Camper - Daintree

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Today, we have decided to go to Daintree, via Mossman Gorge. The Gorge is about 15 minutes drive away, and we set out early to try to beat the crowds. We park by an information centre that turns out to be about 20 minutes walk from the gorge itself. The walk is very nice, though, on a road through the rainforest.

The gorge is... well, it's gorgeous, as you might expect! There are quite a few people there, though. Eddie sums up the courage to go paddling (yes, that is very brave), and eventually coaxes me in too. The water is very cold, but after a minute or two it's lovely. There are loads of fish swimming around, looking at the strange new tree trunks that have arrived in their home. A few very very very brave souls sum up the courage to actually go swimming. We would have too, of course, but darn! we forgot our towels. Oh well.

After the gorge itself, we go for a walk through the rainforest (via a rather wobbly rope bridge!). It is a prescribed route (I think they want to limit the human impact on the forest as much as possible). It is a lovely walk. The weather is very pleasant for it too. Highlight of the walk is spotting some kind of reptile, which we think may have been a dragon of some description (mainly because we saw something similar in Cairns Tropical Zoo described as a ... dragon).

After our walk, we head back to the van for some lunch (after a quick and delicious ice cream in the car park... all the nicer for having worked up a bit of a sweat on the walk!). Then we depart for Daintree. As we approach Daintree, the weather gets progressively cloudier. When we get there, the sun is gone completely. Daintree village itself turns out to be pretty damn tiny. Essentially, it is a single road containing and information centre, a general store, a cafe/bar, and a camp site. In fact, it's so small, we miss the campsite completely the first time around, and find ourselves looping back in the direction we came. But eventually we make it back and sign up for the night. One of the people running the campsite is also offering boat tours down the Daintree river, where there are crocodiles to be spotted. There is one leaving about 30 mins after our arrival, so we sign up for that too.

On the boat trip, it starts drizzling, but the boat is covered and it is still quite warm... and before too long he does spot a crocodile lounging on the banks. He's not very active; it's not the best time of year for it, apparently (this being their winter). The best he manages is a little yawn. Still, it is quite a thrilling experience! This is the only croc we spot on the trip, but we do see a few other interesting things, including a tree snake, another kookaburra, another Ullyses butterfly, and a variety of nice birds.

When we return, the weather steadily degenerates. We have read about a nearby spa, the Daintree Eco-lodge & Spa, which has a nice restaurant, so we go there for dinner. And it was indeed very nice. We sat out on a covered deck, overlooking a lily-leaf littered pool, with the constant sound of frogs in the background. As we leave, we are pleased to see one of these croaking machines up close. And as we drive away, we are less pleased to see several more hopping around on the slippery road... we just hope none of those croaked!

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