Kakadu Walk

A day…night? walk in Kakadu

Originally planned as an overnight pack walk, we switched to a car camping day walk trip instead. We were doing the entire Koolpin – Freezing Gorge route in one day. Easy right, with no overnight pack to slow us down…

So experienced an bushwalker, lets just call him Eric,  warned us … that’s a hard walk to do in one day
Our fearless leader, lets call her Amanda (wait that’s actually her name), no worries we are all fit and young. We can handle 12km in one day…

(for the record it turned out to actually be about 18km but still)

Pre-warning for the walk was – we need to do at least 1km/h to get back before dark… we can do that right?

Hah! Maybe on a straight road!!

1km/h can be laughable in the back country of Kakadu some days
The walk was HARD  (note to self next time listen to the experienced walkers)

BUT THE WALK WAS STUNNING

What a gorgeous area with stunning views and red rock Kakadu country. The start of the walk was not to hard and we started with breakfast overlooking main Koolpin falls before following the main gorge away from camp. Once we hit  further up the gorge it started to be tough going, with thick high grass to cut through then scrambling and 5km turned into 8km because it was downhill compressed.

Exhausted we finally hit the Freezing gorge about 2pm and relaxed for lunch before dropping into the waters of the gorge as it was our only passage to the way out

“THIS IS FREEZING” came the unison cries of walkers.
??? The name Freezing Gorge didn’t prepare you ???.

We floated packs about 300m to the end of freezing gorge, noting the water levels were much higher then a previous visit 2 years earlier (excellant wet season am i right).

After the gorge it was just intense rock scrambling to escape. Which turned into our downfall as a couple of members elected not to take cliff jump (by cliff jump I say 2m) into a pool and instead took the higher ground. ending up trapped and unable to return until many hours later. Meaning the last four of  us had to make the final 2km back to the campsite

IN THE DARK

nevermind… I always say bring a headtorch even on day  walks and  for once we actually needed it (always be prepared) Kinda glad my overpreaperedness was worth it. Actually not going to lie slightly excited by the fact preparing for the worst actually is a good idea.

Oh and the GPS was super helpful cause map and compass can get hard once the sun sets

What a trip! took a few days to recover but I will be back because … the area is so beautiful you’d be crazy not to. Buuuut will take two days next time … thanks Eric