Swimming with Crocodiles: The True Story of a Young Man in Search of Meaning and Adventure Who Finds Himself in an Epic Struggle for Survival

A rousing account of a young man’s forty-day sojourn into the Australian outback and his epic confrontation with the awesome power of nature.

Will Chaffey is eighteen when he boards a plane in New York bound for Australia. Taking time off from school to work and travel, Will meets an enigmatic wanderer and herpetologist. Together they cross the inland desert to the tropical northwest coast, home to the saltwater crocodile, a known man-eater and a predator who has been hunting since the age of the dinosaurs.

The two adventurers devise a plan to explore the remote Prince Regent River, a trek so dangerous it had never been attempted by outsiders. Passing through harsh, primeval country, exhausted and physically worn down, they find themselves locked in a life-and-death struggle when their food runs out and they are stalked by a hungry crocodile. Filled with scenes of great natural beauty, Swimming with Crocodiles is at once the affecting account of a journey into adulthood and a hair-raising epic of survival in the tradition of Into the Wild.

“Chaffey’s briskly written debut is a fitting celebration of the Australian wild.” —Kirkus Reviews