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Next day set off by vehicle for another river/creek system. It had these lovely big pools near the track, actually looks like a substantial river at this point. Even though it probably only has freshwater crocs in it, I can never get myself to trust these bigger pools of water.

This spot is obviously a fishing camp at times, with some bits and pieces on the ground, some line in the trees etc. Didn't try to drop a line ourselves. I did bring a couple of rods and some tackle plus Claydog generously loaned us his tackle. Left these all at camp. But we were there to hunt at this time.

Along the river. Some of the bigger deeper pools peter out and the creek narrows to a stream in places.

Walking up a side creek.

We made a mistake on one walk. Following up a small dry creek, and moving through patches of thick growth, we came to the seeming end of the creek. It was supposed to end up in the wetlands. Thinking the small creek had bended to the West walked in that direction. Hit a substantial pool of water and thought "Wow, this is truly a big water hole" but foolishly turned out to be the main creek again bt further on ... it does pay to pay more attention to the compass and sun direction. So back tracked, found the RIGHT creek which actually had water and followed it along. The satellite photo we had was not detailed enough to pick out these details.

This creek did have pig tracks. In some places a lot of them. Hopefully we would bump into some piggies.

Found a shady spot to have lunch in. Lying down in some shade on the damp earth cools one off a bit. It does get hot during the middle of the day. The buffalo also tend to wallow during these time.

The Jeffery .450 No.2 Nitro Express did feel at home in these places. A gaur is engraved on its plates.

The creek widened out into mudflats. I started to feel hopeful at this point. Some hunting gene started to itch. I did expect to see something soon.

And YES, while it is disappointing to have no photos, we were hunting after all, JB indicated the high grass in front of us. A cow buffalo's arse was sticking out of it. I think maybe forty metres away at this point. Standing still and observing, there were four buffalo in the grass, two cows and two young. Moving when they had their heads down and feeding and not able to view us, we backed away and into some trees nearby and passed them by. Luckily the wind did not play us wrong this time.

A couple hundred metres on, more buffalo, a herd that maybe turned out to be fifteen animals. We had muddy wetlands to our left, in front of us. Dry ground to the right front, but no cover from the buffalo. Observing them we could not spot any adult bulls, only cows and young. One whitish buffalo. There was obviously more buffalo to our left. I used a tree trunk lying on the ground at one point to scan the herd with binoculars, but still could not spot any bulls. Nor could JB. If we moved to the left through the swamps, the wind should still be with us on the other side allowing an approach to see what lay on the side.

So more than a few hundred metres of sucking wet slimy mud. Must be careful on noise. Found lots of wallow holes among the reeds and some shallow pools. Tussocks of grass proved useful to step on, to avoid sinking too deep in the mud when they were there.

Eventually reached dryer solid ground, and could approach the herd from that direction. A good look at the herd, still no adult bulls. Some young bulls were playing around, running to and fro, when one stood and looked at us. Next thing, off they went in a cloud of dust. I do not know what alerted them. I think the wind was good, and we didn't make any noise at that time. Maybe it just spotted us and recognised us as humans. I did not believe buffalo eyesight was that good, on stationary persons behind some cover. But these buffalo I think are hunted a lot and flee at any sign of danger.

A fresh wallow pool.

Walked into another smaller adult bull on the way to the Landcruiser. With hindsight, should have shot this one. A good few kilometres back. And maybe three kilometres back along the track to the vehicle. Flat ground but hot enough.

Back in camp with the sun setting JB is making the coffee and I'm having a coffe in the photos.

One really cool thing about this camp was the clear running water. We used it for washing up but even better was being able to sit in it, wash and cool off. I thought I took some photos of the stream ... but maybe not. Didn't drink it directly but using it to wash pans and dishes, if it had the wrong bacteria it probably would still affect us and it didn't so is drinkable. But still beasties crap in it ...

Pato had said to come to town for dinner that evening and also with Claydog so we set off for Katherine. Getting closer made a call on the mobile, bloody pikers, neither was coming to dinner !!! Pato was away working somewhere and Claydog was tired from the kids running him around.

Claydog did suggest the Katherine Club (RSL) for dinner so JB and I enjoyed a dinner there ourselves. Hopefully one day next time with the guys.

Back to camp to sleep for a big day the next day.

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John aka NitroX

...
Govt get out of our lives NOW!
"I love the smell of cordite in the morning."
"A Sharp spear needs no polish"

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