Wild Mary
THE Top End of Australia is so unique, with animals and plants that can only be found here, a wet season that can leave hundreds of billabongs and rivers full, while seasonal cyclones can destroy huge amounts of land, yet the balance in all this has to be seen to be believed.
One of these delicate and often under-rated sections is the Mary River NP just 150km out of Darwin and very much shadowed by nearby Kakadu. Mary River consists of a handful of small reserve areas which protect part of the huge Mary River catchment area covering a staggering 8000km² and is one of eight rivers in the Top End with huge water systems.
In the dry season from May to September, most areas are accessible to all vehicles, however many roads are unsealed. During the wet season from October to April, flooding can cause seasonal road closures. It has huge areas where monsoon forests, floodplains, savannah grasslands, paperbark and bamboo forests meet, and the best thing is it’s
