Cobourg Peninsula 23-08-11

 

Tony, Jennifer, Michael and I leave camp early to go down and hang around the river crossing to watch the world go by.  Tony tells us to cross over if we think it’s safe (usually he goes first to test the waters so to speak).  Well what a surprise, the water level has fallen dramatically, still deep on the upside of the river, but on the downside (there is a concrete causeway) the rocks are exposed and the river seems to consist of rock pools.  I wonder where those crocs went? 

There is a man fishing but otherwise all is quiet, no sign of crocs.  The rest of our party all cross over and we are now in Arnhem Land..  255 kms of corrugations, sand and dust.  The road is in quite good nick apart from this.  We nearly came off the road as we came around a sharp turn, slid in the sand and the car yawed all over the road., fortunately Michael was able to gain control and we were a bit more circumspect after that.  It was a long drive, people were tired and we were glad to reach our destination.

Peter C lost his CB radio aerial, it bounced off and hit the windscreen on its rubber tip, they stopped to look, but of course it could have been anywhere.  Looks like he will have to rig a ‘coat hanger one’.

Cobourg Peninsula is not as I imagined, I expected tropical vegetation, but it is lowish scrub of some kind.  We are not at all far from the beach (just over the road), it looks wonderful but……we can’t swim.  Salt water crocodiles. 

There is quite a strong wind blowing all the time.  The camp has 2 showers; one hot (solar) and one cold.

We have found a place to fish and drive down there late afternoon.  All of us have been asking ‘experts’ for info on the best bait, lures, etc  We now have as many different stories as there were ‘experts’.

Tony catches a fish – Craig tells him it is too small so it goes back into the sea.  No one else has any luck and we lose 12 lures between us on the rocks!!!  Craig breaks his rod - the top breaks off!

Nice night around the campfire and off to bed, the wind picks up during the night and is quite strong.  Everything is fine, everyone has secured their tents well.

These are the croc warning signs, this one was from kakadu