Port Douglas to Cooktown via Low island,Daintree River and Hope island

At last we could get going again with the weather being kind. over to Low island for a swim and snorkle around before heading off to the 'The Daintree', this brings to mind the sixties and seventies when it was make love not war, get stoned out of your head and tie yourself to a tree so the bulldozers could not wreck the forest.
Of course there was an alterior motive for this behavior, as the crops of dope the hippies had, were hidden over the next hill and the Dali Lama heaven forbid could not see his stoned deciples being straight, alas there is one who had first hand experiance with this hippiness and it is no less than Tess... yes the Captains wench was there tied to a tree and lived off brown rice, dope and love...
Getting back to the sailing it was easy to cross into The Daintree which would be very attractive if you were of reptilian nature, but being a human one magrove bush looks the same as the other to me..
We left the next morning for Cape Tribulation and anchored off Snapper island 2 clicks from The Daintree for brekkie, once underway again the day was a cracker, a 15 knot wind, calm sea and not too many miles to travel, as we got closer to The Trib, (as Tess called it,) a strange look came over Tess.. Hmm after giving up some of the adventures of Tess in this area, the brown rice, dope and love were in great demand at The Trib as well... there was no tying up to the trees here, the bulldozers couldn't get within a cooee, so it was off with the gear and live naked, I suppose we all have a past, crikey imagine if Tess and I did that in this day and age at our age, even tha paparatzi would have put their lens covers back on...
Onward we go, after the revelations of the Trib, I can't really say I was impressed with the place, the anchorage was very rocky rolley, we were sleeping out the front decx as the mozzie/sandfly population was near zero, alas it blew up in the night and Tess left the wind blown front deck for the comfort of the cabin.
In the morning while having brekkie, the untied down mattress which is usually tied down, decided to take flying lessons followed by diving lessons making a perfect double pike forward backwards belly flop into the Coral Sea, bugger me the bastard of a thing was too far away to grab off the boat, so I had to follow suit the only thing wrong with that was the bow wake I made, forcing the mattress to be further out of reach, Tess wasn't laughing so at least no preditors were on my case.
After the usual dressing down for not captaining properly in the steadfastness of the mattress to the deck, we set sail for the Hope islands some 20 miles away, the conditions were good and we made the islands in 4 1/2 hours, the approach to the anchorage was littered with small reefs and coral bommies, I decided to put Tess up on the mainsail boom where she turned into the semi crows nest monster, all she had to do was spot the reefs and bommies and relay to me which course to steer, so here I was steering the boat at a startelling rate from port to starboard, the now puff chested semi crows nest power over the captain monster did not realise that the shadow of the clouds on the water were indeed shadows not reefs...
We picked up a mooring in the lagoon and set upon discovering what the islands had to offer, the first thing we noticed were the Albatrosses diving for fish, these birds are magnificent in flight, they hit the water without leaving a spalsh to emerge with fish in beak ready for eating.
I was hanging for a swim and Tess wanted to circumnavigate the island by foot, so we jumped in the dingy and landed on the shore, not a footprint in sight on the sand we had the place to ourselves, Tess took off and by the size of the island I did not expect to see her for at least 10mins. (yes it is a small island).
I went for a snorkell where the Albatrosses were feeding some hundred metres offshore, the amount of fish that were being fed on was imense, I seemed to get in the middle of the fish school, they were so prolithic I could not see the coral below me, it was time to hightail it out of there, sharks love to cruise through these schools with mouth open eating their fill, if you get in the way they could eat you by mistake.
I swam back to the beach where Tess had completed her circumnavigation, with hands on hips she informed me that the sign just down the beach warned of crocadiles frequenting the island and to not go swimming !!!
I think it's about time to take a bit more care where one swims, you don't think of crocs being out on the islands, the wind came up overnight so we headed for Cooktown the next morning.
After an uneventfull sail we made Cooktown easily, there is something about Cooktown that is weird we can't quite fiquire what it is as yet, from Cooktown we will be out of contact for quite a while, the internet is still sent by drums up this way until we get to Thursday island. Then we will be able to blog on again,
Cheers R&T.

Port Douglas to Cooktown via Low island,Daintree River and Hope island

Cooktown, Australia