Three trips on the Daintree River - was it too much?

The answer?  No!

December 26

We wanted to spend as much time on the river with Ian "Sauce" Worcester as possible, but ended up with even more time.  Sauce had told Trish to meet them at 7:30, but turns out he told her the wrong time and called at about 6:45 to ask if we could come down to the jetty as soon as possible.  We threw on some clothes and quickly walked over.

There was another couple in the boat as well, Ray and Alma from Melbourne.  Ray was also a video guy so he and Steve sat in the front and quickly bonded.  To Ray, everything was worthy of a pun, and he was a hoot.

It was gray and drizzly, and after awhile turned into a downpour.  Sauce gave up and took us back to the dock, told us to get breakfast and come back at 9:30 and we would still go on the full two hours.

On cruise 2 for the day the sun came out, and it was a great trip.  We see the Black Bittern and Great-Billed Heron, and the Papuan Frogmouth and babies.  There are looks and opportunities for video for the Azure Kingfisher and Shining Flycatcher.  The smell of ylang-ylang is in the air, and the night flowering blooms are hitting the river with an audible plop.  (I can't find the correct spelling, but it is something like night flowering borotonia).

These flowers are so beautiful.  They hang down over the river in a sort of string of blooms that look like puffballs.  They bloom at night, and in the day all simply fall into the river.  The surface of Barratt's creek is covered with the fallen blooms.

The sound is so audible, and they look so light and fluffy, that I ask Sauce how heavy they really are.  He gets me a net to scoop one off the surface of the river (crocodiles you know...wouldn't want to put your hand in there!).  There are four pointed petals at the base, that are quite waxy and heavy, then all the thing filaments that are very soft.  From the river they don't have much scent, but if you pick one directly from the tree, they are really fragrant.  He shows us the only pink one he knows of on the river.

The native yellow hibiscus was blooming, and he picked one of those for me and took a bite!  They are edible, and taste a bit like lettuce.

We also saw an absolutely huge crocodile sunning itself.

I asked about a tree that had big red spikes coming out the top.  Turns out it is the fairly common umbrella plant that many of us have as houseplants, but it only flowers there.

Sauce also points out a tassel fern that only grows there; a black bean tree where if you break a small branch it smells like cucumber, beautiful water and river gums that hang out over the river and have beautiful trunk patterns; and, huge basket ferns.  A Ulysses butterfly actually sits still on a tree for us to look at.

End, Part 1!