Darwin

Darwin was a bit of a whirlwind stop. It kind of had to be cos it was so darned expensive!! I will never complain about Sydney prices again! Darwin’s got a pretty interesting history, and is full of WWII relics, references and memorabilia. Being up there really showed how WWII was on our shores. The government kept a lot of it under wraps at the time to minimise the fear amongst Australians of how in danger we really were. It struck me as an incredibly resilient city – every time it gets ‘knocked down’ eg war damage, cyclones etc, it just seems to shrug its shoulders and get on with putting it back together, only better than before. The architecture up there is mostly modern with some fantastic buildings. It feels like a real boomtown with so much building going on. It’s a Mecca for architects, construction workers and tradies. Darwinians are rightly proud of being from Darwin, and their resilience and pride gives the city a real vibrant buzz, sense of optimism, freshness and confidence that’s quite infectious. We liked it a lot, but the cost of living there would certainly play a large part in veto-ing it! I don’t understand why it’s so expensive, as it’s the closest to the rest of the world out of any city in Australia, so surely importing stuff, and freight, would be less expensive. I dunno! Anyway, I didn’t take many pictures of Darwin, but on our last night there, when we were at Mindil Beach markets, the sunset was one of my most memorable. Absolutely stunning watching the sea turn from cobalt blue/grey to violet. And it felt great to dip our feet in the very warm sea and take it all in. 

Getting a little more purple

A little out of focus, but the sea is ‘Cadbury’s purple’! Delicious and delectable!!

Jumping Croc Cruise – Adelaide River

We did this on our way to Kakadu, and it ignited Elliot’s fascination for crocs! We’d seen our first two wild ones, quite by accident, in the Roper River, whilst at Mataranka. But we were well and truly deep in croc country now, and heading towards an area (Kakadu and Arnhem Land) where they are not removed by Parks and Wildlife to suit the influx of visitors. On this boat tour, we must have seen about 30 crocs in the river, most of them around 3 metres long, but a couple of whoppers at about 6 metres. We learnt a lot about them, including breeding and hunting patterns, and how their numbers are more than healthy now due to them being hunted to endangered levels a few decades ago, and all hunting banned from then. That’s why the majority of crocs you see are around 3 metres, because they’re about the age when croc hunting was banned. There’s not many of the big fellas left. I suppose that means that in 30 or so years, most of the crocs will be about 6-7 metres long! A scary thought! Despite them being scary and just a tad dangerous, on learning about them, I found them to be fascinating, incredible creatures and I have a lot of respect for them. They are, after all, true living dinosaurs. Anyway, the boat tour – there were two young women who would dangle bits of meat off hooks attached to a pole. The crocs would jump up out of the water to get it. That’s natural behaviour – they spot their prey, dive underwater, then power up vertically to grab their prey in their jaws, then go into a death roll to drown it. They have very small stomachs, so don’t need much food. And it’s not true that they need their meat to be rotting to soften it before eating it. They like it fresh. So if they grab prey that’s way too big for them, they eat what they want, then jam the rest of the carcass into logs/driftwood/rocks in a river, where crustaceans and small fish fed off it, and in turn attract larger fish which becomes the croc’s next meal. Kind of like stocking up your larder, or even farming ‘croc style’. Although they can go without food for a year, they are opportunists, and eat whenever there’s something there. They also have an inbuilt GPS type system located around the two bones running along the top of their heads. When they see their prey, for example, standing on the river bank, they lock that into their GPS, so they know exactly where to pop up and grab it after they’ve dived down. Aboriginal people taught white man to never collect water, or enter the water from the same place twice, because the croc will learn this after the first time it’s spotted you and ‘locked you in’ to its tracking system. I guess that’s why popular and easily accessible drinking spots for animals are a favourite hunting spot for crocs. Like taking a lolly from a baby! OK, here are some shots:

Beautiful symmetrical patters of their scales running down their back. They love murky water to help them in their stealth hunting mode. 

You can see the two bones that look like ridges running down either side of their head behind their eyes. This is where their ‘GPS’ system is. 

One taking a leap. The netted platform hanging over the side of the boat is where the staff would stand to dangle the meat from. 

This is a photo back in the tour’s office. A sight that would have been quite common when trophy croc hunting was a free for all and considered ‘fun’. This beast would have been well over 100 years old.

We also saw lots of other birds and wildlife on the tour…

A huge Sea Eagle

A Waterbuffalo. These are considered very dangerous, as they’re territorial, short tempered, fast, powerful and very heavy! A big croc does not hesitate to bring one of these down though, if given the chance. What a handsome face this one has! I actually had the urge to jump out of the car and go up to it to grasp it’s jowls between my fists and give them a bit of a shake – like you might do with a cute chubby baby (except toned down a lot of course for the baby!!). Not surprisingly, that was a fleeting thought, but it brought a smile to my face anyway! Waterbuffalo are one of the many feral animals in Australia that are wrecking the land. You can imagine how much damage these fellas would do eh?