Croc Alert? - Escape River, Queensland, Australia
Harmonie
Don and Anne Myers
Wed 21 Jul 2010 05:19
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10:59.201S 142:39.718E
June 17th. Sailing frenzy day 5. 10
hours, 75 miles Perfect wind. Flat water. Sorry for the
repetition, but we feel the need to duly record such marvelous sailing
conditions since they don't happen often and rarely happen in
succession.
Picture 1 - Harmonie passing American boat
Priscilla this time. Still no racing going on, just a bit of speed on our
part (and a longer waterline, which might have something to do with
it).
We might have passed the English catamaran Camille
as well, but just as we were pulling out more sail to squeeze past them at the
entrance to the Escape River, one of Camille's lines jammed and they were forced
to jibe to port in front of us in order to head back out to sea and
sort out the line. We veered to starboard and whizzed past them, but the
thrill of the pseudo-race was gone by then. Passing an
impaired boat is like passing a 1983 VW diesel Rabbit going up a hill
in a Porsche. Where's the fun in that?
Picture 2 - Harmonie anchored near the
mangroves as seen from Storyteller's fly deck where John and Ray were relaxing
at dusk.
Photo by Helen. That night, anchored well up the river where the
water was eerily still, we both saw the shadow of something big
gliding by - water ripples radiating out from its bulk. A croc!
Well, maybe. We couldn't really tell. The night was still and dark
and we didn't have a flashlight handy to shine into the eyes of the
creature. If we did, we might have seen scary red croc eyes
reflected back at us. Still not sure what we did or didn't see, but
not wanting to take any chances, I made Don put the screen panels in
the companionway, and then stared intently at our hatches, deciding the
stainless steel bars Don installed before we left home to keep
thieves at bay would also make effective croc
barriers. The Australian saltwater crocodile is the largest reptile in the
world, so the possibility of one sliding through a 6"x18" slot in one of
our hatches is slim. However, at the time, the thought of a croc
boarding our boat using the stern stairs, like the sea lions in the
Galapagos, did seem plausible. As we watched our two allotted
episodes of Sex and the City after dinner, we (mostly I) kept one ear tuned to
abnormal noises coming from the stern. I'm not exactly sure what a
croc boarding would sound like, but had it happened, I'm certain we would have
known what it was in a jiffy. In the end, we went to bed and woke up to
another sunny day after a completely uneventful croc-free night.
Looking back at the whole episode now, after having seen several crocs
in action in the wetlands south of Darwin, we realize that a croc would have to be one crazed and unusually flexible dude
to get himself up on our boat. So, as the Aussies love to say, 'no
worries!' unplanned croc boarding shouldn't be an issue.
Picture 3 - Captain Cook's long lost
anchor. If not his, then someone else's from a similar bygone
era. The thing wrapped itself up in our anchor chain and didn't
want to let go. Using a boat hook and line, Don wrestled with
the critter-encrusted old-fashioned fisherman's anchor until it finally
gave up with a sigh of putrid, rotting air and dropped back into the water
where it was free to tangle itself into the next unsuspecting sailor's anchor
chain. We found out later that it attached itself to another
boat's anchor chain the following week. Maybe the rotting thing is just
lonely and wants to make new boat friends?
Anne
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