June 24th, 2010

The day went something like this.

We woke up early at our Noah Beach campsite, and went for a walk on the beach to see the sunrise. We headed in one direction, but when we saw a sign warning that there had been a recent crocodile sighting, we headed the other way. There were a few clouds on the horizon, so we waited to see the sun rise over the clouds. We shared the beach with an older gentleman out walking and a man playing cricket with his three young boys.

After the sun came up, we headed back to pack up camp. It was still well before 9am (the time the local café opened for breakfast), so we drove down the road a bit to a boardwalk through the mangroves in the Daintree Rainforest. We were the only ones there, and enjoyed the quiet peacefulness of the morning forest.

We finished, and still it wasn’t 9am, so Dave suggested we head down to Cow Bay. We had been there the day before, and found the beach to be absolutely beautiful. There were these amazing patterns made of sand balls all over the beach. They appear to be made by little crabs which excavate little holes, making little balls of sand which they push out of their holes. The patterns the crabs made with the balls of sand were reminiscent of a certain style of Aboriginal artwork which contains lots of little dots. There were also interesting rocks at Cow Bay, with neat little chitons, which got Dave very excited. Indeed, we liked the beach at Cow Bay more than any of the others we had stopped at the day before, so I was happy to make another visit that morning.

We were standing there on the beach, and I must have been standing up on a rock, or on somewhat higher ground, because I was feeling especially tall compared to Dave. I said to him, “I’m soooo big (as in so tall).” And he said, “But not as big as the ocean.” Then I said, “And you’re so small (short).” And he said, “But not as small as these crabs.” “But,” he said, “I can move sideways like they do.” And he proceeded to scuttle sideways across the beach. Very romantic, indeed.

Well, at least Dave must have been feeling romantic, because the next thing I knew, he was asking me to marry him, and pulling a ring out of his pocket. I was completely surprised, not because he was asking, but because I couldn’t believe he had a ring. I assumed he hadn’t really gotten himself organized before we left the US, but in fact, he had prepared everything, and even asked my parents for permission back in December before we left.

When I finally told my parents, I think they were so relieved because they’d had to be quiet about it for nearly 6 months! My Mom told me how hard it had been to keep it quiet, and my Dad told me that he figured Dave had changed his mind since it had been so long! I think Dave’s mom was thinking the same thing as well.

But, I suppose Dave was just waiting for the right time. Cow Bay is lovely – in fact, Lonely Planet describes it like this: “ Cow Bay is simply beautiful.” It was just the two of us on the beach, at least at first. After I had said yes and we’d hugged a few times, a guy walked out onto the beach and gave us a wave. The next thing we knew, he’d taken off all of his clothes and was going for a swim. Not exactly what I expected to see immediately after getting engaged, but there you go!

Dave told me that he’d spoken with the crabs, and if it hadn’t been high tide, they had agreed to write out, “Will you marry me?” with their sand balls. I told him that was OK, and that I was glad he hadn’t decided to propose to me while we were scuba diving under water. While it would have been a good story, I had visions of getting overly excited and losing my regulator. Plus, how would I have said, “Yes!” underwater? Giving the thumb’s up means let’s go up, hugging with scuba tanks on would have been awkward, and what if Dave had dropped the ring down there?! Indeed, I was glad to be on terra firma, even if there was a naked man just behind us!

We celebrated the rest of the day by walking through the rainforest and seeing two cassowaries named Fred and Wilma (these dinosaur-looking birds are often tricky to find), eating four flavors of ice cream at the Daintree Ice Cream shop (they only make four flavors each day, and your only choice is to buy a cup with a scoop of each), eating Thai food for dinner (where we learned from our menu about vegerarianism, which we assume must be some new religion), and finishing off the day with homemade gelato.

So, that’s the story. We have not picked a date yet, but we’ll let you know when we do! For now, it’s off to central Australia for two weeks in the bush looking for rocks. I can’t wait (seriously) : )

And, here's the very excellent photo we took of ourselves just after getting engaged!