Kakadu National Park

We’re showing our appreciation for protected lands around the world by asking our listeners and Wild Lens Collective members about their favourites from around the world. Here Hannah, our Social Media Manager, discusses her trip to Kakadu National Park and the impact it had on her.

I visited Kakadu National Park in Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, Australia in November 2018. It was an experience that profoundly changed my life and was the first time in my life I’d felt deeply connected to being a member of the human species. This sounds like a strange comment, and at the time it really took me some time to register what I was feeling and be able to properly communicate it. It gave me something that no museum, monument or history book has ever been able to – something much deeper and even spiritual.

Not only is Kakadu National Park fascinating from a nature perspective, but anthropologically too. There’s nothing quite like looking at the 20,000 year old cave paintings that are amongst some of the very first records of humankind in the world to give you a serious amount of goosebumps and make you think deeply about the history of our species. Over the past 20,000+ years, as our ranger guide discussed, the aboriginal people have used these caves for multiple different reasons and as we walked around the park, we were told about which caves were concerned with different ceremonies – cooking, socialising, teaching and sleeping, while others were occupied as part of a transition from boyhood to manhood, or girlhood to womanhood. These caves are no ordinary caves, they gave me a feeling of homeliness – they were arguably cosy – with soot stained ceilings from the fires that would have kept our ancestors warm, and large circle-shaped indents that were used for grinding down the grains that are used for cooking. Ancient tools are frequently excavated from these caves, some used for processing the ‘bushtucker’ collected by the women, others used for animals hunted by the men.

Something very special about November in Kakadu is that the park is about to mostly close down for the wet season – it’s what they know as the ‘shoulder’ season – where the monsoon rains have not yet come but there are still significant storms, mostly in the afternoon. So, you’ve pretty got the place to yourself – a complete contrast to the dry season where tourists flood from around the world to the park. The mornings would be blistering heat, extremely humid with bright blue skies, but in the early afternoon, the incredible storm clouds would roll in and the ground would shake with thunder and it would go pretty much completely dark, which was great for watching the lightning. I have never ever seen storms like it, which explains why there is actually a ‘storm holiday’ trade in the Northern Territory, where people travel from around Australia just to watch them. 

As our Aboriginal guide explained, this is the time of the ‘lightning man’ whose resting place we could see across the savannah. The place where the lightning man rests is completely out of bounds for everyone, as visiting it causes harm to those who dare to venture. Despite this area being in a particularly productive area of the park, no one will visit because of the fearful dreamtime stories. Kakadu has so much significance to the Aboriginal people who are still the protectors of the land and work in partnership with the government to uphold its protections and regenerate damaged areas.

What is also completely gobsmacking about Kakadu is the wildlife and natural habitats – the vast billabongs and savannahs that stretch to the horizon from all angles! This is a seriously wild place with some astounding inhabitants, including huge saltwater crocodiles. Because of the time of year, care is advised while travelling around the national park, as with the rains comes higher rivers and with higher rivers comes hikers coming into a much closer proximity to the park’s crocs, which can grow up to 6 metres long and weigh 1,000kg. They also show absolutely no mercy, so keeping your wits about you is key – I stood on a lookout at one point and realised very quickly that about two metres below me was a basking croc – needless to say I was out of there pretty rapidly! There are birds of every size, shape and colour – it was impossible to count how many different species I saw, but it must have been over 100 when I eventually lost count. It’s actually home to 1/3 of all bird species in Australia. 

This is the gateway to Arnhem Land – one of the last unexplored wildernesses on our planet, inhabited only by the Yolngu people who have called the harsh environment home for upwards of 60,000 years. It remained unsettled by Europeans due to its inaccessibility, hostile landscape and extreme climate. Aside from the wilderness and small amount of inhabitants, there’s also a lot of mining that happens in this part of Australia, causing unknown damage to the unexplored ecosystems and undiscovered species, which, as I looked over the seemingly never-ending forest from the top of the escarpments, filled me with sadness and dread as it is legally unprotected and open for exploration. It is reassuring to know that Kakadu itself, under its current guardianship, will be protected for now, but who knows what will happen as the world runs out of natural resources and such ecologically productive places remain unexplored – will they become prime targets? I really hope not. 

We want to hear from you! What is your favourite protected area and why? Do you want to tell everyone else about it and showcase its beauty like Hannah has done above? Get in touch with us at info@wildlensinc.org or post/message us on the Common Land Facebook page.