Ever caught a barramundi? What about a tour of Adelaide’s 200 wineries or a visit to Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park with an Aboriginal guide? There are many unforgettable experiences to be had in Australia. For starters, we’ve selected five, not to be taken for granted, from South Australia to the Northern Territory, and they’re all worth trying.
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Gourmet, adventurous, ancestral
Australia is a multifaceted land of extraordinary experiences. Driving on the Great Ocean Road and enjoying breathtaking views of the 12 Apostles, swimming among the multicoloured coral gardens of the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland and sea lions, spotting whales and dolphins and ashore the kangaroos that inhabit Kangaroo Island. Then there are the endless horizons, canyons and navigable rivers of the Northern Territory. So, where to start?
Wild and gourmet: enjoying life in Adelaide
Cultured, cosmopolitan, gourmet: the soul of Adelaide is multifaceted. White light, the wild sea just a stone’s throw from the city (a few kilometres to the quiet beaches of Grange and the busy beaches of Henley, 20 minutes by tram to Glenelg Beach, where surfers catch the best waves and swim with dolphins aboard Temptation Sailing boats). And that’s not all: more than 200 wineries scattered across the surrounding hills.
The wine capital, nestled between the banks of the Torrens River and the Mount Lofty Ranges, is South Australia’s premier metropolis where you’ll never be bored. There’s the free South Australian Museum for a better understanding of Aboriginal life with Australia’s most important collection of art and artefacts, the Central Market, a large indoor market that gathers the best local flavours, and good restaurants, such as Orana, for moments of culinary idleness: on the menu, indigenous flavours from bush berries to Coorong mullet.
Canoeing on the Katherine River
Katherine Gorge is the backbone of Nitmiluk National Park. Here, the Katherine River, in its passage from Arnhem Land to the Timor Sea, has carved out gorges, one of the wonders of the Northern Territory. In the dry season the waters are ideal for a canoe trip, in the rainy season they are an extraordinary sight when viewed from above with scenic flights or the ‘Australia in 360°’ app. Also, near Katherine, don’t miss the Biddlecombe Cascades.
To Uluru, the sacred heart of the continent, with Aboriginal guides
The iconic site of the Northern Territory is Uluru, within the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. It is a sacred place for the Anangu Aborigines, who have owned these lands for 22,000 years. Uluru is the Aboriginal name translated into English as Ayers Rock.
The geographical and spiritual epicentre of all of Australia is one of the ways to experience: walk the base of the monolith with Aboriginal guides listening to Dreamtime stories, dine at its foot savouring outback cuisine, discover its different faces with a camel ride or helicopter flight, or with the ‘Australia in 360°’ app and virtual reality.
Castaway: getting lost in the Tiwi Islands
They call them the ‘islands of smiles’ and are about a hundred kilometres north of Darwin, where the Arafura Sea meets the Timor Sea. A small archipelago of eleven points in the partly deserted blue. Only two islands, Bathurst and Melville, are inhabited by Aboriginals. They can be reached by a twenty-minute flight on organised excursions (the number of admissions is limited), by taking part in deep-sea fishing expeditions, walking on the beach with the Tiwi Sea Ranger in search of egg-laying turtles and shopping for authentic Aboriginal arts and crafts: paintings, sculptures, batiks and ceramics.
Fishing in the Northern Territory
Fishing in the Northern Territory offers much satisfaction to enthusiasts who can choose between ocean waves and inland waterways. Different environments, different fish, from marlin to coral trout, from snapper to giant Carangidae. Of them all, however, the star is the barramundi, a huge perch that, at thirty kilograms in weight and a sound metre in length, is one of the tastiest species found in the rivers and billabongs of the Northern Territory. The wealthiest season begins in January when the rivers increase their water flow, and the estuaries flow into the floodplains.
This is the best time for barramundi and giant groupers congregating in the mouths of the Top End rivers. You can hire an experienced skipper for a fishing trip or join a water safari in the Daly and Victoria Rivers and Kakadu National Park, where Fishing Tours are organised at Yellow Waters. Near Darwin Harbour, on the other hand, you can find many barramundi in the creeks and mangroves that characterise the coastline. Local specialist operators are excellent and happy to share the ‘secrets of the trade’ with guests. At the same time, the Gove peninsula in the eastern part of Arnhem Land is the perfect spot for a deep-sea fishing tour. Here, you can hook angelfish, mackerel and trout.
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