"The Outback meets the rainforest " a Northern Territory Travel Page by JustinJansen

The northern part of this state is known as the Top End to the locals. There are only 2 seasons here, the Wet seison and the Dry season. Darwin (pop 80,000) is located here and is the capital city of the Northern Territory. Darwin is a true tropical city and is the last Australian city before heading across the Aradura sea into Asia. The city is pleasant and has a laid back feel to it.

To the west of Darwin lies a huge World Heritage Area called Kakadu National Park. The park is renown for its unique Bird Life and rugged tropical beauty. It also has cultural importance to the Aborigine People and there are manu Aboriginal Paintings found on rocks and cave walls.
Kakadu National Park is Crocodile country in fact parts of the movie ?Crocodile Dundee? were filmed here and it is the crocodiles that are the most popular toerist attraction. There are also many spectacular waterfalls in the park and they are best viewed during the wet season. Kakadu is a huge 1.3 million hectares (3.2 million acres) in size and extends from the wild, sandstone escarpments of Arnhem Land to the east, to the mangrove-rich, tidal flats of Van Dieman Gulf in the north, and south almost to Katherine Gorge.

Alice Springs is the second biggest city in the Northern Territory. The Alice like local people call it is a modern outback city with plenty of air-conditioned shopping malls to please some tourist, but the city still has its pioneering charm. The city is surrounded by the Mac Donell Ranges and endless desert. This area of Australia is called the Red Centre, due to the colour of the sand.
Occasionally this sea of red sand dunes is broken by white salt from dried ou salt lakes.

Ayers Rock is located in the south of the state and almost the centre of Australia. The Rock as it is affectionaly known is probably the country?s most famous geographical landmark and is about a half day drive from Alice Springs. Further west of Ayers Rock are a group of 27 Domes called the Olgas which are even more spectacular and definanely worth seeing.

When you drive south over the main highway (Stuart Highway) you cross the border into South Australia. To the north is the Arafura sea and the nearest land, the Indonesian Island (Papua New Guinea). To the west is Western Australia and to the east there is Queensland.

The Birds

In this state there are 5 endemics Chestnut-quilled Rock Pigeon, Black-banded Fruit Dove, Hooded Parrot, White-throated Grasswren and Brown Whistler.
And there are more specialities like Pied Heron, Green Pygmy-Goose, Black-breasted Buzzard, Red Goshawk, Blue-breasted Quail, Red-backed Button Quail, Chestnut-backed Button Quail, Swinhoe?s Snipe, Flock Bronzewing, Partridge Pigeon, Varied Lorikeet, Rainbow Pitta, Great Bowerbird, Purple-crowned Fairywren, Rufous-crowned Fairywren, Green-backed Gergyone, White-linned Honeyeater, Rufous-banded Honeyeater and Grey Honeyeater.

The best birding is this state is the early morning and the late afternoons, because the heat makes the bird less active during the day. Nocturnal birds are at best observed during the first few hours after sunset.
To find the rarer birds off the Northern Territory you need to know the habitat off the birds well, and to know that for some species you have to try real hard to find them.

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Few Facts

AREA: 1,346,200 sq. km., POPULATION: 160,000
CAPITAL: Darwin (100,000)
TIME ZONES (Hours ahead of G.M.T) = 9.5hrs all year

LOCATION: In the Central-north of Australia between Queensland and Western Australia, and north of South Australia. CLIMATE: Highest temp. 48.2? C at Charlotte Waters; lowest -7.5? at Alice Springs. The Top End has a high rainfall in the 'Wet Season' (Nov.to March) with warm winters due to its proximity to the equator. The southern section has mainly hot, dry weather with very cold winter nights. Temp Darwin = Winter (jul/aug), 30?c Summer (jan/feb) 32?C. Temp Alice Springs = Winter (jul/aug), 20?c Summer (jan/feb) 36?C.

Darwin was first settled in 1839 after 2 previous attempts.
On Christmas Eve, 1974 it was practically obliterated by Cyclone Tracy and was rebuilt over the ensuing years with cyclone proof houses and is now Australia's most modern city.
It is also one of the fastest growing. Prior to the cyclone there was a population of around 44,000, there are now over 100,000 people living in and enjoying Darwin.
In the south, Alice Springs began as a repeater station on the Overland Telegraph Line between Adelaide and Darwin and grew slowly as people congregated around the tiny settlement. It was not until the railway line reached there in 1929 that the town began to prosper.
Alice Springs in 1969 had a population of some 8,000, today there is in excess of 30,000 living there.
The main industry of the Territory is beef cattle and massive stations measured in thousands of square kilometres comprise around half of the state. The other half is occupied by aboriginal groups and a permit is needed to access much of this land.
Uranium is mined in the mid-north and Tennant Creek has copper mines.
It was announced in November 1999 that continuation of the railway line from Alice Springs to Darwin would commence shortly. This guarantee was contained in the hand-over documents when administration of the Northern Territory passed from South Australia to the Federal Government in 1911 but has been ignored by successive governments (excluding the Fraser Government of the 1970/80's which charted a route for it) until now. Completion will open up fast passenger and freight services between Asia and the Southern and Eastern populated areas and should see increased growth and development of the Territory.