Beware of Moving Logs?

In the wild.  Not a zoo.  This is what I have to be careful of when I go hiking???  You crazy!

This beauty is about as big as my hand.  Luckily it was housed no where near my hostel bungalow.

Signs of little crabs

Sign on the right is to be careful of cassowaries as they're endangered and I'm pretty sure they can do some damage to your car.

I gave myself one month to cover Australia’s ENTIRE eastern coastline, not leaving a whole lot of time to relax.  For once, I planned out my trip, booked it all including the bus tickets, and stuck to the plan.  So the first thing I did was head north for a few days up to Cape Tribulation (aka “Cape Trib”) where there are jungles, mountains, ocean, the Reef, cassowaries (more on that later), and crocodiles (aka, “crocs”) both in and out of the ocean.  Yes, the ocean.  Now, nothing says fear like when you check into a hostel and the receptionist warns you of the moving logs.  Uh, what do you mean, moving logs??  The crocs.  Oh, well, of course!  One should always be on the lookout for crocodiles looking to chomp you and drag you into water while they thrash you around until you die, and maybe or maybe not actually eating you.  Yes, this is what I was warned of from a tour guide as well.  Great.  So thus my adventures in Australia truly began – with a warning of being eaten by moving logs.

One of the drawbacks to traveling solo is that you don’t have someone there to make sure you’re ok or even make it back to the hotel/guesthouse/hostel ok… basically making sure you’re still alive.  So as much as I wanted to go hiking around on some nice and relatively easy trails while in Cape Trib, I really didn’t feel comfortable hiking by myself with the crocs on parts of the trail… along with these very large lizards that are nearly as long as I am and have some girth (and teeth and pic claws!) to them.  If I get eaten, bit, mangled, etc., no one would know unless I could somehow miraculously get myself back to civilization or wait for someone to come find me. Oh, and did I mention the cassowaries?  Yeah, they’re these very large and beautiful birds about the size and shape of an ostrich, but they’re territorial, a tad crazy, and have these giant hook/claw on their legs that they can basically cut you open and kill you.  I had even seen one on the road there.  Those are in the area too.  So I never went hiking around Cape Trib.  I’m sure you can understand why. 

I did take a crocodile tour (I hate tours but let’s face it, it’s easier than me going out trying to find them on my own, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t be alive right now) and it was pretty cool (I lived through it), where we take a boat out on the river where the guides can easily spot crocs (tourists cannot for whatever reason, good thing we’re in the boat) and we are advised to keep all hands, feet, body, etc. IN the boat as crocs are known for jumping out of the water at grabbing at well, whatever could potentially be food (me).  Sweet.  Duly noted.  I will most definitely abide that advice.  So we find several crocs (is that supposed to be good?) and find out we have a little green tree frog with us for our boat journey (also not food for the crocs) whom I had the pleasure of taking a few shots of.   All in all, Cape Trib is nice but for me and my jaded self when it comes to travel, rainforests, beaches, it was ok and I personally wouldn’t go see it again.  But for those of you who are new to travel/Australia, yes, check it out!