3 June 2024
We decided to fit in a trip to visit the “jumping crocodiles” between leaving Darwin and heading back into Litchfield National Park. We had heard a lot of people say how good it was, so why not.
We weren’t able to book on to the right time for the original jumping crocodile tour, so we booked instead on the Spectacular Jumping Crocodile Cruise — operating only about 800m further up the Adelaide River. One operator operates downstream, and one upstream (I think).
After a few tours, we’re starting to pick up on the crocodile-related language used by tour operators. For example, on our jet ski tour our lifejackets were referred to as “crocodile chewing gum”. On our jumping crocodile tour, our very ocker lead guide …
- Pointed out a few people with brights shirts saying, “Don’t sit near them if you can help it, as they’ll definitely be first to get taken.”
- Before going through the boat safety briefing, repeated three times, “Whatever happens to the boat, whatever you do, do not leave the boat.”
- After going through the lifejacket safety briefing said, “So, do we all feel better now knowing that we have lifejackets on board?”
And so it goes, and the crowd loves it.
We got to “meet” a few saltwater crocs, one a fairly large male around 5m long. We were told that jumping out of the water is a very natural skill needed by crocs, learned from a very young age, but I wasn’t convinced. Anyway, the show was essentially driving the boat along the river while a few regularly fed crocs swam over to the boat. Then, old mate would put some meat on the end of a piece of rope hanging from a long stick and dangle it far enough above the water to try to get the crocs to jump. So, no rocket science or quantum physics involved there.
The first attempts seemed to get the biggest jump, as you’d expect.
Then, the law of diminishing marginal returns seemed to take over as the crocs got tired of performing.
Then things would get to the point where rubbing pieces of raw meat all over the top of its jaw wasn’t enough to even get them to open their mouths. It all seemed very contrived, but no shocks there.
After a subsequent couple of nights in Litchfield National Park (where the most popular swimming hole, Wangi Falls, is still closed to swimming due to saltwater crocodiles being present), we stayed at a place called Timber Creek to break up the drive to Kununurra. And they too had crocodile feeding (freshwater crocodile this time) using a stick, rope and meat. In this instance, the feeder was wearing flip-flops (standing on a footbridge at least) and seemed to just be a Spanish backpacker who had been given the 15-minute instructional demo by the Park Manager on how to feed wild animals with bait on a stick. Don’t get me wrong, he was quite good, but it did seem a little haphazard.
We have seen so many crocodiles in the NT; from wild to captive, from saltwater to freshwater, from big to small, from statues to earrings. It really does seem to be part of the culture here and something they are quite proud of. From my perspective I think it’s a bit overdone, like in Winton where everything seems to be tied to Waltzing Matilda, even though there are many other dimensions to Winton that don’t get nearly the same attention.
We’ve had our fill of crocodiles, and nearly fully sated in terms of gorges too. In finishing, here’s a little crocodile montage for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!
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