We Reach Our Goal!

Sunday 12 November

We really would have liked to spend a little more time at this hotel – we didn’t have time to try the pool, and it had great gardens to relax in. The food and cocktails were very good too. But no, I was still buying postcards when Ruben called us to the coach.

Jabira came to prominence when uranium was found nearby in the late 1960s, although it was not until the early 1980’s that the mine opened. It is estimated that this mine here contained about 124,000 tons of uranium, and they have found another field nearby, with almost another 100,000 tons, which hasn’t opened yet. At first the aborigines were not happy about the mine – they believed that it would upset the spirits – but when it was agreed to pay a lot of money to the local tribes most accepted the development. The uranium here is about 1,000 parts uranium to each 1,000,000 parts rock – a really rich vein. The area now has a population of less than 2,000, mostly involved with the mine, services and tourism - the Crocodile Hotel is the only large hotel in the area, but there are lots of back-packing centres.

Some of the party had got up very early to take a fixed wing flight out over Kakadu. This National Park, over 20,000 sq kms, is now managed by both the Australian Government and the local tribes of aborigines. The name comes from the European interpretation of the aboriginal word for the local tribe – Gagudju. The Park has been proclaimed a World Heritage Site and a UNESCO site, one of only three sites in the world to hold both awards – one is in China and the other is part of Tasmania. Kakadu is a vast area of savannah woodland (80%), flood plains, monsoon rain forests, and tidal flats and coasts. The South Alligator River is one of the only large river systems in the world to be completely within a National Park. It is home to 10,000 different insects, nearly 300 different birds, and 120 different, lizards and reptiles, as well as over 600 different plants and trees. There are only two sorts of crocodiles in Australia – Estuarine or saltwater (aggressive) and freshwater (usually shy, only becoming aggressive if disturbed – we had been warned though not to dangle arms or legs over the sides of the boat on our trip later!). There are no alligators in Australia, despite the river being called Alligator River – named by a European who didn’t actually know the difference between crocodiles and alligators. We saw a small part of the central area of the National Park yesterday. Today we were heading east, to see more of the land formations and indigenous art.

Every year, during the wet season, huge parts are flooded by the monsoon rains, covering all the land around here to a depth of a few metres (including the roads - houses and buildings are built up on the higher ground and the aborigine tribes just move on), although early this year Cyclone Monica swept through region, decimating many of the trees and destroying lots of the wild life (the soil is poor around here so many of the trees have horizontal root systems which are ripped from the ground as the hurricane winds blow) . Most of the woodland areas still bear the scar – lots of trees are fallen and decaying and some of the grasses are only just recovering – it looks a bit like some of our woodlands after the Great Storm of 1987. But the termites are still building giant nests, some as much as five or six feet tall (we understand that they can reach up to twenty or more feet high in other areas). From May to September, the rangers fire the grass here if necessary – it sometimes grows to 5 metres high – some fronds are already waving at around two feet.

Our first stop was at Ubirr – a small area where there are lots of examples of ancient aboriginal art, drawings in great detail and colour, of turtles, fish and dogs as well as men and tools. Here we also climbed up the large rock formations, to look out over a vast flood plain of the Magdela River, with its meandering ox-bow lakes, edged with water lilies (seen through binoculars) and lots of different birds, wading and fishing. Under the trees we saw rock wallabies hopping away – they are smaller versions of kangaroos, and look particularly cute. The temperature is still up in the top 30’s, despite it being only mid morning, but the humidity has increased tremendously, so everyone was feeling damp and sticky. I personally prefer this to the dry heat of the south, but I know I am in the minority.

We moved on to Bowali Cultural Centre, for a coffee stop, before heading further east to find lunch. We stopped at a particularly dirty café called the Bark Hut Inn, that didn’t look as if it had been cleaned since it was built – thick cobwebs strung from beams to lamps on the ceiling, that were themselves covered in dust, and the tables were covered with thick grease. We managed to eat our sarnies off serviettes. There was a pen of emus out the back, and looking closely into the mouth of one inquisitive bird, I saw that they have no tongue, just a cavity with a “plughole” obviously where anything they eat goes straight down. Perhaps this is the same with all birds – they don’t have teeth do they – but I hadn’t thought about it before. We were pleased to be back on the coach and traveling towards Darwin.

Nearby was the Fogg River Dam. This had been constructed as an economic venture to ensure the land was flooded for six months of the year, so that they could grow rice. It had been intended to sell the crop to the nearby markets of south east Asia. But they hadn’t reckoned with the magpie geese – there are thousands living in this area – who just flew in and devoured the crop each year. After eight years of trying, the investors gave up and the project terminated. The dam is still in existence and now provides a large watering place for many migrant birds.

Our next stop was just a few kilometres outside Darwin, at the Ditch Hut. The current owners, Dennis and his wife, arrived about eight years ago and established a centre for aboriginal art. Many of the artists come there to paint, carve, or decorate didgeridoos. The finished products are not cheap – there were some interesting paintings at A$1,500 – about 600 GBP, but Lee (from New York) bought a couple more paintings - he had already bought one in Sydney and one in Alice Springs. I like the ones showing people – they are an extended form of “stick” people – but Colin is not at all keen - which is probably just as well, as we haven’t any space in our cases. I did buy a necklace and earrings in local hematite – a black coal substance – but they won’t weigh a lot.

On entering Darwin, we had a short tour of the city – its not very big, even though it’s the largest city in Northern Territory – about the size of a small country town – with four parallel main streets, the Esplanade – where our hotel situated – overlooking the Fanny Bay and the harbour, with a large green swathe of trees and gardens between the road and the sea; Mitchell Street, full of bars, restaurants, cafes and ice cream shops, and Cavanagh and Smith Streets where there are more shops and offices. The harbour here is about six times the size of Sydney Harbour. The residential area spreads out from the main streets, around the peninsula. We did see the first pole to be erected to take the telegraph line through the Repeater Stations to Adelaide. Interestingly, there is a “deckchair cinema” but we didn’t get a chance to visit there. Darwin is one of the fastest growing areas in Australia at present and property prices are rising accordingly. We saw some of the new bungalows being built – they look like jigsaw buildings, interlocking parts all much the same shape – small boxes with huge pitch roofs. Palmerston, once a suburb, has now extended to join the outer parts of Darwin.

The area was first settled when John McDouall Stuart finally crossed the continent, and named it Port Darwin to commemorate Darwin’s visits here in the Beagle a century before. George Girder came a few years later and surveyed the area around Fanny Bay, and renamed a new settlement Palmerston – after the British Prime Minister. The whole of the Northern Territory was annexed to South Australia, which maintained supplies to the area, and with the gold rush, the installation of the overland telegraph system, the natural harbour for trade with nearby Indonesia and south east Asia, the railway connecting inland settlements and the establishment of a pearling centre nearby, the area prospered and grew. Somtime in the early 19th century they reverted to the name Darwin. The area has mainly depended on crop growing (they have large mango farms here – we have seen the fruit lying on the ground like windfalls, they have so many mangoes), mining and beef cattle to fund its economy since the early days.

In the second World War, the city was bombed 64 times in eighteen months, from February 1942 and much of the city and all the boats in the harbour were destroyed. There are still a few of the old colonial buildings left, most of which have been renovated and are used as Government offices today. On the headland between Fanny Bay and the Harbour, there is the East Point Military Reserve where a large concrete bunker still exists which once housed a massive gun as part of the defence system, as well as underground rooms where the army planned a military strategy for the area. After the initial bombing it was decided to build five underground fuel tanks for storage, but they were not completed until the end of the war, so were never used! But they are still in existence today.

The region is renowned for cyclones and in 1974 Cyclone Tracey hit the town on Christmas Day. It wrecked havoc in the town, with winds in excess of 300 mph, first ripping off all the corrugated tin roofs, and then blowing buildings apart and overturning vehicles. The whole town was devastated. We visited the Darwin National Museum late in the afternoon after the tour of the city, and saw lots of photos and newsreel showing the damage – it resembled the pictures of the Tsunami destruction. At the Museum there were also large displays of marine life and birds indigenous to the area. And a 5.1 metre stuffed crocodile that had been terrorizing visitors and locals at the nearby Sweet Lagoon. He was finally caught, but unfortunately as they were transporting him to a new location, he died. So he now provides one of the most popular exhibits in the Museum, known affectionately as “Sweetheart”.

We then found our hotel, where we had been allocated a room on the sixth floor – sadly not with an ocean view, but inland over the shopping streets. We are here for a night and a half (we have to leave at 04.45 on Tuesday to catch our early morning flight to Cairns – along with about half of our fellow coach travelers). We only had time for a quick shower and change, before meeting up with Bob and Gwen to explore the town. We wandered along Mitchell Street where all sorts of foods were on offer – the ice cream parlour seemed to be one of the most popular stopping places. There are lots of back-packer establishments here and the town had a similar atmosphere to Yangshuo in China, with a bit more sophistication. We chose to eat in an establishment called “Rourkes Drift” – it did have a poster for the film “Zulu Dawn” on the wall, but nothing else to connect it to that episode that we could see. It was a large, rambling, old fashioned pub, with huge wooden bar and tall tables and high chairs. We all had beers and ordered food – surprise, surprise – I had steak again! its become a bit of a fetish now – I must try something else tomorrow. We ordered the wine of the month – Oyster Bay Merlot rosé – only to be told that it was now out of stock, as they were closing on Saturday for refurbishment. We changed our order to Jacobs Creek rosé and were given the bottle on the house! While we were eating a man in his thirties came and set up drums, bongos, a didgeridoo and plugged in his electric guitar - he had to be better than the singer at Alice Springs! He was, in fact he was excellent and gave us a stonking rendition of “Wonder Wall”, the Oasis song, including playing a didgeridoo instrumental in the middle. We really enjoyed the entertainment

We then wandered back to the hotel around the streets. Darwin has a really friendly atmosphere, and it would have been good to have more time again, for exploration. Colin needed to download his video camera as he was running out of space, so no time for blogging before bed.