:: Expedition to the Top End ::

Monday, January 26, 2009

Darwin bills itself as the "multicultural capital of Australia" and that may well be true - I certainly saw a diverse range of ethnic representation. My dinner one night was a fried crocodile burger with pineapple on a pier overlooking the Timor sea from a Korean-run joint called "Schnitzel Magic". Lunch the next day was an Indian roti wrap with mango lassi, Malaysian chicken laksa, and a side of Thai coconut rice from the local street market.

Saturday morning the only non-cartoon on television was a political news hour in Italian directly from Rome, followed directly by the Greek equivalent (then by a Nickleback video which, in its level of intelligibility, might as well have been Greco-Roman). These shows aired on one of the four local terrestrial stations, not a foreign satellite package.

But all of that said, as a tourist you don't normally come to Darwin for the rainbow coalition. You come for Kakadu, Australia's largest national park. That's why I went, and that's, with two exceptions, what I took pictures of.

Kakadu's the size of a small country and contains within its borders rock plateaus, swamps, monsoon forests, grass wetlands, waterfalls, billabongs, a huge gamut of fauna (including wallaroos and more small lizards than I knew existed), and some prominent examples of aboriginal art. When the sun sets you can drive for half an hour in the twilight without seeing another pair of headlights, the up-tempo metronomic tick of panicked jumping toads hitting the car's front grill the only reminder that while you may be the only person for miles you're far from alone. I did it a great injustice by only spending a few days there.

Posted by morland @ 11:24 PM

:: Comments ::

Don't forget the giant termite formations...I've only seen pictures but they look fairly intense.

Posted by: Alex on January 27, 2009 04:58 AM

They are, and really numerous too. I was going to get a shot of one but they all seemed to be right off the side of the road and I kept thinking "I'll stop at the next one."

Posted by: morland on January 27, 2009 06:41 PM

I guess my question to you would be "how many abodiginals do you see modeling?"

Posted by: Derek Z on January 28, 2009 03:54 PM

wow-amazing sunsets!
and please buy some deep woods off. That looks painful.

Posted by: Cristina on February 1, 2009 11:52 PM

- Post a comment -

« Sydney in summer | Main | A short happy visit to Vanuatu »