Litchfield National Park
Litchfield was one giant water park. We had four nights in the national park, one at Wangi Falls and three at Florence Falls Campground. Both were great camps, Wangi being perfectly located for early morning and late afternoon swims at the falls and Florence a great base to explore the rest of the park.
Our departure from Darwin stared with a most inconvenient breakage in our trailer kitchen. The fold-out kitchen bench snapped off at the hinge rendering it useless. A delayed result of too many corregations on the Gibb? After nine months of continuous use something's got to give I guess.
We stopped in at Berry Springs on our way down to Litchfield and joined the masses in a warm float down a clear steam. We shared the water with a pair of beautiful spotty fish which could have passed for residents of Ningaloo reef.
At Wangi Falls we swam across to the waterfall and found a great little warm natural stone bath perched a little way up the rock face. We then ventured the short loop walk that passed up and over the falls. I'd done the same walk almost four years earlier with a three month old Hugh, my brother Matt and sister-in-law Dana. Matt carried the sweaty semi-naked sleeping Hugh the whole way in his arms. This time Hugh walked the whole way under his own steam. We caught the sun setting right at the top and returned through the lush dark forest as the flying foxes were waking above us in an agitated mass of chatter and wings.
Still adjusting to the extra luggage and lost storage space of the seat between the kids (now occupied by Brigitte), we (I) busted the electric boot door by giving it an extra shove when it was struggling to latch closed. It locked shut and wouldn't open. An hour later, after passing all luggage out through the middle of the car we (Matthias) managed to manually override the electric door from inside the boot. This little set back promoted a broad sweeping cull of clothes and toys and a general reshuffle of everything, resulting in the good fortune of us being able to keep Oma.
After our frustrating start to the day we had a fabulous walk through magical monsoon forest to the Cascades. This was a real highlight of Litchfield. There was no single waterfall with plunge pool, rather a string of smaller pools to cool off in, enough that not all visitors were on top of eachother. It was extra special sharing it with Oma who is such a nature enthusiast. And Hugh is wrapped to have a hiking companion, not to mention a back seat travel mate.
Buley Rockholes was another show stopper, particularly as we had it all to ourselves the evening we arrived at our Florence Falls campsite. With the days being so hot, the water is just divine everywhere in the park and not cold like so many of the swimming spots on the Gibb. Brigitte returned a number of times to Buley, enjoying the linking walk between there and our camp.
The kids were lucky to sight a water buffalo early one morning just up the road from our camp and later an echidna. Water monitors were also on the fauna tick list.
We made the short but hot Greenant Creek walk to the refreshing Tjaeteba Falls where we were rewarded with three small swimming options. The popular "infinity" pool, a shallower pool set back from that which was full of little fish and crustaceans that nibbled on our toes, and then another hidden pool back in the forest. Groups of people came and went for the hour we were there but it wasn't as busy as the bigger pools.
We did three non-swimming activities while in the park, the Tolmer Falls walk, the Lost City and the termite mounds ranger talk, all impressive but hard going in the heat of the day. A walk in to Florence Falls with a swim in the plunge pool rounded out our visit.
