Log-o-diiles, shade-o-diles and swamp-o-diles

Everywhere we look there are 'o-diles'.

Sometimes they are the real thing and it gets REALLY exciting! Other times, we see things that are the same shape and colour and think we are looking at a gator, but when one of us gets brave enough to approach, we find it is only a log-o-dile or similar.

This morning we went driving along the Jane's Scenic Drive. It's an 11 mile unsealed track labeled as a dead end. We wondered if it was truly a dead end road or perhaps a 'never to return zone' road.

And was it scenic? Oh boy it was!!

It starts out with grassland swamps on both sides of the track and then becomes mangrove type swamps. It took us 2 hours to get about 3 miles up this road!

We stopped several times and saw a Cooter turtle, hundreds of butterflies, huge grasshoppers, heaps of birds - herons, vultures, eagles etc - and one tiny mini little pair of eyes peaking out from behind a log in a swamp!!

I didn't think it could get much more exciting, but it was all about to change...

We drove up the road a little more and ahead there was a fallen over fencepost partially blocking the road. As a joke, I said 'ooo look there's half a giant snake'. As I finished the statement, I realised it was not a fencepost at all... It was a very BIG alligator sunning himself on the road between the swamps!

We stopped the car and both assumed the position (camera's up to eye, that is) and started snapping (haha!!). We of course were desperate to get up and really inspect it. But both thought better of it.

After getting many many photos, we turned and headed back to the car - still keeping an eye on where that big fellow was of course!

We found a tiny dead snake on the road that was being escorted away by a large swarm of tiny ants. As we photographed that, the gator got up, crossed the road and slipped back into the water.

We drove on a bit further and again found another gator blocking our path, this time we stayed near the car and once we had taken another several 1000 photos, we decided to head onwards again. Unfortunately the gator had other thoughts and would not move. We managed to convince it to go a few yards then it flopped and went 'back to sleep'. We inched forward and tried again. But again it got up and lurched forward a few feet then flopped down for a rest!

It really did not want to move but we didn't want to get too close in case it had a taste for car tyres. Eventually it slid back into the water and we went on our way.

It was the best spent 2-3 hours yet.

Later we are going out on a boat to the 10 000 Islands, then tomorrow morning out again on another airboat in the mangroves.