Saltwater crocodiles, or "salties" weigh three-quarters of a tonne and average five metres long.

LOWER ORD RIVER, Western Australia -- Scotty Hewitt never gets tired of showing off the crocs and other wildlife that inhabit what he calls "god's country."

Gliding in his flat-bottomed boat Porosus (meaning saltwater crocodile) on a sweltering afternoon, the affable Aussie tells us we'll see about 100 crocodiles -- freshies and salties -- during our 25-km trip downstream to Terrara Bar (a sandbar, not a pub!)

Within minutes of our departure from the banks of the Carlton Hill cattle station (owned by famous Aussie Kerry Packer), Hewitt whispers "croc!" and points to our port side. A long, ugly brownish-grey reptile with beady eyes is sunning itself on the sand bank, its fanged mouth agape.

As we approach, it slithers into the river so quickly and with such agility we're left gaping. All we see poking out of the waters is a pair of nostrils lying in wait.

We've stumbled upon a saltie, one of the deadliest of a long list of dangerous animals native to this very remote part of Australia's Outback.

The Aussie characters who take one into the bush like to brag about the number of poisonous snakes, spiders and crocs that make their home here.

In the Kimberley area of this massive state alone, there are seven different species of deadly land snakes with enough venom to kill you and 19 species of sea snakes with enough poison to put you in hospital.

Always be wary

One must always be wary. The deadliest spider -- the redback -- likes to hide under toilet seats (which certainly encourages one not to bum around when visiting an outdoor loo.)

Swimming in the ocean's waters is strictly off-limits and in the wet season the salties can even be found in inland rivers and gorges. If the crocs don't get you, the hammerhead sharks, the box jellyfish or sea snakes will.

Yikes! No wonder I have one eye peeled to the water's surface at each rocky gorge we're taken to for a cooling dip. One day, I even sit awaiting the return of my travelling companions, with a stick at the ready in case a snake slithers by.

True, I'm more accustomed to fending off the poisonous political snakes at City Hall.

Yet I couldn't get enough "danger!" I fancied myself a female Crocodile Dundee. For weeks after my return, I tuned into the adventures of Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin nearly every night. Even now, more than three months since my rugged 11-day Outback Odyssey, I switch on the Discovery Channel to see what dangerous snakes, lizards, scorpions and salties the crazy Aussie is tackling to the ground to wow his TV audience.

During my trip down the lazy Ord River, I learn that salties like to eat people in addition to fish, birds, cattle and turtles. Freshies prefer insects, fish, live frogs and fruit bats. But both live together in harmony in the river and don't eat each other.

Hewitt tells us salties -- which weigh about three-quarters of a tonne and are on average five metres long -- have brains half the size of an adult baby finger.

'Air out their brains'

"While they're in the sun, they open their mouths to air out their brains," he says.

Although those beady eyes can only see what's in front of them, crocs have "impeccable" hearing and a strong sense of smell.

"They adopt a minimal exposure posture with the head just out of the water, the cranium showing," says Hewitt. If a fish or other prey gets close, they simply open up their mouths and "snap at it."

As we venture upstream past sandstone, sandbanks, shale and huge red Outback rock, we lose count of the number of salties and freshies hanging out on the river banks. I keep praying that the young not yet croc-wary cattle and the Jabiru (birds of love) that venture down to drink won't become the next meal for one of the salivating salties.

During a day-long trip through the 1,700-sq-km Litchfield Park 100 km southwest of Darwin, I encounter my first poisonous snake.

When we stop for tea at a campground near the park, we come face to face with a rust-coloured death adder coiled around a tree by the men's washroom. It is nearly camouflaged by the dusty Outback soil.

"Their large fangs can deliver a powerful venom," notes a book I've purchased on living in harmony with the "Hazardous Animals of Northwestern Australia."

"It is definitely in the top 10 of most poisonous snakes," observes our burly guide John Lloyd, as we watch a parks ranger nonchalantly carry the snake off on the end of a metal poker, while balancing a butt in his other hand.

Termite mounds

Inside Litchfield Park, Lloyd takes us to two types of termite mounds -- magnetic and Cathedral -- both of which tower above us. Quirky, to say the least, we learn that these mounds are built by thousands of spinifex grass and soil-eating termites, which live as a colony within the mound.

"There can be up to one million termites in the Cathedral mounds," Lloyd says, noting that the Queen termite lives 50-75 years while the workers only last three years.

The field of magnetic mounds -- so named says Lloyd because they're 10 degrees off magnetic north -- remind us of a cemetery. "They face north and south to capture the UV rays and get baked by the sun," he says.

We also drive by many funny-looking Boabs, semi deciduous trees with stubby, cigar-like trunks to store water during the dry season.

At the Buley Rockhole, one of a series of spectacular rock pools and waterfalls found in the park, Lloyd points out a tree containing a paper bag nest chock full of green ants.

He makes like an Aboriginal and chomps one down. He suggests I sniff in the acidic secretions of another to clear my head cold.

I look at him like he's crackers but Lloyd is serious. The nest above is making me antsy. It is positively swarming with green ants which are ready to "attack" with their "formic acid" if bothered, says my book.

It's quite alright, I tell him. There's a limit to how much "danger" Crocodile Levy is prepared to endure.

Guess I'll have to leave the hardcore hunting to Steve Irwin, the real Crocodile Hunter. Or to Crocodile Dundee.