We arrived at 4:30am in Darwin. Everyone was feeling rather sleepy after a few uncomfortable hours of trying to sleep on the plane. We collected our bags no trouble but we then headed for the border control. Obviously we had nothing to hide but with Australia being known for its extremely strict procedures, having nothing to hide doesn't always mean you don't get a good grilling and your bag emptied. First up was the passport control. It did seem like they were trying to be a bit intimidating asking lots of questions. As it came to our turn they just really asked where we were staying and what we were doing. When Matt told his woman where we were going she just replied "yeah good luck with that one" as we later found out that it was actually a 3 hour journey from the airport not 1 as we thought and there were no buses going there! We then went to get our bags checked as we had declared that we had food and hiking boots, figuring its easier to be honest than get quizzed about all sorts. This paid off as everything we had was fine so it took a matter of minutes. So that was it, after all the dreaming and planning, we had finally arrived in Australia!!

Now we had the dilemma of it being 5am and we were 3 hours from our destination without transport . Matt went to get a quote from a hire car company as a local man outside had said this was probably the best way to do Kakadu park, or even Lichfield park which we now discovered was the preferred park by the locals. The quote came in at about $300 for 2 days. This seemed a lot so we headed to town to try and see what the tours were priced like. Of course nothing in town is open at 5:30 so we had to wait until 8am for things to start opening up. This gave us a chance to get a drink and fresh croissants from the bakery. We constantly weighed up different options like the tours, the car, scrap the whole park visit, just do 1 day or go to Lichfield instead. As it was, the tours were pretty expensive so we figured by the time we all paid for a tour we could just as well get the hire car for less. The thing was we had already paid for accommodation in Kakadu tonight so if we didn't get to there it was $130 wasted plus we'd still need to stay somewhere else. Come 8am we bit the bullet and decided the car was the best option. Obviously if we'd known this at 4:30 this morning we would have almost been at Kakadu by now and not sat outside a care hire centre but what can you do!! Matt went and struck a deal and we got ourselves a lovely silver Toyota Camry . I've never heard of one of these before but it looked alright and seemed massive so easily took all of our bags and us 3. It was an automatic so this made it nice and easy to drive and Matt was overjoyed when he discovered it also had cruise control!! And so we were off on our first road trip in Australia!

Luckily they still drive on the same side of the road as us here so that avoided some worries. The directions were fairly simple. At the end of the road turn right and follow the Stuart highway until we see the Kakadu highway then just follow that for 2 hours or so. Simple! Well no! We got lost. After ending up somewhere we weren't supposed to be we turned round and backtracked until we saw a petrol station so Matt could ask for help. We had a map but by now we didn't actually know where on the map we were. A kind man laughed at us for being so lost but did actually help. Telling us to, "follow the road then turn left at a place called Humpty Doo, that will put you on the Arnhem Highway which you just follow all the way ." A happier but slightly puzzled Matt returned until we looked on the map and discovered there actually is a place called Humpty Doo and it wasn't just the man's figure of speech. It turns out we had been going the right way but had just missed the exit sign as there was a road train on the inside lane blocking it. (Well that's my story anyway as I was supposed to be navigating!). There were quite a lot of road trains about, these are just lorries but whereas at home they only have 1 trailer, here they have 3 or 4 making them quite long. We have heard that they can have as many as 7 or 8 trailers!

Back in the right direction we soon ended up on completely empty roads which stretched as far as we could see. This really felt like an Australian road trip now. It was very exciting at first but that soon wears off as you don't really see much apart from the forests on either side and the odd road train. The scenery was lovely to see though as we passed several massive termite mounds, different lakes and rivers . As much as we looked for wildlife we didn't see much other than birds. We made really good time and arrived in the park by around 11:30am.

Kakadu National Park is spread over 19,757 sq km comprising of stony plateaux, red escarpment cliffs, waterfalls, billabongs, long twisting rivers, flood plains and coastal flats. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Area partly due to the huge galleries of Aboriginal rock art found there. The land actually still belongs to a group of aboriginal tribes who lease the land back to the government. They continue to live in private areas of the park which are not accessible to visitors and play an active role in managing the park along with the government.

The Mamukala Wetlands was our first stop. It was lovely to get out of the car now and stretch our legs as we all needed waking up a bit from Matt driving so long and me and Gareth getting little sleeps in. The temperature was about 35 degrees but felt a lot hotter . This was by far the hottest temperature we had been in since being away. The whole area was so dry and dusty because without us knowing we had come at the driest point of the seasons as the rainy season starts in a few weeks. So we didn't get a true picture of how beautiful this park can be when it's wet and green. With it being so dry there were swarms of flies everywhere. This made it very irritating to walk about as they constantly flew around our ears, eyes and mouths. The wet land itself was a vast open area which was scattered with lots of different birds and usually has large crocodiles in. The water level was very low so I don't imagine there was many crocs in there but we had a good look. There was a 45 min nature walk which we did but we didn't really see much other than more termite mounds, geese and a different part of the wetland. We headed back to the car to cool off and escape the flies then set off for our next site.

The Ubirr Art Site was next up . This was recommended by the man Matt had spoken to at the airport, mainly because it has a brilliant view point over a wet land and has some ancient aboriginal paintings that are over 20,000 years old. Some of them are called X-ray art as it shows the internal as well as the external anatomy of living subjects. Lessons on how to kill animals would be given using this type of artwork as everything was passed down through the generations using pictures. It was about a 30-40 minute drive to this site from the Mamukala wetlands and Matt was clearing struggling to drive still after our long night and driving all morning. So after only about 5-10 mins back on the road Gareth took to the driving seat to give him a break. This was worrying as not only had Gareth not driven at all for over 6 months he had never driven an automatic before. With a quick lesson from Matt and a cautious set off we were on our way again. Gareth did an excellent job and got us to Ubirr safely, until it came to stopping that is, when Gareth quickly found out how sharp the brakes are giving us all a good bump .

The Ubirr site really was beautiful. We followed the art trail which took us around a group of rocks that had lots of original drawings still on them. We all read the descriptions with interest and tried to spot the images they were talking about. It's amazing to think generations of people passed down their knowledge using these pictures. The rock art trail brought us to the lookout which, having found a new store of energy, we all scrambled up pretty quickly. From the top you could see a huge distance in all directions of the park and it was fascinating to see how the landscape changed depending on the type of ground an area was sat on. We were a little concerned to see a couple of areas where there were forest fires. 1 looking worse than the other as even from the distance we were at, we could clearly see the flames. Later on we found out that this wasn't really a problem as these fires are quite often started on purpose to help get rid of dead trees and foliage and to promote new growth . Also this is a way of controlling natural forest fires and preventing too much damage being done during those times. We spent quite a long time on the lookout taking photos & soaking in the view.

Once back down we decided that was enough trekking for one day and that we would make our way to the Gagudju Lodge where we had rooms booked for the night. By this point, I was really struggling to stay awake and my ankles had swollen up so I decided to lay across the back seats while Gareth drove & Matt navigated. I didn't get to sleep for very long as after a few minutes Gareth decided to test the brakes and I went flying into the back of their seats before landing in the footwell behind them!! Whilst I only incurred a bit of bruising to my hip, I decided maybe laying down wasn't a good idea and decided to sit up and put my seatbelt on!!

About an hour later we pulled into the car park of Gagudju Lodge and checked in. We were very excited to hear there were 2 swimming pools on the site and after dropping off our bags in our little tin shed of a room, Matt & I headed straight to the pool . It was really pretty with lots of different swimming areas and a man made waterfall over a jacuzzi. We had a lovely time relaxing there until we thought it was probably time to get ready for dinner. We met up with Gareth and made our way to the restaurant where a very friendly man kindly poured us 3 well earned & much needed ice cold beers which we enjoyed as we waited for our pizzas to be ready! At 7pm we were all starting to feel really tired so we made our way back to our rooms. Matt & I collapsed on the bed and were amazed when the next thing we knew we were waking up and it was 9pm!! Still feeling exhausted, we popped out to the toilets (they were in a separate block on the other side of the campsite!!) and then straight back to sleep again not waking until 8:30 the next morning!!

The next morning we really struggled to get out of bed! The last few days had caught up with us & the thought of going on lots of treks didn't seem to excite anyone! Nevertheless, we got up, packed our bags & checked out by 10 . We made our way to our first stop of the day, Yellow Water Billabong. This offered a short walk across a boardwalk to a lookout point. This area is closed during the wet season as the path completely floods and you could see evidence of this as it was very rusty!! The big hike that comes off this walk was closed already as the shooting of feral animals was taking place! Apparently wild pigs cause a bit of a problem in this area so they try to keep the numbers down! We were really excited as we set off on this walk as within seconds we spotted a crocodile casually making his way along the river and a few minutes later we spotted a second! You could just make out their heads poking out above the surface of the water with their big eyes taking in everything around them! During this walk we also spotted some beautiful white birds and some pretty big bugs, as well as an army of ants building themselves a new home higher up in the tree ready for the water level to rise!

Once we had finished this walk, we jumped back in the car and made our way to the Warradjan Aboriginal Cultural Centre . This houses an interactive display explaining many aspects of aboriginal life. It really was fascinating and we felt like we learnt a lot. I loved the fact that everything was so visual and hands on! It certainly wasn't a boring or stuffy museum! We were about half way round when we noticed Matt wasn't looking too good. He was flagging behind and seemed hot & sticky and feeling a bit light headed despite the centre being air conditioned. He decided to pop out to the toilet and see if splashing cold water helped and when he returned he did seem a little brighter. By this time we had almost come to the end of the display and were making our way in to the shop. I reckon the fact I had picked up a number of things I quite liked the look of, influenced what happened next... Matt started to feel unwell again and quickly bought himself a drink to see if that would help. The only problem being once he had paid for the drink he found he was stuck to the spot and couldn't move away from the counter. Gareth & I quickly realised something was wrong and positioned ourselves either side of him just in time as he promptly fainted and fell to his knees, we managed to break his fall to the floor! A lady who saw what was happening along with the man behind the counter came to help us and, after a few seconds, he came round and we were able to get him to sit down with his head between his legs . The man was exceptionally kind and insisted Matt took a bottle of water, bar of Dairy Milk and a chocolate muffin to boost his energy levels and help him feel better, all free of charge! (of course they would have made him feel much better if he had been allowed to eat all of them but Gareth & I felt it was important we ate some too as a preventative measure!!) Eventually, Matt felt well enough to move to the car where the air conditioning helped him cool down and I took over the driving!!

Our next stop was the Mardugal Billabong Walk. This was just a short walk to a billabong and back where we spent a while hunting for more crocodiles. Unfortunately, we didn't see any but there were lots of fish splashing about and leaping out of the water so it seemed like they were trying to get away from something!

We decided our last trek would be the Nourlangie Rock which houses the Anbangbang Gallery. This is another aboriginal rock art site which includes paintings of Namaragan, the Lightning Man who features heavily in the aboriginal dreamtime stories . The trek is 2.5km long and takes you round a big loop of the main art sites and up onto a lookout point where you can see some interesting rock formations. To our dismay, this site was by the worst for flies and we spent the entire trek swatting them away from our ears, eyes and mouths which really did dampen our enjoyment of the site. Although we joked about it, we really did feel like we were going insane with all the buzzing and that at any moment we would lose our minds! I came up with a genius plan which involved using my hair to cover my ears while the boys pulled their t-shirts over their heads! While this did help with the buzzing sound, it just meant they all went for our eyes instead!!! We really couldn't win! Getting back to the car couldn't come soon enough. Especially when Matt's expensive sunglasses went flying and a lens popped out as he tried to swat a fly.

By now it was getting late, we had to check in at our hostel by 8pm and knowing we had at least a 3hour journey back to Darwin, we decided to make our next stop our final one . We pulled in to the Bowali Visitor Centre and unfortunately the shop was closed but the display area was still open so we had a look around there. This centre has won awards for their beautiful displays which describe the animals, aboriginal culture and the geology of Kakadu and its easy to see why! The displays were remarkable... So informative while at the same time colourful and engaging! We spent ages wandering round looking at everything.

Finally we decided we really had better be getting back on the road, so with me still behind the wheel, we set off for Darwin, only stopping to take photos next to some giant termite mounds and to get petrol! I was very excited to spot a kangaroo by the side of the road (our first one!!) and declared myself the winner of the animal spotting competition!! Matt took over the driving as we got closer to the city centre and at approx. 19:45 we pulled up outside Dingo Moon Lodge! Once we had checked in, we dropped off our bags & had showers then headed out into the city for food. We settled on an Italian restaurant where we all enjoyed big meals and refreshing drinks while we watched the nightlife kick in with lots of very drunk people stumbling up & down the road!! Unfortunately, as we had to be up at 3am we couldn't join them & climbed into our comfy beds at about midnight instead!!

After all the dramas at the beginning, we are so glad we persevered and made it to Kakadu. It was a wonderful first taste of Australia! And if the locals are to be believed and Litchfield really is better than Kakadu, it's an area we would love to go back to and explore further!