Australasia > Australia > Northern Territories > Kakadu National Park > Articles > On the Trail of the Rainbow Serpent

"The child cried louder and louder, whereupon a great wind sprang up and the Rainbow Serpent rushed into the camp, trapping everyone with its huge circular body and swallowing them forever."

The ranger's voice held a hushed group of tourists spellbound, as I examined the rock painting of the fabled Rainbow Serpent.

The tale also served as a warning to aboriginal girls brought here to learn about life as adults and how to take care of their children. The crying child in the legend had apparently been given the wrong food through carelessness.

This was Ubirr, one of the foremost rock art sites in Kakadu National Park in Australia's Northern Territory.

Other paintings here included a man with swollen joints, struck by a sickness for disturbing a nearby sacred site, as well as the figures of animals painted in robust condition to increase their abundance as part of the hunting magic. I saw barramundi, turtle and goanna on the rock face.

Kakadu comprises six different types of habitats including the stone country of Ubirr. The various habitats with the animals they support, and the ancient aboriginal rock art were the main reasons why Kakadu National Park was given World Heritage status.

One feature of the stone country that tourists have taken a liking to is the "lookout". At Ubirr quite a crowd had assembled to see the blood-red tropical sunset. On one side the floodplains stretched toward the sea, on the other stood the darkening rock formations of Arnhem Land.

Sunset is a special time in the Territory. Arriving next day in the quiet of the late afternoon for the last cruise on Yellow Water, I was amazed to see hundreds of people materialize just in time to board the flat-bottomed boats.

On this land-locked billabong in Kakadu National Park nature lovers were treated to a wetlands system comprising the billabong, river, floodplain and paperbark swamps. An area teeming with birdlife.

There were egrets, darter birds, jabiru, rainbow bee-eaters and white-bellied sea eagles. And the magpie geese, which had long been a special part of the aboriginal diet.

Crocodiles watched us warily, eyes and snouts just showing above the surface.

At the water's edge grew pandanus, used by aboriginal people for its edible fruit and as material for weaving and making rope. Pink flowering lotus flourished here.

Not far from Yellow Water was the Warradjan Aboriginal Cultural Centre, where the Aboriginal people or Bininj, had a story to tell to the non-Aboriginal people, the Balandra. A story told from many perspectives, by many people from different times.

There were tales of the creation period and the spirit ancestors or Mimi who were the first to paint on the rocks, the Rainbow Snake and Namarrgon, the lightning man.

Quoted accounts brought more recent periods to life and showed the good and bad experiences with the buffalo hunters, pastoralists and missionaries.

Tourism statistics indicate that international visitors have indigenous aboriginal culture and history at the top of their list of interests, and the variety of accents and languages heard at the Warradjan centre was certainly testament to that.

Back along the road to Jabiru was the turn-off to Nourlangie Rock, where there was a shelter which has been used by aboriginal people for 20,000 years to take refuge from the violent electrical storms of the wet season, and in which archaeological digs have unearthed organic objects like bone and bark string, rarely preserved in tropical Australia.

The rock art here dated from thousands of years ago, though some sections were repainted in 1964 in an attempt to encourage young aboriginal people to stay on their traditional land.

There were different styles, from stick figure paintings to the x-ray type.

In the Main Gallery was a picture of Namarrgon, the lightning man, depicted with a halo-like band around him connecting his arms, legs and head to indicate the lightning, and with stone axes on his knees to make the thunder.

One of the creation spirits, Namarrgon had come from the north but stopped at the western edge of Arnhem Land, sending his children all over the country, changing them from common grasshoppers into the spectacular alyurr, bright orange and blue grasshoppers which appear early in the wet season.

From the lookout at Nourlangie I gazed into the distance at the pillar-like cliffs of that Arnhem Land escarpment, sensing the ancient time when one spirit's journey had finally ended.

Articles

• More from Bruce Holmes