En route to Darwin, Australia. Arrive on 12-Feb.
So, time to visit the Daintree Rainforest. A 90-minute drive from Cairns brought us the Daintree river, where our guide casually mentioned that less than two weeks ago the river was a full 12 meters higher due to flooding. It was obvious the local authorities were still recovering.
Seems the Daintree is a rainforest stuck out of time, surviving since the Gondwana super continent. I can’t claim we were rugged explorers within the rainforest, as we stuck to the wooden boardwalk trail. But our guide was good and I learned about the different layers of rainforest structure. Several times I was amused to see how trees were allowed to grow thru the boardwalk.
We had lunch at the Lync Haven restaurant. They offered basic salads and burgers, but the serving sizes were amazing. I enjoyed the Tandoori Chicken salad once I removed the olives (I can’t stand olives). While waiting for our food we fed the wallabies within their retreat. Seems they like sliced sweet potato. Look for the shy joey.
Not all the joeys had perfect form. Yes, that is his leg sticking out.
Wallabies are much smaller than kangaroos, and live in the forests. Kangaroos are made big and fast as they must follow the rains on the plains, where the wallabies stay in the moist forests. I learned that their hips do not allow for separate leg motion – which is why they must hop. There is a single exception, the tree kangaroo, which lives in trees (duh).
It was here that I was introduced to the Australian “Ute“, or utility vehicle. Seems the Aussies take cars and just chop off the back, leaving a tray to hold various things. I’m not talking a pickup truck. I even saw police versions. The below picture includes an impressive snorkel for forwarding rivers (and flood waters).
Seems we are here during the raining season, and all the locals said the recent rain were particularly heavy. Well, I guess that’s why they call it a “rainforest”. But I have not been so wet since I left the Army.
After lunch we traveled to learn crab hunting from an indigenous guide. The tide was going out, so we were told not to worry about crocodiles and jellyfish. We started with spear throwing, both by hand and by spear thrower, which I had never used before.
We then spent two hours walking the (rather firm) mud flats near the mangroves. We caught some crabs (none very impressive) as they moved from the shallows due to the lowering tide. We also found some young puffer fish. We then were fed some fresh boiled crab (the ones steamed with sweet pepper were excellent) and our guide explained the different uses of the various animals and material.
At the end of the day, we were tired and wet in places I don’t want to talk about. But it was a good day, and I felt far more involved than yesterday’s super-touristy trip to the Great Barrier Reef.