A new Australian port for me, Arlie Beach (pronounced early beach) and my tour was the amazing Arlie Beach Crocodile Safari.

This would involve a short bus ride before swamp boat and tractor tour through the swamps and bush. I was escort and unfortunately there were only enough seats on the boat for guests, but I did get a quick run out on the boat to meet Ruby (above) while the guests got lunch. Notice how camouflaged Ruby is against the muddy bank, when she slithered in to the river she simply disappeared into the muddy water, you’d never have known she was under the boat!

As we drove into the reserve we were lucky enough to encounter a herd of Wallabies so once my guests were safely onboard, or as safe as you can be on a crocodile infested river, I asked if it was safe for me to walk back along the lane.

Assured that it was, as long as I kept on the track, I wandered back through a host of beautiful butterflies and wow! I got to witness two male wallabies have a boxing bout in the bush.

The birds overhead were stunning and this has to be one of my favourite photos, a large magpie goose high in the trees.

Back at the camp, as Steve got on with the traditional Aussie Barbie, needs must, and I had to brave the Dunny – I was ‘lucky’ enough to share it with not one, but two huge spiders….

We had a fabulous lunch of bbq steak, chicken, fish and sausages plus bread rolls and salads. I’d watched Steve prepare this and although it was camp cooking, he was meticulously clean and everything was kept cool and covered. Beers and soft drinks could be purchased or there were water stations and lots of free bug spray!

After lunch, and my quick trip on the swamp boat, where I met two large crocodiles, several hatchlings, four kingfishers, a mangrove heron and several more birds, it was all aboard the tractor trailers for our bouncy ride across the fields. The tractor was a bit noisier than me walking, so this trip we saw less birds and wallabies than I encountered earlier, we still did see a good number of ducks and geese plus we had a fun demonstration of ‘bush dynamite’ the saponin tree.

We made it back to camp in time for afternoon tea, bush style, damper bread and billie tea – delicious!

To end a fantastic trip, on the way out we met two stunning Brolga on the lane, of course when I hadn’t my phone at the ready!

We had avoided the rain all day, but as we headed back in to town it came on in sheets, the driver even stopped and collected guests at the shuttle stop, he felt so sorry for them!

This was an excellent tour, if you want to experience an authentic trip into the Australian bush, this is the one for you!