Lakes, Creeks and Croc Spotting

---

Very comfortable night's sleep in our swag bags - although we kept close together in case there were any wandering snakes or spiders! Was woken by squawking cockatoos around 6am! What a wakeup call! Was weird waking up and looking left and right to see the surrounding trees! Cornflakes and vegemite on toast for brekkie before packing up our things and heading to Joe Creek in Gregory National Park.

Had a 1.7km walk up and around the rocky red mountains to see Aboriginal drawings on the rocks. It was already hot by 8am! Really gorgeous scenery - not like anything I'd seen before - and very peaceful. On the way to the border between the Northern Territory and Western Australia, the bus started judderng and Jim announced that the bus had broken down - in the middle of the outback! Scene of a horror film or what! After fiddling with the tank however, Jim had fixed it! 'Dodgy fuel', he was muttering under his breath. Ate lunch at the border (you can't take fruit and veg over due to fruit fly probems) and after the obligatory photos at the border we set off for Lake Argyle.

It was hard to imagine how big Lake Argyle really was, being the largest expanse of water in inland Australia and twice the size of Sydney's Harbour Bridge! Jim drove us up to the viewpoint to see the blue waters and then went down to the water's edge - the non-croc part - for a swim! Had an impromtu boat cruise around the lake and saw some very cute rock wallabies and archerfish - which spurt water up at you if you hold your hand above the water (to kill insects from the leaves they're sitting on), very bizarre. Set off for the camsite at Kununarra - with showers and everything! Had to set up the tents in the dark which wasn't easy - I think we'll become pros at tentmaking before long!

Our guide Jim took us down to the waters' edge in the torchlight and I was shocked to see a big freshwater crocodile staring back at us just a metre away! Couldn't believe he and other red-eyed crocs were in the water just a few hundred metres from where our tents were! Later in the evening Chelley, Dirk and I stayed up chatting to Jim, who is an absolute legend. A true raspy voiced, beer bellied Australian with a hundred and one stories and a wicked sense of humour, you get the feeling nothing in the world would faze him. He comes from a small town near Perth with 80 inhabitants ('where 50% are related') and has five pet pythons!

I woke up at 3am in the tent to feel something dripping on me - it was pouring down with rain and we hadn't put on our waterproof covers as Jim had said there wouldn't be any rain! I wondered briefly if I could get away with falling back to sleep but it wasn't going to happen. Half-asleep, Chelley and I got out of our 2-man tent and spent far too long debating whether to put our tent under the sheltered roof or whether to put the cover on while there was thunder and lightning going on all around us. Eventually we decided on the latter option, got the cover on and went back to sleep. What a funny night!

---