17^th July:Derby - Horizontal Falls

Today, has been non-stop excitement plus. I had searched the internet and booked a flight for us all to the Horizontal Falls back in March. What an operation they run!! What a capital investment! And what amazing fun!!

We were picked up by bus out the front of our caravan park early. A bus ride to the airport was followed by a division of patrons and seat allocation on the basis of weight. The little float planes are very weight sensitive and one does not have a choice of where one sits on them. The company owns 4 of these planes (at $3 m each!) and on this trip there were 3 planes going. The flight to the Buccaneer Archipelago was only 30 minutes long and over massive mudflats and then parallel ranges. These are highly contorted very old sedimentary chains of mountains with deep valleys between them.

We landed on the water at a series of pontoons at the edge of Talbot Bay. What we didn't know was that there is accommodation on board for 38 people and at the cost of $100 extra, visitors can stay the night. I'd have loved to do that! There are 3 houseboats and various extra decks. 4 helicopters are based there as well as 4 jet boats capable of transporting 13 to 30 people. Probably a dozen workers on the complex: pilots, cooks, boat drivers, even shark handlers. Huge investment! When cyclones threaten, the whole complex is moved and anchored in Cyclone Creek which is very protected.

Next treat was feeding and swimming with the Tawny Nurse Sharks and the metre long groper. It is an enclosure on one of the pontoons that is open to the sea. One swims in an enclosure beside it that is a cage. Although we took our togs, we decided not to swim. It wasn't appealing despite the fact that many did!

After Morning Tea, we went for a boat ride up Cyclone Creek and saw some amazing cliff faces of really contorted rock. Water flowed very quickly with lots of eddies and torrents. Tides are 11 metres here and as the gaps are small, water rushes in and out! After that we went to the Horizontal Falls which are exaggerated versions of the eddies and torrents as the gaps are very narrow. The first is 20 metres wide and the second is only 7 metres. The jetboats bounced through at great speed. Our driver was a young guy who seemed to be the top driver because he swopped boats after awhile. But he went back and forth a couple of times. The difference in the height of the water from one side to the other was a metre and the drop and then the climb back up was very marked. Very rough with lots of whirlpools! It was just so exhilerating!. The little girls in the front of the boat were sceaming with excitement. I think some of the adults were too!

Then it was lunch and that was when we went for a helicopter ride over the falls. It ws only 10 minutes long but it was amazing to see the falls from the air. After lunch we had another jet boat ride but the narrow gap was too dangerous: the drop from one side to the other was almost 2 metres. Coming back up might have been a bit hairy!!

Sadly, it was time to come back to Derby and we took off across Talbot Bay, barely skimming the tops of the ranges. Gail was seated beside the pilot and both of us could see the fuel guage flashing!! We arrived back at 3.00pm and celebrated with a nice bottle of bubbles!! Aftter dinner,we heard a Mr Whippy van and all these big kids went out to meet it for an icecream. A fitting end to a mad and exciing day! So much fun!!