Buley Rockhole at Litchfield National Park

posted in: Northern Territory

I’ve got to skip the rest of my Darwin posts for now, hopefully I’ll get to post them at some point. After a couple of wonderful weeks in Darwin we made our way south to spend the night in Adelaide River.  We wanted to visit nearby Litchfield National Park and this was a good base for doing so.  We spent the night at their showgrounds, which honestly look like they haven’t seen a show in some time.  There was a small pool and we enjoyed all the large toads we saw that night.  Showgrounds are often cheap places to stay and aren’t the greatest, but at this one the amenities were clean and the grass was nice and green.  After we arrived and unhitched we immediately headed to Litchfield for a swim at Buley Rockhole. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? When we arrived it was very crowded, we weren’t even sure we’d find a parking spot.  Lots of people coming and going.  We realised it was Sunday afternoon.  Ooops.  We know better than to visit a place like this on the weekend but we’d forgotten what day it was and only planned to spend one day here, so Sunday it would have to be.  There were groups of people all up and down the pools, some with their music on and their grog in hand. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? The main couple of pools at the bottom were too deep for TurboBug to play in on his own, and the rocks above were too slippery to easily move around on.  So after we’d both had a swim we sat down to enjoy a snack.  You can see the lovely dental work he had done in Darwin, he had to have a filling right on those front teeth.  Hopefully when he’s older and willing to sit still in a dental chair they can make it look a bit nicer.  He did great, sat on my lap and opened his mouth when they asked, but he is only two and though he walked into the room willingly he pretty much froze when he saw the room full of dental equipment.  They worked as quickly as they could which means a not-so-nice looking spot on his teeth. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? Before long the crowd started to thin and we moved up to the upper pool where it was even less crowded.  There was a good swimming hole here that wasn’t too deep at the edges.  Other kids were jumping in and ours didn’t hesitate to join them. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? These next two pictures made me laugh.  Here’s SkeeterBug (10) doing a lovely dive into the pool.  So graceful, right? Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? The very next pictures on my camera were of JitterBug (8) leaping in.  Not so very graceful!  Why dive when you can launch yourself off the side? Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? Complete with a gigantic splash! Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? We took our new snorkels with us and had another go with them.  The kids took turns dropping things into the water and diving under to get them.  Endlessly fascinating for them!  I love watching them play in the water.  They’ve had so much time in the pool lately and they are all like little fish now. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes?Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes?Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? Further up the creek was a lovely little waterfall but we didn’t see anyone swimming up this way. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? At the top pool we found a good spot for TurboBug to wander around in.  The edges of the rockhole created a shallow entrance into the water so he could get in and out as he pleased.  LadyBug set up a little picnic area and we enjoyed all sorts of pretend goodies she gathered. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? I wandered around for some more views of some of the middle pools.  You can see Dad holding TurboBug with LadyBug next to them in this first picture, that’s the pool they were jumping into. Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? On the way out I admired the palms as I do everywhere we go! Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? TurboBug was happy to find a bridge where he could stomp his feet and make a great noise.  Which he did over and over again.  It was difficult to convince him to leave and I was carrying too much stuff to do a grab-the-toddler-and-run.  🙂 Buley Rockhole at Litchfield Nat'l Park | How Many More Minutes? Eventually he followed and by the time we left Buley Rockhole was not crowded at all.  A great swim on a hot day.  There are other waterfalls and swimming holes in the park but we chose not to drive any further in.  You can only see so much and we can’t swim in them all!  We did make a couple of more stops in the national park, post to come.

  1. […] our swim at Buley Rockhole we had two more places to visit in Litchfield National Park.  First we stopped to see Florence […]

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.