The next day we headed out in search of whales. We rafted up to watch a mother and calf from a distance then made a for a whale watching catamaran, Kingfisher I. As we approached there was a bit of party going on with tail slapping, flipper waving and plenty
of blows. Turns out that this was a pod of four males, one large bull the others being two or three year old males. We took position behind the boat and watched as these four put on an impressive display. One spy hopped the front of the catamaran while Brian and I were sitting alongside towards the rear. Soon after the largest of the four emerged, blew then headed straight for Brian and I. I mean straight for us. The passengers on the boat followed its track with anticipation. Brian and I went for herd immunity and made a grab for each other's boat and Brian was heard to declare Who's bloody idea was this ? At 3 metres from impact the whale dived, the passengers roared with laughter and I just about peed myself. As if that wasn't enough the other three quickly followed suit and within moments we were surrounded by all four whales. Well there is not much you can do
except sit. I felt like a bunch of sheep at the dog trials.
The captain of the vessel radioed on Channel 68 that they were getting a good show from these four whales and that there was a group of kayakers out the back shitting themselves. Well he wasn't far from the truth and Mark radioed back the confirmation. What quickly became apparent was that the whales knew where we were. They rounded us up then took turns at coming up in the middle of the group. At times there were more than one whale passing under your boat. It is a formidable sight when a full grown whale comes at you side on, blows in your face then dives just when you think it is going to take you out. What was remarkable was that none raised a flipper or fluke (the scary
bit) or did anything remotely like broaching as they swam around and amongst us. The passengers continued to take great mirth at the entertainment.
As the whale boat made ready to head back, we were offered left over Anzac biscuits for AM tea. Ray took a couple, then I was
showered the rest of the tray, which with the movement of the boat landed either on the deck or in my life jacket. Mark collected the next lot whilst I played tea lady. After that
experience it really didn't matter to anyone whether or not we saw another whale as that experience was simply unbelievable and more than any of us had ever hoped for.
That afternoon Mark and I went for a walk to the end of the 4WD track alongside the mangroves at the northern end of the creek. At the end of this is a trail which followed the creek and
brought us to a curious relic - a rusted steel post about 20 foot high embossed vertically on the lower part with Siemens Brothers & Co London Patent No 56 OBP. Rust aside it was not an inconsequential structure and looked securely set. At this point
the trail branched with the left fork heading up the hill. We followed the right fork to come across a second post in similar condition about another 50m further inland. It was unclear what these would have been for - ? telegraph ? signalling. The trail continued to parallel the creek along the hillside with great views over the swamp. It came back down to the creek which had narrowed to 3 feet wide and looked about 5 feet deep with strong continuous flow. The trail continued back up the hill and quickly petered out into thick undergrowth.
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