Hi all, the internet connection on-board our boat is tricky, seems it doesn’t like uploading larger files. I will update our blog when I have time either in Darwin or (spoiler alert) Bali.
Done
Big day today.
We were up a bit before 6am, we got our times confused! We had made our way overnight to Careening Bay(Wunbung-gu). It’s in an area of the Kimberley coast made famous by Lieutenant Phillip Parker King. His ship, The Mermaid was holed off Bowen, Qld and he eventually had to find a suitable place to Careen it (basically a place to beach it, that would also be easy to repair it) to effect repairs. King was mapping the coast of the Kimberley and knew its tides well. So he beached The Mermaid on a Spring tide, at a beach now know as Careening Beach in Careening Bay. While there, the crew carved the boats name and the date into a very large Boab tree.
Our day started with boarding the Explorers at 8am, so we had plenty of time this morning to watch the moon set and the sunrise.
We left the boat on the first of the Explorers at around 7:55am and had a very wet (just below our knees) landing.
We walked up the beach to change over to walking shoes and found fresh dingo tracks across the recent high tide line. 
We changed our shoes on rocks between a cycad Grove and a Kakadu Plum tree.
From there, we set out on a 1.6km walk through some rocky basalt countryside and dry monsoon creeks. It was a short walk to the, “Mermaid “ Boab tree. The tree is surrounded by a raised steel platform, to protect the root system from trampling and foreign diseases. From there we walked along some bush paths that circled back to the beach.
Along the way we saw a couple of Greater Bower Bird’s bowers (nest) ( I found the second, apparently the bower wasn’t there 2 week prior to this).
Along the creek beds we saw ochre rocks (red colour used in painting by the local tribes),
flowering Mulla Mulla bushes and more animal tracks – Quolls, dingos, crabs and various birds. We also saw a rare sighting of two Brolgas flying overhead.
On the cruise back to the boat we saw Long Toms ( fish) “flying” over the water (well more or less running over the water on their tails)
More animal tracks
, and some more. There are wild things out there!
A relaxing and enjoyable excursion. We were back on-board at 9:40am.
Later in the morning we had a lecture on Phillip Parker King, an explorer/cartographer, Australia’s first home born Vice Admiral and Colony Governor. It was interesting hearing about his life and times, and his connection to the Kimberley Coast.
Following that we had our mandatory Helicopter Safety Briefing, dry but very informative. We do our flight to and walk around Mitchell Falls tomorrow.
While the lectures were going on I noticed the crew doing checks etc to the ships lifeboat on the starboard side of the boat.
There is a lot of ship movement as we cruise to our next stop, apparently the currents are very strong through here and whirlpools are not uncommon.
Lunch at 12:15pm we had it in our cabin.
In the afternoon, around 2:15pm, we set out on a cruise up the Prince Regent River on an Explorer up to King Cascade (Mambulbada) The river is situated on a geological split that has resulted in it being almost perfectly straight for about 30kms. Our Explorer went at about 30Knots/hr for 1st half of the trip up there (20mins), and then we paused for a small pod of Snubfin dolphins (5-6). This species has only been classified in the last 6 years. They are small, very shy and hard to photograph. The river is lined with mangrove, and occasionally the mangrove green is broken by orange coloured trees in mangroves, these were Cedar mangrove trees.
We diverted into a side creek to try and find a flying fox colony known to be there. The Crocs and sea eagles like them for dinner. We saw the flying fox colony and then a sea eagle came through, disturbed them and grabbed one. Only to drop it back into the trees. 10 minutes later we saw a lone male crocodile, about 2m long,
We were soon at the entrance to the Cascade. A small inlet to the river, opened up into a large “pond” with a cliff on the southern side, the cascades. There were 3 main Cascade waterfalls, with a few more in between them and outside them. It was beautiful. The water of the cascades is fed by springs. Water that had accumulated over the wet season and then comes back out in the dry. It sort of sparkled. We both had a turn of having, a Kimberly Shower, off the front of the Explorer. It was very refreshing, standing under the waterfall.
We were told the story of an old very large crocodile that lives in the cascades area. Back during the Americas Cup in Fremantle, a young model, Fay Ginger Meadows, 24, from the USA was up at the Cascade swimming with others in the pond, and then was taken by the crocodile. Her body was recovered a few days later. The crocodile was never caught and is said to still live in the area.
We got final photos and left the cascades at 4:30pm.
On the way back the dolphins were spotted again and we stopped to watch them for a while. Then there was a larger 4 metre crocodile.
Then it was full steam back to the boat.
I loved the countryside along the river, it all looks so wild and untamed, beautiful rock features everywhere with mangroves by the water, all the way, and tree covered hills. I love this country. It was a great afternoon.
We arrived back at the ship around 5:10pm and had to wait a bit for the first Explorer to be loaded on-board. We were back in our cabin around 5:30pm.
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