River of No Return
The barefoot crocodile hunter
Three years ago, I wrote about my endless trip down the Sepik River after finding the Aussie piano tuner who had become a crocodile hunter.
He settled 400 miles up the river and never returned home.
Even though it was one of the first stories I posted, it has turned out to be — according to substack in San Francisco — the most popular of all my 100 posts.
Somewhere in that picture above is where the piano tuner took me crocodile-spotting in the middle of a black night.
We couldn’t find one.
But he found us.
Since this story first went out, more than 400 readers have joined the site. Most of those will have missed this exciting adventure.
To read it, click on The White Crocodile.
And for those with a strong stomach, click on part 2, The Eye of the Crocodile.
Looking at that twisting Sepik River, you could describe it almost as a maze. And as in a maze, it looks like fun from above, but when you are in it you must have wondered if you were just going round in a loop as you tried to go downstream, with every tree and muddy bank looking the same.
Crocks are getting a bit of news lately - Olympic Rowing on a river known to have crocodiles. It does bring back memories, right? Late '67 I was on the south coast of Papua, oil exploration. We had some in the area, "No Swimming".