Crocodile rock (Prince Frederick Harbour and Porosus Creek)

Welcome back dear reader to the easiest blog title ever. We left Vansittart Island and Gwion Gwion art in our wake to be informed at Recap that we would have an afternoon start for today. Winner. Jayne was most excited. A leisurely breakfast, some work on the belated blog posts and polishing of photos would be the order of the day. Then to Josh's lecture on crocodiles at 11am, followed by lunch and a zodiac trip up the Porosus Creek looking for the critters Josh had warned us about.

The lecture went overtime. To gauge its effectiveness, the majority of people were still there at the end and people remained behind to ask questions. It was a great mixture of information, statistics, and humour, measured by Josh's work in science, conservation and the crocodile industry. Josh is an interesting man with an amazing, eclectic knowledge, not just on crocodiles, his specialty, but of conservation, science and the environment in general. We had a most enjoyable dinner with him after the visit to Vansittart Island where we discussed indigenous art and archeology in Australia.

No, this rock doesn't look like a crocodile.

The whole area is stunning and I doubt that we would have seen it had we not come on this cruise. No, dear reader it is not a cheap and cheerful option, but it has been worth it. The experience of the Kimberley is not something I can easily describe and is certainly not something easily accessed. The ship is beautiful, the food is great, there are even activities for cruise type people, like French lessons, dancing lessons, concerts ad nauseam.



Post lecture and the long lunch we headed for the zodiacs and by pure chance we boarded the zodiac that was skippered by Josh. Winner (again). We hadn't moved too far from the ship before we spotted a sea snake. Absolutely beautiful animal just swimming around minding its own business until we turned up.

Pretty cute, eh?

The snake left us and we continued our journey to see more crocodiles. And see more crocodiles we did. The photos are testament. The statistics suggest around 6 crocodiles per 1 km stretch of river. One of the  most famous crocs of the region is Stumpy, a three legged croc. While there were tracks up and down the beach where he and his women live, they were not to be seen.

We continued on and motored up a side creek where we came across a  mud skipper. They are seriously huge up here.

Mud or mud skipper? Hard to tell where one begins and the other ends.

We followed up the mud skipper sighting with that of the Lesser Sand Plover, a migratory bird that would have only arrived this week from somewhere in Siberia or the Himalayas - according to Wikipedia. The Kimberley is a nice place to avoid the cold Siberian winter.

What is it with animals and mud?

Yeah, I'm looking at you.

So much for the warm up acts. Where is the main feature? Oh, yeah, just over there. At the mouth of a rapidly emptying creek as the tide ran out, two crocs were having a dispute over valuable territory. This was easy fishing. As the tide runs out the fish have to go with it and the crocs just sit at the end of the creek with mouth open and the fish literally swim in. Our exploration interrupted the battle and one of the crocs slipped silently away down the river. The other stayed and while he didn't challenge us, we got the feeling he would have, if we moved too close.

You might be a boat but I'll still bite you.

We did spot some other crocs but they were smaller and not in dispute, so not quite as exciting as our original sighting. It was time to head for home. Everyone on board was scanning the water looking for sightings. The tide, which runs up to around 6 metres, was almost out, the mud flats were exposed. I looked ahead and saw a croc. Or was it birds? Or a log? No it's a croc. I alert Josh. We both look, no it's a log I think. Agreed says Josh. Then the log moved. We had a found a reasonable sized croc on the mud flats eating a fish (a cat fish as it turned out). Rather unusual behaviour.

Catfish are not so easy to swallow.

Just when you thought there was nothing else to sight we came across some humpback dolphins. Sorry no photos, they are quite shy and don't wait for the cameras to be set before they disappear. That is now twice we have seen them. The Kimberley is just awesome.

Back to the ship. Drinks on the observation deck level 6 where one might play Titanic if one was immature enough. No, dear reader, we did not. Drinks with Ken and Moya and dinner on level 4 that was enhanced by a lovely little 8 year old red for Chateauneuf du Pape. This is living.

Until next time.

If a picture paints a thousand words (Vansittart Bay, WA)

It's time to leave the Australian rock legends behind and wander back to the gentler times of the 1970s with Bread. This post dear reader will be relatively brief and devoid of relevant photos. However, to continue the visual feast that is the Kimberley region, I will include some previously unpublished photos to sweeten my dirge of words.

The reason for no photos you ask? Today's expedition was to Jar Island to observe Gwion Gwion rock art. While we were given permission to take photos, they requested that we do not publish them on social media. Since I'm one of those bleeding heart lefties that you hear that right wing bufoon Alan Jones spew about, it is my right to observe the wishes of the original inhabitants of this land. Therefore ... what you'll get today is a thousand words and no pictures of the art. See what I did there?

So at the expedition briefing the night before, we were unsurprised to find that group Yellow B would be the second of eight groups to depart by zodiac for the short trip to the beach of Jar Island for the first excursion of two planned for the day.  This meant another early start since departure time for us was 7:10am. We are hanging out for the rotation among the groups since we (read Jayne) really feel we have done our fair share of early risings already!

Once on the beach, we elected to keep our reef shoes on while others changed into joggers for the 500 metre stroll up to Gallery 1 to have the first set of Gwion Gwion interpreted for us.  The figures are quite distinctive in their style with defined bodies and detailed representations of hands, fingers and body adornments, especially the large and intricate headdresses worn for particular ceremonies.  The art has been dated at around 17,000 years old.

Interestingly, they are sometimes hard to discern as you look at them with the naked eye but they come out of the rock more distinctly if photographed.

We retraced our path towards the beach and crossed over with the other Yellow group to view Gallery 2, a slightly more rocky walk which took us in behind rocks to another, more extensive and diverse set of Gwion Gwion.  Here there were snakes, people, an echidna and fish. The scene was described whereby the paintings would have been used as a backdrop to tell stories around the campfire at night both to entertain and instruct - the world's first open air cinema. For some more detailed background read this: http://theconversation.com/aboriginal-history-rewritten-again-by-ignorant-political-class-43996

The colour that remains is a dark red ochre stained into the rock but originally it is thought that there would have been black, yellow and white as well as the red to bring this dimension of the Dreaming vividly into the midst of the gathering.

After Gallery 2, we returned to the beach and then the ship via the zodiacs for a lunch interlude until the second part of the day - another zodiac trip to walk over a salt pan to view the wreck of a WWII C53 plane that crashed on to the island.

We had already decided that the expedition leader's representation the previous evening of what we would see was less than inspiring - vandalised, parts missing, unable to go inside the wreck.  We weighed this up against the huge responsibility to you, dear reader, since the blog was well and truly behind in its usual daily production.  We opted to forego the C53 experience and stay on board to catch up on the blog and emails.  We duly discovered that many of our co-passengers were similarly uninspired by the briefing and had also stayed put that afternoon.  Therefore the C53 will have to remain a WWII mystery to you all.

For the dedicated reader, you will be pleased to know that Jayne has rediscovered her love affair with the Pina Colada. It has become the go to drink when we have time prior to lunch. Although that is not often - this is, after all, an expedition, not a cruising holiday.

Tomorrow we are back on the zodiacs heading up Porosus Creek off Prince Frederick Harbour.

Until then.