Day 49

Day 49 Broome

Yesterday I mentioned that we were trainee Grey Nomads, I think Maureen took it a bit to heart as the

Maureen going for scale

Me entering scale

first job we did today after Maureen returned from the beach, was to go for a haircut and colour. Well I got the hair cut and Maureen got the colour. Mine was easy as I had a number 2 all over so not much grey to see now and Maureen had a trim and some colour to make sure there was no grey (boy am I in trouble now). To back track a bit, we started off wanting to see the Malcom Douglas Crocodile Park that on the maps was just around the corner from us at Cable Beach, but the site is abandoned and has moved 15 minutes out of town. So a quick google and we found out it only opens at 2 pm until 5 pm with a tour at 3, every day of the year – except Christmas, for those who are thinking

Welcome to the PArk

Black bamboo

of being in Broome for Christmas. So that gave us a few hours to kill, plan needed – drop Maureen off at shops to see about hair job, apparently takes a couple of hours!!! I would go into China Town and visit bank, get financial again, then meet up with Maureen who wou;d also check the Post Office for mail, have lunch then shoot out to Crocodile Park. Plan made and executed, I went back to shops, found Maureen in Hairdressers and said I would meet her at café, she said you look scruffy, sit down and see what the lady can do. Well 10 minutes later scruffy leaves looking like Brad Pitt yet again. Now I have to put up with all the fans getting us confused again – god I hate that, wonder if Brad has the same

Eclectus Parrot

Cooling in the shade

problem.

I had a coffee, the new Mrs Pitt walked down and off we went to China Town to visit the Post Office there as there are two Post Offices in town. Our lovely daughter Tia had mailed up a relief package for Maureen – Pants and some insurance documents for me. We got the mail, grabbed Subways for lunch and we headed out to the park. The park is pretty unassuming

Perenti

Black Cockatoo

from the road. When you get to the entrance there is a huge croc mouth you walk through, quite impressive. The first thing you notice is the huge pond in front that is a few hundred metres long and covered in green duck weed and you see a few crocs floating in it, you go up to the fence and look straight down and there are these huge crocodiles that you have not seen, they just blended in to the ground. These things are huge both in length and weight. I reckon they

The Red Baron

 

are over 2.5 metres long and according to the sing there are over 70 males in the pond. They were all hatched out together 21 years ago and they have all been together since then, no one else has done this.

Zooey

 

We then wandered off to another area where they keep the really big ones that have been captured from the wild. The first one you see looks dead. It is heaved up on the ground, legs all over the place at odd angles, look quite deflated, in fact I first thought it was a bad concrete model, then you look at the eyes and it is watching you. These boys are huge, I wanted Maureen to stand beside one to give us a scale, but she

Barn Owl

Dingo

would not be in it, I would of but my legs, you know. They look so docile and sleepy. We looked at the birds nearby and returned to the main area for the 3 pm show.

The presenter came out with a number of baby crocs and as we were all sitting down, he handed them out for us to hold and pass along, well most of us were sitting. A group of French tourists were standing up and walking

Dingo following me

dingo stuying the Beast

around and as we were passing them along they wanted to hold them. We were told to hold them by their tails as they are very strong and could easily get away and drop to the ground, hence we were sitting less distance to drop etc, but these rues apparently do not apply to the French. They had them on their heads and arms and every where else and as we had them a short time they were making a meal of

black dingo

 

them, in fact the other crocs had gone around almost twice and these guys had not moved on. The presenter eventually had to tell them to pass them along and sit down. Well the show got under way albeit with a couple of the French standing in the middle in front of the crowd sitting and he could not help but rip into them!

He outlined that the big pond behind him was full f 70 plus big crocs, that they could jump over 12’

Red Kangaroo

Whi tail Wallaby

and had in fact jumped over the fence in the past and when he got into the feeding area, they had jumped in with him so do not block the gates as he would be coming out post haste. He also said not to hold cameras over the top of the fence as the crocs saw it as food and could easily get up and grab it. Thank god for the French because as he was saying it on was reaching over the fence to get a picture and he said “like the guy

Maureen with Crocodile

Maureen smiling at Handbag

over there”. As he was talking there were crocs coming from everywhere. They were obviously used to thee 3 pm feed and there were dozens gathering, it was like a scene out of the old Tarzan movies. They were snapping at each other and fighting and there were crocs launching themselves back into the water and then you could see these lethargic animals move. In a blink from sleepy and relaxed to flat out run and attack

Hand Bag smiling back

Leather watch bad

or rush into the water! Their speed and reflexes were astonishing. He then fed a few and the snapping jaws were awesome in not just speed, but sound as well, it is hard to describe the sound, like to huge thongs clapping together. We then went to a pen of Alligators. these came from 6 confiscated in Sydney 20 odd years ago and they are really worried about them as if they escaped into the wild down there they would take over the river systems there as they can handle the cold.

We then moved on from the large pool to the individual ponds where the really big males were kept. Each of these had been caught in the wild and were “rogue” or problem crocs being too close to people. It turns out you cannot relocate crocs, they make a territory and if you move them 2,000kms away, they will swim back. In fact the crocs never leave their pens that they are now in. Some had some creative names on

The Boys gather for lunch

 

their pens such as ‘shy’ – rarely seen, or ‘rarely’ – rarely seen, sounds like the Creative Naming people from out of Tom Price had been through. But they were big boys of over 4ms long and huge in girth. Again, the ponds were covered in duck weed that they liked as it keeps the water cool and stops the crocs from getting sunburnt, but you cannot see them and he would throw a ball on the surface and it would

Feeding Alligators

 

explode with this huge croc going for it. I did not follow the group too closely as it was hard to get the Beast close enough to the action to see and the French were always on the phone gibbering away to people who were obviously hard of hearing as they were always yelling and you could not hear the guide. If it was not the French, there was a family that had 2 young kids who talked incessantly in loud voices as well. I went to a few other pens ahead and looking at the pool you would swear there was nothing there as it was smooth duck weed, but then you would see what looked like 2 leaves under the weed

 

Maniac

and then you could see that they were its eyes and it was watching you, quite spooky.

Apart from the crocs they also have a big collection of birds, wallabies, roos and dingos. The dingos were very interested in the Beast and would follow me along the fence I think either interested in the sound the motors make or the tyres on the gravel. We went around the park and wandered back to the presentation area where the presenter was talking to a few people. It turns out that Malcom Douglas was killed on the property and his wife has cordoned off the area and no one goes there, she was making the park his monument not the tree. Amongst the crowd going

Feeding time

Blue winged Kookaburras

around there was an obvious Crocodile Dundee fan in his Crocodile leather hat, RM Williams boots, RM Williams work pants, Crocodile leather belt and crocodile leather vest, not shirt. Would have pulled it off if he had had a few muscles to go with it and did not have lily white skin with a dropped six pack! I think a very special chid who never grew up, he was having a ball and did not mind parading around in his getup.

I am Batman. No, I am Batman. No, No...

Nothing up this sleeve..

From the Park we drove back to town and got some food for tea and returned to Girt. Maureen got a call from her brother Doug and he invited us out to tea at Zanders, just down the road from here on Cable Beach. It was great to catch up with Doug again and chat about families and stuff. The restaurant is spectacular with ocean views, a lovely outdoor area that allowed the gentle breeze to waft across, just perfect. Doug had been flying that day out to the rigs and had just returned. We are going to have him over to tea tonight at Girt, not quite as picturesque but it will be good to se him again.

Dinner with Doug is why this posting is a little late as we did not get home until late, it was oh 10 pm! The whole camp was asleep, these party animals of the Nomads, such a hectic pace!

Dinner with Doug