After a quick breakfast, we made our way to the front entrance of the caravan park. There, we jumped on a bus that drove us to the Derby airport. At the Derby airport, we boarded a seaplane!

This is a photo Mum took of a seaplane landing on the water.

This is the view of the Derby mud flats from the plane.

The seaplane took us over the Horizontal Falls!
We landed on the water next to a big pontoon. On the pontoon they had two shark proof cages. While they fed the sharks we were able to swim in the cages, next to the sharks. The sharks were tawny nurse sharks. We also got to feed and even pat one of the sharks. When the sharks sense the food, they snap in a very violent, vigorous action. We were able to pat this particular shark because it was somewhat tamer than the other sharks. How they worked this out, I guess we’ll never know. I really enjoyed interacting with the sharks, even though at first, I was not so sure.

Patting the sharks!

We then hopped onto a power boat. The boat took us to the Horizontal Falls. We actually sped right through the falls! The boat was going very fast, and it was lots of fun! Then we went back to the pontoon where we had some very nice fish for lunch. After lunch we went back onto the boat and back to Horizontal Falls. This time the falls were much more rapid and quite a bit faster this time because the tide was higher. Twice a day the tide rises and falls by eleven metres resulting in huge quantities of water moving in and out of the bays through the small opening which is the horizontal falls.

When we got back from the tour, we went to have a look at the Boab Prison Tree. The tree was quite spectacular, and very big! It got it’s name because a long time ago, when people used to capture aboriginals to have as slaves or pearl divers, they would often stop over night at the tree. Nowadays there is a fence around the tree because the tree is also of great importance to Aboriginal beliefs.

This is the Boab Prison Tree.

We walked down to the wharf again tonight for the sunset. We had a very exciting and thrilling day today, and we were all quite tired by the end of it!

Tara