Kakadu Animal Tracks Safari

Wildlife Safari & Authentic Aboriginal Culture

We conduct exclusive, 7 hour safaris within Kakadu National Park that combines wildlife and aboriginal bush food (bush tucker) gathering, and many other interactive aspects of aboriginal culture with a real bush aboriginal guide, culminating in a traditional aboriginal campfire bush food cook-up at sunset. This tour is for open-minded people looking for a personalised and earthy experience. We show you the Kakadu you imagined.

You may have seen us recently on TV shows: Getaway, Postcards, SBS Food Lovers Guide to Australia and Australian Geographic Films and in various Australian newpaper travel stories.

Our safari has exclusive access to 170 km. sq. of wildlife rich wetlands and tropical savannah woodland within Kakadu National Park including exclusive access to a seasonal unbelievable bird gathering spectacle. Small groups (max. 16 persons). We provide a truly unique and authentic experience. We stand out from the rest by providing exclusive wildlife viewing access, in an open-sided 4wd safari vehicle and extensive personal teaching from our expert aboriginal guide with a focus on hands-on activities that utilise all of your senses.

KEY POINTS

WHERE - Departs Gagudju Lodge Cooinda (near Yellow Waters), Kakadu National Park, Northern Territory, Australia.(Click here for suggestions on how to get to Cooinda and the advantages of self-driving and buses from Darwin).

WHEN - 1.30 pm daily (May - Oct) and returns about 8.20 pm

PRICE - $179 adults, $129 children 16 years and under.

HOW TO BOOK - Click here or on the Contact Us icon at the top

ITINERARY

At 1.30 pm daily we depart Gagudju Lodge Cooinda, Kakadu National Park, in our open-sided safari vehicle. We drive a short distance to the Kakadu Buffalo Farm reserve, a wildlife rich area of 170 km. sq. that only this tour has exclusive access to visit. Our bush aboriginal guide will then join us and from there we commence our real adventure. Our aboriginal guide is searching for wildlife, bush foods of plants and animals, useful plants for making baskets, mats and shelter as we safari. We have many breaks for hands-on activities and photos. Under the guidance of our bush-wise aboriginal guide we hunt and gather food, experience various bush medicines, and countless other authentic activities. It is possible to view many wildlife species on this safari with the highlight being an amazing wetland called Gindjala (Goose Camp) where from roughly July to September you may watch the largest bird gathering in the Top End at that time. At sunset, we make a camp fire at a remote location/wildlife viewing point and our aboriginal guide prepares bush foods using traditional aboriginal cooking methods. We also enjoy hot billy tea and fresh damper and relax to an amazing Kakadu sunset watching birds and animals on the move.

The homeward trip may yield some wildlife surprises and some good stories. We return to Cooinda about 8.20 pm.

It is honestly one of Austalia's few 'Real' Safaris.

QUALITY KAKADU DAY TOUR

ABOUT ANIMAL TRACKS SAFARIS

Directly assisting the local Kakadu aboriginal community: Our day tours commenced in Kakadu National Park, Northern Territory, in 2000. The senior aboriginal traditional owner (now deceased) requested we commence tours to enable the Kakadu Buffalo Farm to continue to provide preferred bush meats (buffalo, magpie geese, wild pig, fish etc.) to the aboriginal people of Kakadu. The tour pays a large percentage of gross tour proceeds to fund the Kakadu Buffalo Farm which has continued to provide bush food to smiling faces. The land is Aboriginal owned and Kakadu Animal Tracks tours has been granted special entry permission and other privileges that are not offered on other Northern Territory tours. We are a small, family operated business.

The Kakadu Animal Tracks Safaris has been a finalist in the Brolga Awards for the Aboriginal Culture and Heritage Category 2003, 2004 and 2005 and also for the Adventure Tourism Category 2005. You're welcome to look at our Guest Comments page for other guests opinions about this tour in Kakadu.

ABOUT OUR GUIDES

Top Tour and Guides - Our two leading guides have been named the best in the Northern Territory by winning the 2008 and 2003 Northern Territory Tourism Awards for Interpretive Guide NT. Our leading non-aboriginal guide, Sean Arnold, (2008 winner) has guided Animal Tracks safaris since it commenced in 2000.

Our aboriginal guide Patsy Raglar (2003 winner) is very well-known and respected in Kakadu and Australian Aboriginal Tourism and has been guiding since 2001. She was born in the bush and lived in bark shelters for most of her growing years. She survived for long periods with her family being nomadic hunter gatherers relying 100% on bush food in remote regions away from Europeans. She is one of few Australian aboriginals alive that has lived for long periods with no contact or assistance from Europeans. Her generation of true 100% Hunter Gatherers is the last that Australia and probably the world will ever see.

It is very rare to find a person like Patsy being involved in tourism and sharing her authentic knowledge and stories with strangers from very different backgrounds especially when English is her fourth language, she hid from Europeans when growing up and she still lives by very strict rules governing her interaction with all others (kinship) and overall, her culture is vastly different from modern western culture.

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