Darwin and Kakadu (By Mike)

We left for our third and final two-week school holiday on Saturday the 29th of September. We drove to Sydney, hopped on a plane to Brisbane and on another to Darwin. We finally arrived at about 1:30 in the morning. When we walked off the plane, down onto the tarmac, it felt like we were walking into a warm shower. It was 32 degrees (about 90 F.) at that time...We found out early in the trip that we had to do everything early in the day and then hit the pool for the hours between 11:00 am and 5:00 pm. We were sapped by the heat and the humidity on most days. It reached 42 degrees in Kakadu National Park on one of our camping days. That's about 108 degrees.
We didn't stay in Darwin long as we like to get out to the parks and do some hiking. We did stay long enough to watch the Rugby League Grand Final in an outdoor pub (with the kids) with a bunch of Aussie fans. Melbourne crushed Manly if you were interested. It was a very fun night.

From there we headed to Kakadu National Park. I'll save the crocodile stories for the kids and a later blog. We cruised around to estuaries, aboriginal art sites, and some waterfalls and natural pools in which to swim. We saw what it would have been like to live in the tropics out in the bush. November to April is called 'The Wet' and May to October is 'The Dry'. We were there at the end of the dry and as a result most of the waterfalls were trickle falls. We found some that were serviceable for a nice swim. We hiked to the top of one in 40 degree heat and enjoyed a cool dip for our efforts. The kids found trees to climb and jump from. We learned the distinction between saltwater and freshwater crocs. The important difference is that the saltwater ones can and will eat you while the freshwater ones would only 'nip at your toes if you get too near their nests'. We were very safe and only saw one that wasnt' part of our 'croc tour'.

One interesting part of the Kakadu landscape was the millions of termite mounds, some up to 3 or 4 meters high. We couldn't believe how many there were. They are wind, water and fire proof. We saw many small bushfires while we were there and in the remains were these bright red dirt mounds in the midst of the black charred ground as if nothing had happened at all. We definitely wouldn't want to build a wood house anywhere near Kakadu...

Jake is going to explain how the croc tour went next.

From there we were headed southwest to Katherine where we used kayaks to explore the gorge there. I'll go figure out who is going to write that part!