Today, we left Darwin and arrived at the Litchfield Tourist Park for Lunch - this is the first Caravan Park where they have caravan ports (like car ports only bigger. similar to Grandma's where we used to park our previous caravan) where you can get out of the sun and rain (in the wet season). Since arriving here at the top end we have had three nights when it rained (sprinkled) - the locals are really shocked because it never rains this time of the year.
 |
| That's a Cathedral Termite Mound .... |
 |
| ..... no, that is! |
After we had lunch we headed out for a short trip to the closer attractions here, the first one being the Magnetic Termite Mounds. They were a bit disappointing because we weren't allowed to get up close and the way they had the viewing platform situated didn't allow us to see or get a good photo of the narrowness of the mound - these termites use the magnetic earth forces to line their mounds north & south so that they don't get the direct sunlight on them and therefore helps to keep them cool. I did however manage to get a couple of shots that showed their narrowness (don't ask me how).
 |
| These are Magnetic Termite Nests |
We then went on to Florence Falls where we walked down 135 (advertised) steps - I counted 150 - to the plunge pool at the bottom of the falls and had a nice cool swim. One of the problems with these plunge pools is that you never know quite what's under the water - you can be swimming along and all of a sudden run into a submerged rock or tree trunk where you thought the water was quite deep, so they can be a bit dangerous (one lady was complaining because the fish were nibbling her toes). We usually wear swimming shoes because scrambling over the rocks in and out of the water is hard on the feet.
 |
| Florence Falls |
 |
| Ruth at Florence Falls |
 |
| Another photo of Florence Falls |
We had a nice cool swim, but then we were faced with the 150 steps back up to the car park, by then we were hot and bothered again, so we drove back to the caravan park and went for a dip in their pool, which was quite nice and Ruth says makes it almost not worth the trouble of swimming in the waterfall plunge pools.
 |
| Sunset at Litchfield National Park - taken by Ruth |
