Katherine, Kakadu and Croc Jumping

It was a very peaceful night away from the noise of the road trains thundering up and down the Stuart Highway.  Unfortunately our next night wasn't as quiet.  We spent the night in a Highways Department 24 hour Rest Stop adjacent to the highway.  The more experienced 'Grey Nomads'; or perhaps those with a toilet in their caravan drove 500 metres further away from the highway whereas I wanted to be closer to the rest stop toilets knowing I would need to do the 'walk of shame' during the night (old man's bladder). 

My sleep was punctured by the sound of road trains rumbling by.  Obviously one driver knows the location of the rest area as he repeatedly sounded his air horns whilst passing (Bast@$d!)

It's 1500km from Alice Springs to the town of Katherine where we stopped to refuel.  Katherine mostly supports tourism although there is a major air force base nearby.   RAAF Tindal was constructed by the USA during WW2 as a base for Liberator bombers to attack Japanese forces in Papua New Guinea and the Dutch East Indies.   It was named after a RAAF officer who was killed manning a machine gun during one of the Japanese air attacks on Darwin.  Tindal is the main operational air force base in the Northern Territory,

It is now the home of 75 Squadron, which is being equipped with F35 Lightnings.  The USA is funding the upgraded of the base to service B52 bombers.

We are now far enough north to see termite mounds

Small at the moment, but they will get taller.

Katherine is named after the river which runs through the town.

I came upon some interesting information regarding the name of the town.

[quote]

Origin of Name

Should the town, perhaps, be called Catherine? The story of the naming of Katherine is a comment on the nature of 19th century exploration. On his third journey north the great inland explorer John McDouall Stuart reached the Katherine River. This expedition had been financially sponsored by the South Australian pastoralist, James Chambers, and Stuart was so grateful that he kept naming prominent landmarks after Chambers' family. On 4 July, 1862 Stuart crossed the Katherine River and recorded in his diary: "Came upon another large creek, having a running stream to the south of west and coming from the north of east. This I have named 'Katherine', in honour of the second daughter of James Chambers Esq." The only problem is that Chambers' daughter was Catherine. His wife's name was Katherine. So did Stuart make a mistake with the member of the family he was honouring or did he make a mistake with the name.

[unquote]

Our next stop was Kakadu National Park and I must admit I was disappointed.  Perhaps I've been spoilt having previously seen other spectacular locations around the world?

Crocs….. Don't swim

The Bougainvillea was in full bloom.

 

We stopped at Adelaide River electing to go on a crocodile jumping river tour.

Safer cement crocs

First croc.  After this we started to see several.  Obviously they know the sound of the boat motor means food.  The tour guide had to continuously move the boat to a different location in an effort to ensure the crocodiles didn't congregate and start fighting each other.  Crocs are territorial.

The technique to get the croc to jump out of the water is to dangle a large piece of meat over it's head.  Initially the majority of the crocs body will be visible on the surface.  Then It's head will start to raise as it submerges the rest of its body into a vertical position in preparation from driving itself out of the water.

Jumping out of the water requires the c roc to expend a huge amount of energy and it can only repeat this manoeuvre 3-4 times before being exhausted and giving up.

The boat went to several locations where the jumping was done by different crocodiles.

This croc had been in a fight with another and lost much of its front left leg

An interesting fact regarding crocodiles is 80% of them are female.  If the temperature is cool, around 30 °C, the hatchlings are all female. Warmer temperatures, around 34 °C, hatch all males.

In this location the Adelaide River is quite wide and fast flowing.  However the guide then mentioned in the 'wet season' this part of the river is 14km wide. 

On the way back we saw several local birds.  A Jabiru was hunting on the riverbank.  Actually the name Jabiru isn't technically correct as the 'true' Jabiru is native to the Americas and looks quite different.

This is a black necked stork.    It's a large white bird with black bands across the wings.  The neck is actually a beautiful iridescent purple-green. They have extremely strong beaks, which they use to hunt snakes, frogs, turtles, eels and fish in wetland marshes.

The tour guide threw food onto the water which resulted in a flock of 'Fire Kites' swooping down to snatch it off the surface.  The aboriginal names for these birds is  Karrkanj.  It's also called; the Brown Falcon and the firebird.

 

These birds can sometimes be seen soaring overhead carrying a smouldering stick in its talons.

On the move from one fire, it drops the stick to start another. As small reptiles and mammals scuttle away from the newly lit flames, the fire kite becomes the hunter, swooping in to pick up its meal.