Kakadu National Park’s vast wetlands and stone country

Kakadu National Park in Australia’s Northern Territory expands inland from the small town of Jabiru, where sandstone escarpments rise above sweeping floodplains and tidal wetlands. It is one of the largest protected landscapes in the country and carries dual UNESCO World Heritage status for outstanding natural and cultural values.

A living cultural landscape in Australia’s tropical north

Kakadu National Park lies in the tropical north of Australia, in the Alligator Rivers region east of Darwin, with Jabiru as the main service town within its boundaries.The nearest city is Jabiru and the protected area stretches between the Wildman and East Alligator rivers across a vast sweep of monsoonal country.Situated between the Wildman and East Alligator rivers

The park covers close to 20,000 square kilometres (about 7,700 square miles), extending from low-lying coastal mangroves through freshwater floodplains and open woodland to higher sandstone ridges.Kakadu covers almost 20,000 square kilometres It lies within the monsoonal tropics, where a pronounced wet season shapes rivers, billabongs and billowing expanses of grasses that dry and burn in the drier months.

World Heritage recognition for culture and nature

Kakadu National Park holds a rare place on the UNESCO World Heritage List as a site recognised for both cultural and natural values.It is inscribed as a cultural and natural World Heritage Site The first stage of the park was inscribed in 1981, with further extensions in 1987 and 1992, and an additional area at Koongarra added in 2011.Kakadu was first added to the World Heritage List in 1981

The inscription highlights an extraordinary combination of ecosystems and a deep human story. Kakadu protects almost the entire catchment of a major tropical river system, with estuaries, floodplains, lowlands and plateaux supporting habitats for rare and endemic plants and animals.A complex of tidal flats, floodplains, lowlands and plateaux At the same time, the park is described as a living cultural landscape, with Aboriginal custodians maintaining connections to country that stretch back tens of thousands of years.Kakadu is described as a living cultural landscape

Rock art galleries on the stone country

Across Kakadu’s sandstone outliers and escarpments, rock shelters preserve one of the most significant concentrations of Aboriginal rock art known, with thousands of recorded sites spread through the stone country.There are more than 5,000 recorded rock art sites in Kakadu Two of the best known galleries are at Ubirr and Burrungkuy, the latter also known by the name Nourlangie.The main rock art galleries are at Ubirr and Burrungkuy

At Ubirr, overhanging rock provides shelter for layered paintings of fish, turtles and kangaroos, rendered in a distinctive x-ray style that shows internal organs and bones alongside silhouettes of ancestral figures such as Namarrgon, the Lightning Man.The main gallery at Ubirr contains x-ray paintings and ancestral figures Nearby, the sandstone mass of Burrungkuy rises above woodland, its galleries including the Anbangbang shelter, where images of Namarrgon and Barrginj stand among other figures painted and repainted over long periods.

Wetlands, billabongs and stone escarpments

The breadth of terrain inside Kakadu National Park is striking, with tidal flats and mangroves in the north giving way inland to floodplains and billabongs bordered by paperbarks and pandanus, then to drier woodland and rocky uplands.The park extends from coast and estuaries through floodplains and lowlands to ridges and stone country Yellow Water, also known by the name Ngurrungurrudjba, is one of the best known billabongs, a broad expanse of permanent wetland in the southern part of the park near Cooinda.Yellow Water is a landlocked billabong

Further south and east, sandstone plateaux and escarpments form what is sometimes called the stone country, with sheer faces and weathered outliers rising above the surrounding plains.Nourlangie is described as a massive sandstone outlier From these higher areas, views stretch over the floodplains of the Alligator Rivers system, where winding channels, seasonal lagoons and open grassland together form a mosaic that reflects changes in rainfall and river levels.

Visiting Kakadu National Park: what travellers from Western Europe should know

• Kakadu National Park lies in Australia’s Northern Territory east of Darwin, with road access from the Stuart and Arnhem highways and Jabiru serving as the main service town.
• The terrain ranges from flat floodplains and wetlands to rocky escarpments and sandstone outliers, and some walking tracks include sections over uneven rock and short climbs.
• The park’s regions include areas such as East Alligator, Jabiru, Burrungkuy and Yellow Water, each with distinct landscapes of wetlands, woodland or stone country.
• The official language is English and the currency is the Australian dollar. Entry requirements depend on your nationality; UK travellers can check the FCDO travel advice at gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice, Irish travellers the Department of Foreign Affairs at ireland.ie.

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Frequently asked questions about Kakadu National Park

Where is Kakadu National Park?

Kakadu National Park is in the Northern Territory of Australia, east of Darwin, with the town of Jabiru inside its boundaries in the Alligator Rivers region.

What can visitors expect on a visit to Kakadu?

Visitors encounter a mix of wetlands, billabongs, open woodland and sandstone escarpments, together with Aboriginal rock art galleries at places such as Ubirr and Burrungkuy.

What makes Kakadu National Park distinctive?

Kakadu stands out for its dual World Heritage listing, large continuous tropical landscape and the depth of its Aboriginal cultural heritage expressed through rock art and ongoing custodianship.