Arnhem Land is right next to Kakadu and the road in is just near Jabiru. You can go into Arnhem Land yourself – you need a permit from the Lands Council (I think). I’m not sure how hard they are to get. I’m also not sure where exactly you’d go on your own. I guess if you were into fishing you’d find places – apparently its great fishing in certain areas – esp around the coastline. But I’m not – so didn’t really want to just track off into Arnhem Land. (I’m just going to type AL for Arnhem Land from here on – too much typing otherwise) BUT I did want to see some of it. So I booked a day tour – which came from Darwin – they started there at around 5.30 – but luckily they didn’t pick me up until 8.30 – so that was good. In the end it was just a little 12 seater bus – and there were only 6 of us all up. So, we went out to Cahill’s Crossing – which is the only way into AL from this area. Cahill’s Crossing is a concrete causeway over a river – which is the border between AL & Kakadu. The crossing is a tidal river – which amazes me considering how far from the sea it is. We were “lucky” in the fact that the tide was down when we go there – so we could just drive across. Otherwise we’d just have to wait until it went down again!! Lucky indeed. When we drove across there was a bloke & 2 x 13-14 year old kids standing on the causeway fishing. There was also a bloody big crocodile just up the river a little – amazes me what people will do to go fishing!! Not sure how long ago but one life at least had been lost off that causeway – old mate was fishing, tripped up, went into the water – and was eaten by a croc. But, I guess the blokey this day had done the right thing – he’d brought the kids too (bait??).
Drove through some more really interesting country – more billabongs, more rock outcrops. We went to the town of Oenpelli – or Gunbalanya – which is the town closest to Kakadu. Here there is the Injalak Arts & Crafts Centre – a business run by the local indigenous community – with some business assistance from some people from outside the community. The locals paint & make baskets and they are sold – both at the centre & in places outside the community. They have also had displays/showings in art galleries in major cities as well.
At this stage we didn’t look at the art centre – just picked up our guide for the day – an aboriginal man named Thommo. Thommo was from AL – was also an artist at the center – but today he was going to show us around Injalak Hill – a big outcrop of rock behind the town – which has a lot of rock art on it.
Once again – to get to the rock art – we had to climb up over rocks – up a hill – down a hill – at one stage during the day we had to sit on our bums and scoot over about 5 metres before we could get back on our feet. It was a fairly strenous type of day – but once again luckily the most of it was in the shade of the rocks, etc – so it wasn’t too bad. The worst part was coming back down – which wasn’t as well shaded & touching the rocks to use to balance when stepping over other rocks was horrible – the rocks were really hot to the touch. But, it was a good tour & they had cold, wet face washers when you got back to the tour bus – which were great to cool you down with.
Thommo guided us through a lot of art sites – as I said some you had to climb in & over stuff to get to it. It was a great experience. Unlike the more well tramped areas (like Nourlangie the few days before) this area isn’t a big touristy area – so there are no walkways and no handrails – either up the path or right near the actual rock art. Lots of places we were you could have just reached out & touched it. Which, of course, we couldn’t do – but you could have.
Rock art
This photo shows a few things – but interestingly the figure in the middle is depicting a Tassie Tiger – so that shows how old the paintings are (scientist believe the Tassie Tiger hasn’t been on mainland Aus for centuries++). Rock art is fairly confusing because they just paint over each other’s work – so you can get this “layering” where you see all of the top painting & then part of what was underneath – whatever is sticking out where the lastest painting didn’t cover it up. It seems a shame really – but that’s the way they did it.
Rock art - layering
We climbed up & over rocks and the part where we had to scoot across on our backsides – that led to where we had lunch – it was in an open sided cave – it had a lovely view – and was lovely to sit there, looking out over the world, eating our sarnies.
The view for lunch - Injalak Hill/Rock with Oenpelli in the background
Its really hard to describe what it was like climbing up & down this piece of ground, over rocks, around boulders – ducking down to get through crevices – all sorts of contortions to get to see some of this amazing artwork. According to our guide the work is between 20,000 – 6,000 years old. Amazing stuff. And to learn about the history/beliefs of these people.
Along with Kakadu – being in AL is really like being in a different country to living in Canberra – or Bredbo – or Scone. I must say I’ve really had very little to do with people from an indigenous background – but I also think the way they live up here is totally different to anything down south. Its still a conundrum as to how they combine their original beliefs with living in the “modern” world. It must be hard – they obviously have a lot of problems with it – but the more you learn the less you know I guess – I don’t know how they do it. But, it is different here – and its not just the actual country-side.
The arts centre was interesting to visit. We got to see a couple of the fellows painting – the rarrk painting method I think its called – or cross hatching – where they paint paint lines parralel and then more lines on top of those in a different direction So they use very fine lines – many very fine lines – to paint their stories. Of course, the painters make it look easy – but I know its not. And their paintings are all really good. The women do the basket weaving – which on the surface sounds really easy. But, when you consider they go out & collect the pandanus plant leaf (and of course, its only the newest, highest leaf that works well), cut it down, tear it up, tear it up, tear it up – into very, very fine pieces of “string”. (and – to add to the job – the pandanus leaf is serrated on the sides – it cuts fairly easily too – its a bad plant if you ask me). Then they have to get the bits & pieces of earth & plants that they use to dye the string. Then they put the string bits in pots & dye it. Then dry it. Then they have to actually do the weaving – and just the weaving can take hours of work. So those baskets are great too – and its not so surprising when they cost $450 for a basket!!! Luckily for me, they had a “throw out” table at the art centre and I picked up a small basket for under $20 – so that was good. I also bought a small painting – a depiction of a barramundi – which are special fish up here – for all peoples I think. As we know – I’m not really into fish – so that’s the barra I “caught” for the trip!!! LOL.
From there, the tour was basically over – the bus drove me back into Jabiru and they headed off back to Darwin – I was happy to tell them I’d be in the pool before they were out of town !! But really, by this time, with the face washers and the AC in the bus, we’d all cooled down anyway.
And I did get back in the pool. And here’s another thing – all the pools here are absolutely bloody freezing. I thought the one at Katherine Gorge was chilly. The one at Cooinda wasn’t warm, but the one at Jabiru was really freezing. And to make it worse – you had to walk down a slope to get into the pool – so instead of just jumping in & getting it over you immerse yourself into it SLOWLY!!! But once you get in – its still cold really. This one has a cover over it – so that’s probably why it is a bit colder – but the other 2 were open to the sun & were still cold. Weird. But – none of them were cold enough for me NOT to swim in it – it was very hot & the pool was a necessity!!!
margiecrimmins 