We started our day early, 7am breakfast, I mean, come on we are on holidays! But when you have to work with the tides, I guess that what it takes. And it was definitely worth it.
This morning we went for an 8 nautical mile cruise in one of the Explorers and then swimming in Crocodile Creek! Now who ever thought of that! We passed the Iron Islands and Nares Point (visiting the point a bit later in the day and having a closer look at one of the Iron islands).
We got to Crocodile Creek around 8:30am ships time, about 30 mins after a low tide of 2.91m.
One of the expedition crew went to the waterhole we were going to swim in to check for crocs…… seriously. 
At high tide crocs can get into the area, but usually leave due to the fresh water. We were given the all clear, walked up about 8 steps and then about 15m along, a rocky trail to a small waterhole with a waterfall gently cascading into the pool. There was one of the expedition team stationed above the waterfall keeping an eye out for unwanted visitors of the salty kind!
We had a great time swimming in the waterhole. 
It was cool water for the top metre or so and warm water below that. Apparently this occurs due to the colder Creek water flowing down over the top of the sun drenched warm saltwater of the waterhole, the two don’t really mix. We swam for about an hour. Apparently we shared the waterhole with quite a few small fish- Mangrove Jacks, Trevally, Mudskippers and even jelly fish. We had a slower trip back to the boat. Going back there was a bit of wind swell, and the Explorer bounced around a bit and occasionally streams of water flowed down the length of it.
We had a great time.
Not long after we got back we had a Geology 101 lecture given by Ian Herford. It was an interesting talk setting the ground for a more specific talk on the Kimberley in a day or 2.
After lunch, we took an afternoon cruise to Nares Point and the Iron Islands. The seas were alot smoother this trip. We stopped at a few examples of the geological formations Ian had talked about in the morning and he explained 
more about them.o Then it was onto Nares Point, a small beach with a couple of siltstone caves, one of which is home to a small micro-bat colony, but unfortunately we didn’t see any. There were a few different kinds of animal tracks on the beach, our crew thought they were probably bandicoot and lizard tracks.
After we finished there, we took a slow cruise back the way we came, taking in the scenery. We learnt something really interesting about some of the Eucalyptus trees up here. Some have rough bark on their trucks and smooth bark on their branches, apparently, the rough bark helps the trees survive bushfires, if they had smooth bark all over, they would die in bushfires.
We spent a bit of time offshore from the Koolan Island mine site. It is a high purity iron ore mine, with iron percentages around 65% purity. 
The mine is 55 years old and is estimated to have another 20 years life. It is an open cut mine right on the coast. A seawall has been left/built to hold out the ocean, the mine is currently around 180m deep! They have pumps running constantly to expel seawater. There was a Osprey nest with eggs and one of the parents sitting right on top of the shiploads axle.
We has an easier cruise back to the boat today, much smoother waters and less speed.
One thing I’ve noticed up here, there is a distinct Kimberley tidal mark on all the rocks, its a black zone that stains the rocks from the low tide mark to the high tide mark. It is actually a bacteria that is possibly related to some of the first forms of life on our planet.
All, well most of, the sandstone here has a very red colour to it. Not all of it is “iron ore”, most in fact is just leached out iron on the surface of the sandstone, and if you chipped it off, the rock is much lighter colour of white underneath.
Later in the afternoon Deb took the opportunity to have a bath overlooking the Kimberley coast, I went to a wine tasting with paired canapés in the Bridge Deck lounge.
Deb really enjoyed her bath and I had a fun time at the Purser’s wine tasting. Manfred, our Purser, was very personable, knowledgeable and funny. And the wines he chose, a Sauvignon Blanc, a Pinot Noir and a Merlot were very tasty. Deb made it to the lounge at the end of the tasting for the review of the day and a briefing of what lies ahead for us tomorrow – morning cruise and afternoon at the Horizontal Waterfalls. ( a heads up for anyone reading this, word is out that the runs through the Horizontal Waterfalls will be stopped for good sometime next year!)
We had dinner with Colin and Carol, again, and had an enjoyable night.
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