Aussie Fishing Weekend: Crabs, Camping, and the Beach...(And yet even more Fauna)

What a weekend! When I was invited to go to a 'hut' with three Mundingburra Rotarians and two of their friends for a "fishing" weekend, little did I know what it would involve...how ideal some of these locations are...about 45 minutes north of Townsville and down a long 4X4 track to a private alcove on the beach. Couldn't swim in the ocean, because of the jellys, and had to be careful walking when the tide went out because of the one-step-your-dead stone fish. But the weather was great, and Darcy Cooke, Bill Kennedy, Ian Weller, Jim Foley, and Sam provided good company (though the old farts beat me in age by at least 20 years). So, with the Aussie Tablelands in the background, and clouds drifting by, we had a nice weekend at Darcy's beach hut...

Darcy Cooke's hut, to put it mildly, was the ideal short gettaway spot. Kinda resembles those weekend rentals that use to exist at Constance Beach...only a lot less skeeters...plenty of beds too, ideal for any sisters wishing to visit their nephew in Australia (hint hint):

Bill Kennedy (Scotland) cooked us up some steaks for supper the first night:

Thay's some nice seenry from the porch. Palm Island's out there. The tides here are huge, about 7 feet, so when it goes out, it goes out (see the second photo at top).

It was darn hot, and the water was coolingly refreshing. BUT NO SWIMMING! This is salt water croc ("Salty") territory, and they'd do more than just a flesh wound. This is way thays be livin'.

It's funny they don't eat the cows.

Darcy tried to catch some bait fish at the mouth of the estuary, but there was too much fresh water runoff. Then we tried to do some fishing too, but only for about 15 minutes. Crab catchin' was way cooler.

Reggie, Sam, and Jim were hopeless when it came to catch'in grub.

Thaise hair mud crabs were tutin big (you gotta grab'em by the back laigs). These thangs are kinney bigger than them thair in Lousianner.

Reggie and me, we's went out Saturday evenin' to collect the rest of dem crab traps (they call em 'pots'):

Oddly, the estuary looks alot like the Bayou?!!

Yum Yum Yum, Ian cooked a roast to go along with the crabs. I must say, these were the best tastin' crabs I've ever eaten...and we didn't even use crab boil! Actually, we went out to the ocean and swished up a pot of seawater to cook them in, then after they were cooked took them back out into the sea and washed off all the fat inside...yum. T'was Surf and Turf:

Look at all the meat on these claws! And I have big hands...interestingly enough, the claws had cusps on them alot like our molars, so I saved them:

La la on the Sunday morning walk on the beach...and what do I see? These imprints, about an inch long and two by two, in a straight line...What could these be but little wallaby tracks in the sand?!! Next to them are goana tracks, and next to them are more wallaby tracks (thair's me furder down, too):

And yet even more Aussie fauna for you: this here is the infamous Kookaburra, the animal you hear in all the Tarzan movies and think is a monkey. I think it is in the kingfisher family. This one here was on our balcony for some odd reason the other morning, so I was able to stalk it for some one-on-one photographing...