Macassan Beach - NT

Garanhan/Macassan Beach ?is a long, wide beach of white sand which contrasts with the rough-textured shelves of laterite that run parallel to the general line of the coast.

A narrow, dense strip of retja (monsoon coastal vine forest) overlies the rockshelf and a short walk behind the sandhills leads to a paperbark swamp. There are good shady picnic and camping spots under the casuarinas behind the rockshelf.

South of the sandy beach behind the rock shelf is Wurrwurrwuy, where a Yolngu record of the annual visits of the Macassan traders is recorded as stone pictures. Here visitors can walk among the stone pictures and learn a little about the history of Yolngu contact with Macassans over hundreds of years.