Yeah, my biggest concern... we, like I said, we've overloaded the tinnies this time.
And we haven't got a lot of free board.
Jase has got less than me.
His quadbike's heavier than mine, so we're really worried about his his tinny with his weight.
But the free board's a big thing.
You've got to be careful when you slow down, careful when you turn.
They're punts after all said and done.
They're just sort of sitting there on top of the water, and we're very top-heavy.
My quad bike seems to be a lot heavier than Simon's.
The nose of my boat or the front of my boat seems to be a little bit lower in the water,
and I'm sort of yelling out to Simon.
Simon, what's the depth, you know, how much free board have I got in the front?
Because my boat seems to be filling up with water.
There's no hole in my boat.
How low is it at the front of my boat?
Oh, 6-8 inches?
Pretty similar to mine from what I can see.
The water's splashing over the front.
I just can't seem to get that nose up, and I'm getting a little bit concerned here.
I got a bit of water in my boat.
It doesn't look like it from here.
I'll keep an eye on this water level.
Simon seems to have heaps of free board.
His quad bike seems to be a lot lighter.
We spent quite a few hours getting out of all the shallower part of the river,
because obviously we're up the headwaters of it.
So the further we get, the less sticks there is.
We get out into the open water--a bit of a sigh of relief.
A bit of plain sailing now.
Get on the gas a bit.
It's some nice, twisty, open, beautiful water.
But looks can be deceiving.
So I'm behind Simon.
We go around the turn.
So you sort of you lose sight of Simon who's out in front.
Come around the corner. Tight corner on the gas a bit.
So it's sort of leaning over a bit as I come around the corner.
And then without warning, their trip to the coast turns into a fight for survival.
Simon's just yelled out.
And he throws the word ‘sinking’ in.
I've come round the corner...
...and here's Simon standing on the upturned hull of his tinny,
and I've just gone...
Holy sh**.
In my mind I thought I'm still gonna be alright, but it the felt like it was gonna go straight down.
It literally started going straight down, and then it rolled.
I'm just thinking I'm gonna be swimming.
I couldn't see Jase, and here we go.
Time to start freestyling into the bank.
Heaps of crocodiles in this river system.
****
It went straight under.
Like in an instant before I could back the throttle off, it just went.
Straight to the bottom in a heartbeat.
Where's the quadbike?
You know where the quadbike is.
Aww, no!
It's on the bottom of the river up there somewhere.
It's gone.
And my gun. My .30-30.
What about a .30-30, there's a quadbike on the bottom of the river!
Yep.
A realization at that point is: Oh, the quad bike.
It's not tied in to the tinnie. It's gone.
Oh, my rifle... it's strapped to the quad bike.
It's gone.
The whole mission, the whole next few days getting up to this plane wreck, it's gone.
It's just the realization standing on the tinnie, it was too much to think about.
It was too much.