"Jumping Crocodile Cruise" Top 5 Page for this destination Darwin Off The Beaten Path Tip by tiabunna

Maybe you’d care to see some crocodiles “in the wild” – without getting too “up close and personal’? This trip is for you.

This company operates several boats for one hour cruises on the Adelaide River, east of Darwin. The VT Meeting group travelled on the largest, the “Adelaide River Queen”, a purpose-made two decked vessel about 15metres long. The upper deck is open but with substantial railings, the lower deck is fitted with thick glass windows for viewing.

Once away from the jetty, a glance up river showed several dark floating shapes: these moved steadily closer, the crocodilian appearance soon becoming evident. At that stage, the tour operators popped out some long ‘fishing rods’ to which they tied meat scraps. With these dangling above the water, the crocs swam up and jumped for a meal (photo 2). You might care to note the wake behind the swimming croc in the main photo – not much chance of outswimming these blokes! Later we watched as a croc the cruise company estimates at 6.4 metres, slid into the water oozing menace and came for a feed (photo 3). Finally, the cruise operators fed the local Whistling Kites (birds of prey), bringing quite a swarm around (photo 4).

Though these tours have been operating for over 20 years, I must admit I found myself wondering about the wisdom of feeding wild animals in this way. The attraction of relatively easy meals must increase the croc numbers in the area and make the river less safe for everyone – quite apart from the possibility of encouraging hungry crocs to head for every boat for a feed. Still, those questions are for the authorities and meanwhile this is an interesting tourist outing. It’s 65 km from Darwin via the Arnhem Highway, turn off right 200 metres before the Adelaide River bridge.

The cost is $25 per adult and cruises operate daily from 1 April to 31 October at 0900, 1100, 1300 and 1500.
(08) 8988 8144