Litchfield National Park

Litchfield is the park Darwin uses on a day off, close enough for a return trip on sealed road and organised around water. Florence Falls drops in twin streams into a deep pool at the bottom of a staircase through monsoon forest, Buley Rockhole is a chain of small cascades and pools you can sit in, and Wangi Falls has the largest and easiest pool, right beside the car park. Tolmer Falls is for looking at rather than swimming, since the cave below it shelters a bat colony. Along the entry road, magnetic termite mounds stand in a grass plain like thin grey slabs, all aligned on the same north-south axis, with taller cathedral mounds nearby.

History

The area is important to the Kungarakan and Marranunggu peoples, whose ancestral spirits, still present in the land, shaped its landscape, plants and animals. The park is named after Frederick Henry Litchfield, a member of the Finniss Expedition of 1864, the first to reach the Top End overland from South Australia, which tried and failed to found a settlement at Escape Cliffs; in September 1865 Litchfield led a small party towards the Daly River, the first Europeans in what is now the park, and it was proclaimed a national park in 1986 (Wikipedia, Litchfield National Park).

What you'll find

• Florence Falls - twin falls and a deep plunge pool reached by a long staircase.
• Buley Rockhole - a chain of small cascades and shallow pools to sit in.
• Wangi Falls - the largest and most accessible swimming pool in the park.
• Magnetic termite mounds - thin grey mounds on a plain, all aligned north to south.

When to go

May to September is the dry season and the reliable time to swim. Come on a weekday if you can, as Darwin residents fill the pools at weekends. Early morning gives the best light in the gorges and the fewest people. After heavy rain the pools close until water levels drop and rangers reopen them.

Good to know

Pools close without much warning after rain, and Wangi in particular can be shut for long stretches of the wet season, so a visit can turn into a drive with no swimming. The main sites are busy and the car parks small. Some of the more interesting corners, including the Lost City sandstone formations, need a four-wheel drive.

Nearby

Darwin is an easy drive north, and Kakadu National Park lies to the east.

Key facts