Many is the time I have sat watching the water and suddenly a bird pops out, they are of course, Cormorant. They can swim underwater for lengthy periods when fishing. They are often seen on the banks spreading their wings to dry them in the sun.

Our first morning on the river was very calm and peaceful. The water was like a mill pond and we were enjoying just sitting quietly reading, writing the blog and watching the

birds fish.

Suddenly Roger noticed a small boat heading in our direction.

It stopped about 10 metres from us and the 3 occupants started casting their fishing nets. But instead of hauling them in, they jumped over board!

Roger and I watched with great interest.

They drove long stakes into the river bed to hold the boat and nets in place. It was only then that we noticed they were STANDING in the river and it was only waist high!!

For those of you who haven’t realised the significance of this, we were anchored and we draw 6’8”!!!!!!

Roger quickly put the depth gauge on to check our depth and of course, we were ok. So I settled back to watch the fishermen.

The 2 in the water swam into the net enclosure and started diving down, just like the cormorants. They were under for up to 30 seconds at a time and would surface having caught crabs and fish in with their bare hands.

I watched a while and took my photos and was just enjoying the whole scene when I realised they were now only about 5’ away from us.

Roger wasn’t too concerned, saying that we were just swinging, but when we checked the depth gauge we were in 5’9” of water. As the fishermen were there and they had nets out, we couldn’t start the engine, so Roger went forward and hauled in a load of chain thus moving us to deeper water. This was one occasion I was glad I am inquisitive!!!

Shortly afterwards the fishermen gathered their nets to cast them again, so we took the opportunity to up anchor and move to a safer distance.

It was really funny because when we started the engine and started to move, all the little birds that had been nest building appeared from nowhere in a flurry of activity with twigs and sticks in their beaks as if they were frightened their new home was going to leave them.