Breakfast with friends

Gross.

So we pull up in Lesueur NP (gorgeous views and quite underrated if you ask me) for breakfast.  Robyn says, "Ah, a spider's crawling up my leg!" and briskly brushes it off.  Odd, thinks I, that a spider would be so bold as to do that.

Minutes later I look down and also see a spider-looking insect crawling down my singlet.  A moment later Robyn notices another crawling up her leg.  I sit down for breakfast and feel something on my leg, glancing down to find three of them struggling to negotiate the bushy terrain of my left shin.  What's going on?

It is then that Robyn remembers something she read on the board at the entrance to the park.  Something along the lines of: "There are ticks present in this park.  Be sure to check for them before leaving.  If one is embedded in your skin, use a pair of tweezers to extract the parasite."  Maybe not in those terms but I kid you not about the tweezers.

Ticks.  My memory flashes back to the display we saw the day before at The Pinnacles.  These things bear a striking resemblance to the critters depicted on that info panel.  I remember reading something about how they bury themselves inside a host's ear and sit there comfortably sucking blood until they're full, at which point they drop off.  The hosts don't feel it because they inject a saliva into the bite that numbs the sensory receptors.  Hosts can include kangaroos, mice and (casually noted) passing humans.

Ew.  Ew ew ew.  I nervously start rubbing my ears.  I laugh at how my sister Ann would be handling this situation.  Robyn looks down and spots one trying to bury itself into her singlet.  Pretty sure they're not spiders.

We throw everything back in the car after breakfast, checking it for any unwanted excess baggage.  There's only so much you can do though.  Oh well, if some managed to hitch a ride into the interior of our Troopy, we'll find out by morning.

I'm still rubbing my ears.

One of the numerous critters that were on our fridge. Any entomologists out there that can confirm our fears?