Day trip to South Daintree National Park

After visiting northern Daintree National Park, today we visited the south side by first taking a croc boat ride and then heading to Mossman Gorge. Seeing crocodile signs on every beach yesterday, we thought we would check out the crocs via a river tour. It was a bit disappointing in that we didn't see as many as we did in Darwin; but the crocs aren't fed here so there isn't any incentive for them to show themselves. It seems in Queensland (state), they don't allow river boats to feed the crocs; so we only saw 3 crocs: 2 being under 2 years old, the 3rd larger but hiding and couldn't get a picture. A bonus was 2 frogs that were catching a ride on (in) our boat; then there was a tree snake that fell off the boat's roof and fell into the water next to us. Only after it fell into the water were we told that tree snakes in Australia aren't dangerous; so no one got pics of it b/c we were all pretty focused on backing away from it. 🐍😳
Afterward, we drove over to Mossman Gorge and were surprised at the facilities offered: it's an ecotourism facility that (aside from self-guided walks) has walks lead by members of the local Indigenous community; it's supposedly the only place in the area free of crocs, so there is an area where you find people swimming; and there's a shuttle that takes you from the park's entrance to the beginning of the walking trails (~2km). The day was hot enough to take the shuttle. We opted for the self-guided route.

At first, it felt like the entrance to Disney World: the trails are perfectly manicured with beautifully laid rocks outlining the paths. After we passed the Gorge itself, the "Disney" feel was gone and we found ourselves on more natural trails that looped ~2.2k distance. The trail had beautiful old growth trees with buttress roots and running streams.
Australia continues to amaze us in each area with its diversity in plants.Read more