Rain Forest and Hartley’s  Crocodile Farm

Tuesday, Oct. 24, 2017

This was another special day! We rode a gondola through the rainforest adjacent to Barron River National Park, a World Heritage site. We had a marvelous guide, Cameron, who was so knowledgeable of our eco-system and all the flora and fauna. Bob and I were amazed at the amount of palm trees in the forest.

From the rainforest we drive along the coast to Hartley's Crocodile Farm. I took photos from the bus because the coastline was so beautiful. Later we visited Hartley’s  where we had a delicious buffet lunch and we even tried crocodile meat, which wasn’t bad - rather bland. We viewed crocodile feeding from a viewing platform and then took a river ride where our driver fed the crocs from the boat. Those crocodiles were huge! When they snapped their jaws shut the sound was deafening!

However, the biggest treat of the day was seeing the Koalas.  Bob and I each had our picture taken with a koala and we actually got to hold her. She was so soft and cuddly. Then we viewed some other Koalas up close and even saw a mother koala with her baby. It was the highlight of my day!
In the evening we had a special dinner put on by our hotel as it was our last night there. We had wonderful hors d’oeuvres and then a show put on by Aborigenese dancers. It was a lot of fun and one person from each table actually got up and danced with the pros! We finished with a fantastic meal. Bob and I had the  Coral Sea fish, which was a tasty, flaky white fish. Tomorrow we leave for Sydney.

                                                          Cassawaries

                                                 Gondola ride through the rain forest

                                             Gondola view of rain forest

                                                Our rain forest guide Cameron

                                              Rainforest

                                                             Unusually large tree much like
                                                              our  redwoods

      A fern nest

                                                 Beautiful ferns

                                                    Coastal view

                                                     Coastal view

                                                Coastal view

                                               Crocodile reaching for a chicken

                                                   Young crocodile

                                                   Crocodile seen from our boat

                                                     Scary crocodile

                                                      Fierce!

                                               Going for food

                                                  A heron on land who taunted the crocodile

                                                     Possums in the rainforest

                                                   Rainforest

                                                   Crocodile meat

                                                      Koala

                                                  Koala and baby

                                             Bob holds a baby croc!

                                                  Waterfall in rainforest

                                                  The ultimate experience - holding Daisy

                                                            Holding Daisy

Comments

  1. UnknownNovember 13, 2017 at 8:50 PM

    What an amazing trip you had! I had my bubble burst about those sweet cuddly koalas. Apparently, they can be quite vicious. I had a photo taken, too. When I was picking up the photo, the lady showed me some koala gone wrong photos. I'm glad she showed me after I took my photos.

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