A Very Good Day......Part 1

We crossed the East Alligator River into Arnhemland and Oenpelli..........Permit Required.
Heads turning right and left....looking for Crocs (and not the kind you wear on your feet!)....

Then stopped to drink in the beauty of the Red Lily Billabong ......where I picked up a rusty flattened can and earned my friend and I the title of 'art chics' for the day........

We observed our Oenpelli sisters at the 

Injalak Arts and Crafts Center do a boil up of Pandanas Palm leaves......

Resulting in naturally colored material...........

For these fine hands to weave............

And then we headed into the hills with a guide.......
Not really prepared for the experience ahead of us.......



There is no Joy in Oenpelli.  The Indigenous People here do not smile.....make eye contact.....or converse openly with outsiders....perhaps not even within their own group.

Their culture is 50,000 years old................try to grasp that.

The ladies make beautiful baskets...........

We went on to hike the rocky hill........part 2