Fish for Dinner

The week is rushing by.  I thought staying the extra week would be too long, but we are relaxing and enjoying ourselves and each day is full.  I just hope we can go a bit slower for Katie as well when she gets here.  She will certainly need the rest.

After our school work this morning, we were slowly getting ready to head out for the afternoon, when Les, the manager here, came and asked if we wanted any fish.  He had been out with a few of the long term residents here in the park, and they had some fish to share.  They gave us some freshly filleted Spangled Emperor, which are a nice big fish with botox lips and nasty looking teeth.  Les said it tastes better if it's left to sit for a bit, so we decided to have it for dinner and had sandwiches for our lunch.

We drove to look at a ship wreck off  North West Cape, a rusty Skelton sticking out of the water, then in to town again for more food and phone calls.

The wreck off Point Murat

On our way back to the van, we turned in to the Bundegi beach and Dominic and Joseph fished off the jetty with their squid for bait.  They could see all these fish in the water, but they just nibbled the bait off their hooks and we didn't catch anything.

Fishing off Bundegi Jetty

I spoke to a retired couple who are on a trip around the coast of Australia, and will get home to Gundagai for Christmas.  The lady was missing her two grandchildren, one and two years old and her favourite part of Australia so far is Mooloolaba .  We chatted about the places we'd been and agreed that the crocodiles in Kakadu were pretty scary.  The man said around six people a year are taken by crocs up north, but they don't advertise it.  He spoke to a pilot who flew a small plane every day along the same stretch of coast to deliver mail or something to a remote location.  He noticed some bushwalkers making their way along the beach, a bit further along the coast each day, however he also noticed what they couldn't see - the large crocodile following them off shore, just waiting for them to reach the river that joined with the sea and which they would need to cross.  He dropped them a note from the plane one day, and the next day they had turned away from the coast and headed inland.  I'm so glad we are away from the crocs.

As we were packing up the fishing rods to head home, a man called us to watch a whale splashing out to sea. It was getting dark, but we could make out it's dark shape, and then the white of the waves it was making by breaching, or jumping out of the water.

At home we cooked the very fresh Spangled Emperor fillets and they were fantastic.  Just right.  Even if we hadn't managed to catch them ourselves.

The wind occasionally gusts here,  and we've had a few night and morning showers, although I think we are getting very calm weather for this time of year. It is just lovely, and I wish I could bring you all over here to see it.
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Vicki