1... 2... 3... Jump!

2008-09-22 - Monday

Today we had another appointment with crocks, but these were the jumping variety!

We met up with the "Spectacular Jumping Crocodile Cruise", and our hosts, Ian and Sissy, who would be taking us out on the Aledaile river to meet these athletic creatures.

Ian's appearance seemed to be pulled right out of the Crocodile Dundee character woredrobe: Leather brimbed crocodile toothed hat, leather crocodile toothed necklace and leather wristbands. I don't really know which came first, the look or the movie, but regardless, it worked for him; and somehow added to his authenticity.

But, before the cruise, Ian introduced us to one of his "pets", a juvenile python named Monty, yep, Monty the Python ... Clever, yes?

As you can see from the pics, Monty was about 5 feet in length, was quite strong; but also quite gentle. As long as he was able to move where he wanted he was fine.

So, back to our jumping crocks. The crocks along this river have developed the unique ability to jump out of the water to grab birds from trees along the riverbanks.

Unfortunately, these pictures don't do any justice for the scale of these creatures. The smaller crocks that we saw were about 4 feet in size, with the majority of them being closer to 8 feet in length.

If you look at one of these pictures closely, you'll notice that the crock's hind legs are almost totally out of the water. That's because the power to perform the jump comes completely from their tail. According to Ian, once a crock commits to jumping, it has to follow thru; otherwise, the buildup of lactic acid in the crock's tail muscles could kill it.

Towards the midpoint of our tour, Ian and Sissy started to get quite excited. The reason... They had spotted the dominant male of this waterway, aka "Hannibal the Cannibal". Again, my pictures do no justice to the true size of Hannibal. As he pulled up along our boat, his snout almost in line with our bow, the tip of this tail reached back to about 3/4's to the Stern. He measured approximately 6.1 meters (21 feet long - giver or take a few). Ian had estimated he was close to 100 years old.

While everyone was quite impressed with the size of Hannibal, it was only when Ian had beached our boat, while Sissy encouraged Hannibal up on shore, that the true immensity of Hannibal could be appreciated. Just massive and easily over a ton in weight. And even with his years and size, he had little problem getting his massive structure above the water in his demonstration of crocodile jumping.

On the way back into the dock, for which we are now running about 20 minutes behind schedule due to our encounter with Hannibal (trust me, no one is upset) Sissy demonstrated the talents of some of the local birds of prey - throwing out piecies of meat as they swooped down and caught them with their talons.

With many a thank you given and the crocks left to rest, we were off to our next destination and home for the next two nights: Darwin.

Tonight is the first night we've had during our trek to really let loose and party a bit. To acoomplish this mission, we'll be heading to "The Vic"; a well known watering hole for backpackers, featuring a nightly $5.00 meal, games and drink specials.

For supper: Whatever the VIC is serving.