Crocodile spotting!

Yesterday we enjoyed a rest day and went on 2 tours on the Daintree River - one up stream just by our camp and one down by the ferry. They were great tours and we were fortunate to see several crocs of varying sizes from a baby that would have hatched in April, to a monster 4 metre one. We struck a great day for them as they were sunning on the banks. 

         

    

They are certainly creatures to be respectful of as to them we are just food and their cunningness and speed make us no match for them at all! Not a good idea to swim up here!  We were in a boat like this and you can see how big the river is.

          

We went across the ferry (which cost us $24 return!) to the Discovery Centre. We had an hour wait to get across as it was super busy with tourists in their hire cars doing day trips, tourist busses and 4WD vehicles heading north! We found a great spot for our picnic lunch then went through the centre but we were all disappointed as not one bird or animal was to be seen!

We shouted ourselves dinner last night at the local pub and we had a beautiful meal - prawn pie for us and prawns for Darryl! Yum Yum! Gail and Alan Mathers joined us -they have been in the same camp after their Cape trip and we've seen a bit of them! Funny that Darryl and I had to travel over 2000kms to meet Patti's brother and sister in law from Barham! 

Back at our camp, we watched the travellers flock in - mostly on their return trip from the Cape! Dennis and I were under the impression that we were going to be like pioneers and would be the only ones making it up to the top, but I reckon it's going to be rather busy up there! A group of 3 couples set up tents near us and we got chatting to them about their experiences - we have so much information our brains are in Cape York overload! These couples were Queenslanders and took tents up - which worked well for them till last nights rain! Water ran through their tents and they had a rather uncomfortable night! We felt quite smug in our campers - then the caravan people were probably smug cos they could pack up and we couldn't - and the people in the units would be looking down on all of us campers and feeling glad they were in dry comfy rooms! 

        

We knew we'd strike a wet day here and there and last night it was rather wet! Seemed like it rained all night - but we are under a tree and it dripped all night! So instead of packing up we decided to stay another night and let everything dry out. 

We headed to Port Douglas and had a coffee - with Claire and Greg Murphy!! They are staying at Port Douglas a couple of nights and found out we were here yesterday when they noticed the Arnoldt & Greenwood sticker on Dennis's ute! Small world! 

Port Douglas was very busy - except at the marina where we had lunch ( my goodness we splashed out and had 2 meals out in a row!) 

        

So hopefully tomorrow we will get an early start and try and get to Cooktown. We'll run out of bitumen after Cape Tribulation to just before Cooktown so Darryl and Dennis are getting excited about finally getting onto the Bloomfield Track and doing some real 4WDriving! I wonder which car will perform best?? They are busy taping up to keep dust out and have cardboard protection for the back window! We already know which car is more dust proof! 

      

                        

If you look carefully at Darryl you might see some facial hair - and Dennis is sporting a Port Douglas hair cut!! 

Hope all our readers are well and until our next blog, we excited travellers send our love! xxxxxxx