Five Nights in Kakadu National Park
Updated: Sep 12
Ask around on the road and you get two answers about Kakadu. About half will tell you it is worth a week. The other half call it Kakadont and tell you to keep driving through to Katherine.
We gave it five nights to make its case. If you're interested in following our tracks from this blog, you can find all the routes and waypoints in our GPX file pack.
Merl Campground, and sunset at Ubirr
We based ourselves at Merl for the first night, which put us within reach of two bucket list activities we'd come north for. Ubirr sits a short drive away and Cahill's Crossing is about a kilometre's walk from camp, so we barely had to move the vehicles.
Ubirr at sunset had been on the bucket list for years. There was a decent bit of cloud about, which usually means a good one, and we found ourselves a spot tucked into the corner of the rock. It was busy. Very busy. That is the trade you make for one of the best known sunsets in the Territory, and honestly it was good to see that many people out enjoying the place.
The bit nobody tells you is what happens afterwards. The crowd clapped the sunset (!?!), then got up and left, and the light kept getting better for another twenty minutes with hardly anyone there to see it. If you go, stay put.
Cahill's Crossing at high tide
The next morning we walked down to Cahill's Crossing. We had read that you want to be there around high tide, give or take a couple of hours, and we timed it to arrive pretty much bang on the high.
It was quieter than we expected. A few crocodiles working the water, a few fish crossing the causeway, but no feeding frenzy and nothing like the footage that makes the rounds online. The crocs were there, the place has an atmosphere all of its own, and we were still glad we walked down. But if you are going out of your way for it, arrive earlier than we did. Once it goes slack there is nothing to see.
Back to camp for breakfast, then off to the art.
The rock art at Ubirr
We had been to Ubirr the evening before, but only for the lookout. The gallery is a different visit entirely, and it starts almost immediately. A couple of hundred metres from the car park and you are already standing in front of it.
Ubirr is a massive outdoor gallery. Intricate paintings, and good signage alongside each section explaining what you are looking at. Even without the art the scenery would be worth the walk, but the art is the reason to come.
From there we said goodbye to the north of the park and headed south for Djarradjin Billabong, which put us closer to what we had planned for the next day.
Burrungkuy, Nawurlandja and Anbangbang
The following morning started with the Burrungkuy loop, a two kilometre return walk to a lookout. The country changes quickly once you come into this part of the park. The north is flat, and then suddenly you are among rocky outcrops and huge cliff faces.
Burrungkuy has another culturally significant art gallery, which contributed to Kakadu National Park achieving world heritige listing status.
Most of the artwork can be photographed, however a small section featuring 'Lightning Man' is not permitted for cultural reasons. The detail in him is extraordinary. Alien looking was how we put it at the time, and standing in front of him that is exactly how it feels. It was the most detailed work we saw anywhere in the park.
The lookout at the end gives you a 360 degree view, and it is genuinely different in every direction.
We stopped at Anbangbang Billabong for lunch, which is a lovely spot with a lot of birdlife on the water. We knocked up some chicken wraps on the induction and did a bit of bird watching. The walk around the billabong was still closed for crocodile management while we were there, so it is worth checking what is open before you plan your day around it.
In the afternoon we found the Nawurlandja Lookout walk. It is 300 metres return, the sign claims 40 minutes, and there are even stairs. Short but sweet, and a good lookout at the top.
Nanguluwurr Gallery
The last thing on the list for the day was the Nanguluwurr walk, four kilometres return to another art site. The sign at the trailhead allows two and a half hours. We took closer to an hour, but you want to leave time for the artwork itself rather than just the walking.
It is the easiest walk of the lot and also the longest, and it is the one we would do first if we had our time again. Most of the other walks in that area have some cover. This one does not, so get it done early in the morning.
From there we headed for Mardukal campground, where it pays to get there early to snag a good spot.
The Yellow Water sunrise cruise
We were up early for the Yellow Water sunrise cruise, and it turned out to be the highlight of the week.
We had already seen plenty of crocodiles on our houseboat trip on the Mary River. What Yellow Water gave us was the birdlife, and a lot more of it than we expected. Jabiru on the mudflats, sea eagles, herons, jacanas picking their way across the lily pads, and a sunrise over the water that made the early start worth it on its own.
The other thing you get is the commentary. Our guide knew the country properly, and we came away with a much better understanding of the wildlife, the ecosystem and the history of the park. One small mystery got solved along the way. There is an animal we had been hearing since the Pilbara that we were convinced was a frog. It is an owl.
Afterwards we packed down at Mardukal, which is a beautiful campground. Green grass, plenty of trees and shade if you want it, open areas if you need solar, hot showers and a lot of sites. It gets used as a base for Jim Jim Falls when that is open, and with Jim Jim closed it was reasonably quiet while we were there.
The Mardukal billabong walk reopened the day we were leaving, so we went and had a look. It is a cracking spot and we would recommend taking a picnic or a couple of cold ones down there. There is a boat ramp on the other side of camp if you are travelling with a tinny.
Good for sunset, though you will get eaten alive the moment the sun drops.
Planning a Kakadu trip?
Park passes, seasonal info, fuel and camps - all in our free guide.
Gungurul Lookout
Heading further south we pulled into Gungurul. It is a small campground compared with the others, with fairly basic facilities and more car parking than actual sites. It looked better suited to tent camping, and it was already busy when we arrived, so we did the walk and kept moving.
The walk is two kilometres return and takes in both the lookout and the South Alligator River. The first two or three hundred metres after the turn off is a steady incline, then you hit a ridge and it flattens out into something easy and undulating. The views at the top are worth it.
There was not much river left by that stage of the season, but you could see where the main flow was.
Gunlom Falls
We got into Gunlom Campground in the afternoon and managed to snag what we reckon was the best site in the place. We set the rooftop tent up so that climbing the ladder gave us a view straight out to the waterfall.
The bottom plunge pool was closed to swimming. There was a resident 3.8 metre saltwater crocodile in there at the time, and the rangers were updating the last sighting date as they went. Kakadu cops a lot of criticism for its seasonal closures, and after the wet they had just had, it is not hard to see why they happen. It is an enormous park and the water moves.
The top pools were open, and that is where you want to be anyway.
The top plunge pool was busy when we arrived, so we made a plan for a sunrise mission instead.
Sunrise and sunset at the top of Gunlom
We were up in the dark for the climb, and someone had comprehensively beaten us to it. There was already a head torch up there. Even so, it was quieter than the middle of the day and it was a beautiful sunrise, with the country lighting up underneath us.
That evening our mate Luke came down from Darwin, so we dragged him back up for sunset and a swim. Same walk, twelve hours apart, and a completely different place. Sitting in the pools looking out over the savannah at sunset is corny and it has been photographed a thousand times, but it has to be done.
Motor Car Falls
The last morning we were a bit dusty. We had stayed up later than planned around the fire, and it would have been easy to skip it. But we had come a long way and we were not coming back any time soon.
Motor Car Falls sits in the Yurmikmik area at the southern end of the park. It is six kilometres return, mostly easy, with a bit of a rock scramble at the end. The temperature drops as you come into the gorge and the water at the bottom is beautiful.
From there it was back to the car for the last time in Kakadu, and on towards Katherine.
So, Kakadu or Kakadont?
Ubirr at sunset. Cahill's on the incoming tide. Sunrise on Yellow Water. Three things we had wanted to see for years, all in the one week. And the bits in between turned out to be just as good.
Call it what you like. For us it was KakaDO.
What we would do differently
Get to Cahill's Crossing about an hour before high tide rather than on it
Do the Nanguluwurr walk first thing in the morning, since it is the longest and the least shaded
Stay at Ubirr longer after sunset - wear long sleeves and put mozzie spray on. We were getting eaten alive so had to bail.
Where we camped
Merl - closest base for Ubirr and Cahill's Crossing, hot showers
Djarradjin Billabong - quiet, good base for the art sites and walks, hot showers
Mardukal - green, shady, hot showers, close to Cooinda for Yellow Water Cruise
Gunlom - waterfall views from the good sites, hot showers, high clearance 4WD access
All of the campgrounds in Kakadu are first in, best dressed, so arrive early to avoid disappointment.
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Kakadu GPX File Pack
Kakadu is not a hard park to drive. It is a hard park to plan. Parks Australia splits it into regions without showing you where those regions actually are, and the sites within them are not listed in any order that helps you build a route.
This GPX pack has every camp and stop from this trip, in the order we did them, ready to drop into Hema, Gaia, Garmin, OsmAnd or Google Earth. Work out which campground puts you closest to what and the whole thing gets a lot simpler.
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