Day 28 Litchfield National Park, NT

Litchfield National Park keeps surprising us.  Just when we thought that we had visited one of nature’s most lovely places yesterday at Florence Falls, today just gave us a whole lot more. Looking at our trusty little map we saw that we had yet to visit the Magnetic Termite Mounds, Tolmer Falls and Wangi Falls.  There are a couple more places on our map that we would like to have visited (Lost City and the old homestead) but a large sign at one of the many information sheds said that they are still closed.

The Magnetic Termite Mounds are 21km from LTP (Litchfield Tourist Park) and we passed them yesterday but didn’t stop.  We didn’t make that mistake today.  It is easy parking and an easy walk to see these incredible termite mounds that face north south.  They are tall and narrow facing north/south and it is thought that the reason the termites build them this way is to avoid the harsh western sun that would destroy the colony. Cathedral Termite Mound is also very impressive but it is, alas, a dead mound with bull ants now inhabiting it.

Back in the car and another 20km away is Tolmer Falls.  Our trusty map says that there is a viewing platform and a little further on a lookout.  I must say that the paths leading to and from all the falls are very good. They are all raised walkways, mostly steel mesh, to avoid people stomping the earth and brushing against bushes, thus protecting this important area. The walk to the viewing platform was an easy 400m walk and another 400m took you to the lookout.  Wow. These falls are truly magnificent.  You can’t walk to the bottom area of the falls as it is closed to the public to help with rehabilitation of this area.  Looking down from the lookout we can see a beautiful green area full of palms, ferns and typical rainforest vegetation.  It is home to colonies of rare and protected bats.

Our next stop, and 52km from LTP, is Wangi Falls.  There are several camping grounds here and a restaurant along with lots of picnic tables.  It is so green and lush in this area and we can understand why it draws a crowd of people setting up their picnic tables.  It is a very short work to Wangi Falls and they are by far the best we have seen.  They are not the longest but the twin falls plunging into the rockpool make for a beautiful area.  Sadly, swimming is not permitted at the moment.  During the wet season Saltwater Crocodiles make their way into this rockpool so the park rangers have to make absolutely sure they are re-located before allowing swimming.  There are always freshwater crocodiles living here but they are harmless to humans.

We saw a sign pointing to a treetop viewing platform on our way to the falls so we decided to walk the 800m to this place.  It was a little bit disappointing that there was not a view of the falls from this upward walk but still and all it was quite interesting.  You look out across the top of the treetops and take your time to see if you can spot any of the birds that frequent this area.

We drove on another 5km towards Litchfield Safari Camp and Café but this area is closed.  I can only guess that Covid shut them down.  If we continued along the Litchfield Park Road, we would end up at Berry Springs and all the signs say that it is now a sealed road so this is the way we will head tomorrow when we leave Litchfield NP and make our way to Darwin.

As we made our way back to our camp we decided to visit Batchelor.  We needed to top up with fuel (diesel 1.99) so it was a good opportunity.  The little town is quite lovely. There are parks that look very inviting with beautiful tall trees and lush green grass and most of the houses look very well maintained. 

The town of Batchelor is more infamously known for its close proximity to the Rum Jungle Uranium mine. The mine was devastating for the area and no amount of rehabilitation the government has undertaken has been able to fix the acidic contamination of the river courses and land.  There was talk of government funding to start over again with rehabilitation but we will wait and see.  The mine was owned by the Federal Government and leased to a subsidiary of Rio Tinto.  Uranium was mined from 1954 to 1971 and roughly one third was exported for nuclear weapons.  The rest was stockpiled and then eventually sold in 1994 to the USA.