150. It had been warm here averaging 32 and humid most days. We are off to Litchfield National Park and hopefully will get into Wangi Falls. I have just read on wikicamp that you need to get there by 9am to secure a spot, so fingers crossed. After turning off Stuart Hwy we had to obvious fires in front of us, one on the left and one on the left. This was a bit worrying especially when we came across the caution sign, Wild Fires!! We are pushing on because if they didn't want us in here then we would have been stopped. There had been plenty of burning off happening as it's the time of the year to do it up here. We managed to get the last two places, we keep jagging our luck.
Wangi Falls is beautiful with two falls and a huge waterhole to swim in at this time of the year. In the wet season the crocodiles are known to frequent this area. There was a boardwalk that took us through a tropical canopy were we saw side pigs on the other side of the creek and eventually were led to a set of stairs and up to a lookout. You couldn't see the waterfall from here but you were up and personal with the bats and huge golden orb spiders!!
We went back and had our lunch then returned for a swim. It took me and hour to get in as it as freezing. I watched everyone else go in without any great effort, I am such a wimp! The other 3 had got out before I had even gotten in. I had managed to get wet up to my thighs as I acclimatised and had been slowly dunking up and down. I turned around to speak to Glenn and lots my footing and fell in! Glenn said it was the funniest thing to see, the sort of thing Funniest Home Videos would be proud off!
We had a BBQ dinner but had to retreat to the vans to eat as the mozzies were bad. We caught up on episode 10 of season 2 of Game of Thrones. We haven't watched any since we left Alice Springs. The night was very warm so sleeping was difficult. The following morning we had a mother wallaby and her joey scratching around in the leaves behind the van for food scrapes. I took some photos, they didn't seem to worried by me being near.
We all headed out with a packed lunch to visit the "lost city" not the Aztec's the Austec's ,Tollmer Waterfall, The Magnetic Termite Mounds, Florence Falls (135steps down and 135steps back up) and Buley Rockholes. This whole area was more like what I expected Kakadu to be like but now realise Kakadu's cultural significance instead.
It was a short 400m walk to Tollmer Falls which was very spectacular falling into a deep pool below. There appeared to be a cave that went back under the waterfall too. We had to stand on a suspended platform to get some nice photos. The "lost city" was a 9km very rough single lane dirt track. We managed to shake the begeebers out of one of the spotlights and it broke the bracket weld on the nudge bar! It was luck Glenn noticed it straight away as it was just left resting back against the front of the grill instead of falling off and smashing on the ground. The "lost city" is a series of limestone rocks formed by millions of years of eroding wind and rain. They really did look like ruins.
There were two different sorts of Termite Mounds to learn about on opposite sides of the road. Those that like the wet season the Magnetic Mounds and the Cathedral Termite Mounds that survive on the grasses during the dry season (these are the really big ones). We had a look at the Magnetic Mounds first and they are set out like a graveyard full of tombstones it amazing. They are positioned in a north south arrangement to maximise the sun.
When we crossed over to see the Cathedral Mounds there was a tour guide explaining all about these, so we hopped on to the back of the group to have a listen. These can get up to 4metres high. We had stopped on the size of the road to take a photo of these earlier in our trip but the one the guide was standing next to was huge. He explained that there are between 5 and 7 million living in this particular mound which stands about 25feet tall and probably took about that long to build. Only a 1/3 of the mound is above ground and 2/3 is below ground. The termites are mainly underground and what you see above is part of their ventilation system, keeping an even core temperature of 28', all year round. When the grasses are ready for harvest the termite's tunnel out to the plains and bring back and store up to 350kilograms to keep the community feed throughout the wet season. At the same time every year the reproductive termites (winged) are released from the colony and go off to start their own colony. They are all potential kings and queens. Fascinating stuff!
Florence Falls and the Buley Rockholes are part of the Florence Creek water system. The falls is a spectacular double display falling into a plunge pool which is a popular swimming hole. The swimming hole is difficult to get to as you have to climb down 135 steps and then clamber over a rocky stream to get to the pool. Unfortunately this was too difficult for me and it also limited my view of the falls at the bottom as I could only see part of one of the falls from where I was sitting. The climb back up was an effort but the breeze coming through the treetops was a nice relieve. Buley Rockholes is a bit further upstream but a nice collection of pools heading down stream. Lots of people were enjoying the cool water under the canopy of trees.
We headed back to camp for another swim at Wangi Falls and followed up with another yummy Chicken Curry by Chris. We eat earlier this time to avoid the mozzie invasion. We still had to head indoors for about an hour and came out to enjoy each other's company before bed.
Back off to Katherine again in the morning.
See you soon, Virginia and Glenn.
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