Easter Weekend Comes to an End

Sunset at Cullen Bay

The Storm Approaches

Coffee by Jules

Its Monday night and the long weekend has almost drawn to a close. What a fantastic 4 days it has been! The celebrations started on Thursday night when we headed down to Cullen Bay with the usual gang. We were treated to a fabulous sunset and a barrage of fish and chips. Midway through our meal, the sunset disappeared and a storm started brewing in the horizon. Thankfully, it circumvented us and eventually vanished beyond the horizon. The funny thing was, there were streaks of lightning shooting sporadically and everytime I saw a bolt of lightning, I would tremble in fear as we were sitting in the middle of a field. Having spent countless number of years reminding pupils to run for shelter at the slightest hint of lightning, it seemed quite the opposite here. Kids were playing around, people in fitness groups were still enjoying their exercises and I wondered to myself if Darwinians had some sort of immunity from getting struck by lightning. Anyway, thankfully everyone was safe and the only thing that stayed fried were the fish and chips on our plates.

3 Car Convoy

Lunch at Wangi Falls

Friday was the beginning of our excursion! Sang and I drove to Litchfield once again. This time, we were part of a larger entourage of 8 others. The first mandatory stop was Florence Falls (yes again). After about an hour there, we headed down to Buley's Rockhole (YES AGAIN!). Unfortunately, it was a little crowded at Buley's and we decided to stop by at Wangi Falls for lunch. After lunch was done, we decided to try our luck at Buley's again. This time we were lucky. All three cars managed to get parking in less than 5 minutes. We then did the usual Buley's ritual, soaking and chatting in flowing waters for another 45 min. This spelt the end of the journey for our friends. They were heading back to Darwin while Sangeetha and I had planned to drive down south towards a small town named Katherine. I had huge plans for the trip. I had wanted to get into some birding followed by witnessing the sunset from a special place named Katherine Gorge. Unfortunately, both of these didn't pan out as planned. After a long 3 hour drive, we reached Nitmiluk National Park where Katherine Gorge was located. Unfortunately, the sun had almost completely set by the time we arrived and with no one in sight, we had no idea what to do there. We explored the nearby signages and walked around for a bit  before we bumped into a couple who advised us that we should do a 30 min hike up a trail. However, with daylight beyond us, we decided it would be best to attempt this hike another day. Tired and dejected, we made our way to Pine Tree Motel located 30 min away in the town of Katherine.

Breakfast at Edith Falls

It was a pleasant stay although the motel did remind Sang and me of a scene from a 1970s snuff film. Fortunately, no one came to kill us that night and we saw it through the morning. We headed out early to catch some birds in action 30min from where we were. Unfortunately, mother nature seemed to have other plans and after an hour of not spotting any birds, we decided to make our way to Edith Falls. We have never been here before but heard that it was a nice place to visit. 

Beginning of the Hike up Edith Falls

By the time we arrived at Edith Falls, our tummies were rumbling like Holden V8 engines. Just as luck might have it, there was a small quaint cafe that was open and we got ourselves muffins and a banana milkshake. We also took the opportunity to ask the owner how best might we want to explore Edith Falls. She told us about the options available and we opted to go for a 2.6km hike.

The hike up was arduous to say the least. The heat did us no favours but being a relatively short hike, we reached the falls fairly quickly. It was stunning and easily the best waterfall we have soaked ourselves in. 2 hours rolled by as we explored the different pockets of spaces within the falls. Although there were a number of other visitors, there was so much space for everyone to find their own sweet spots to chill.

Edith Falls

Edith Falls Topview

Sang likes Lalang

Chicken Schnitzel Burger at Hayes' Creek

 Finally, as we were running out of time, we made our way back to our car. Along the way, we saw some nice scenery and Sang got the opportunity to pose with some speargrass. We then began the long journey back to Darwin. At around 2pm, we stopped at a place called Hayes' Creek where we refuelled our car, grabbed a fantastic chicken schnitzel burger for lunch and treated ourselves to Connoisseur Ice-cream (which is bloody good by the way). Once everything was fuelled up, we continued the journey back to Darwin and reach home at about 5pm. In all, we had covered about 1000km in 2 days. Although we were exhausted from the long drive, we still managed to squeeze a dinner session with Pearl and Sid at the Casuarina Sports Bar.

We eventually crashed into our bed at 10pm. Sunday was a quiet affair as we spent the day cleaning up our apartment and cooking prawn briyani which turned out pretty good. As for today, we spent the day helping out at Pearl and Sid's restaurant before heading to Nando's for a sinful dinner. That's it for the long weekend and we are back to work tomorrow. That also means that its about time that I got to bed. Good night everyone and have a great week ahead!