The first time I heard the words ‘The Forgotten Islands’ was from the lips of Dowager Queen Marau of Tahiti. Her dark eyes slowly lighted up with some inner fire as she said ‘Les Iles Oubliees!’ Yes, there you find what you seek, the soul of Polynesia. Go there!
So begins the first chapter of the book I’ve started reading aboard a flight to these very islands. I read on, stopping sometimes to stare out the window at the big blue South Pacific below. Tahiti has gone from view now. Almost 2,000 kilometres of eternal ocean stretches out from here to my little-known destination.
“But what, and where, are these islands?” I asked, my curiosity mounting by quick degrees. “They are the Gambier Archipelago,” she answered. “There are eight of them, and they lie more than a thousand miles to the southeast of Tahiti. Mangareva is the most interesting, the island for you. They tell me it is very beautiful.”
The book – Manga Reva, The Forgotten Islands – was written in the 1920s by an artist called Robert Lee Eskridge. It’s a firsthand account of the American’s eight-month stay on French Polynesia’s outlying Gambier Islands, the place I’m now headed. Although written almost 100 years ago, it’s all I have to give me a sense of the islands I’m about to arrive at. Modern-day guidebooks don’t offer much, if any information on this part of the world.
The small plane begins its descent, circling the coral circumference of the biggest lagoon I’ve ever seen. As it banks left, I catch sight of Mangareva stretched out in the pristine blueness like a prostrate man enjoying a bath. It’s a superb sight, full of promise for adventure.
It’s a more temperate landscape than I was expecting – like the tropics meets Tasmania. While Tahiti and her sister islands in the north have been mythologised for centuries for their hot and uninhibited sexiness, I get the sense that the Gambier Islands are like Tahiti’s distant cousins twice removed: more prudish and pious, but still perfectly pretty.
“Welcome to our paradise!” says a local lady in a heavy French accent as I get off the shuttle boat from the airport. She lobs a massive necklace of sweet-smelling flowers around my neck and introduces herself as Bianca, my host and one half of Bianca & Benoît, the family-run pension I’m staying at on Mangareva. We pile into her pick-up and head for the pension.
The drive, if done in one hit, should take about three to four minutes from the jetty. But with Bianca slowing down and waving at every man, woman, child and chicken we pass, it takes closer to 20.
“All Mangarevan people wave for saying ‘ello,” she says. “If no wave, they are tourist or no ‘ave education.”
As we pass through the main village, Rikitea, Bianca tells me there are about 1,000 people living on the island. There’s no crime and most of the people are “always ‘appy”. In town, in the shadow of the throne-like Mount Duff, everything is much more tropical and colourful than it looked from the plane. Lively green gardens with bright hibiscus and healthy fruit trees embellish the plain brick houses. Kids play in the sun. Adults gossip in the shade of breadfruit palms. There are only a couple of cars on the road and a few scooters run about the main street.
Along the way we pass European style stone buildings and a monstrous cathedral – big enough to fit every Mangarevan and more inside. They look as out of place in this small village as coconut palms in the Pyrenees.
At the pension I find Bianca’s husband, Benoît, and a few of his fishing pals hacking into the day’s catch of 13 massive wahoo fish. The tattooed workmen doing renovations at the pension join in by slicing off hefty chunks, a kilo or more each, to take as a weekly wage bonus.
Bianca, a first-rate eater by the looks of her, also gets involved, pulling raw flesh from the bone and munching it down with an unidentified brown sauce. Soon there’s very little left of the ute-load of 50-kilogram fish. When I ask Benoît if he makes a tidy profit selling the fish to others in town he looks at me like I’ve just farted in his face.
“Not for selling,” he says. “Only for giving, for my friends and for the people.”
I note my sinful, capitalist ways and get back to eating raw wahoo and drinking beer while the sun goes down.
Sin is a topical subject on Mangareva, I learn as I read in my cute little bungalow that night. This place was once the cradle of Catholicism in Polynesia and the idyllic Truman Show vibe of today hasn’t always existed here.
The reason these far-off islands hold more than 100 stone buildings – churches, presbyteries, convents, schools, weaving workshops, bakers’ ovens and watch towers, is that they were once ruled by a nutty French missionary, Père Laval, who was hell-bent on constructing things in order to please God.
In his book, Eskridge explains that Laval made the pilgrimage to the “unheeding cannibals” of the Forgotten Islands to save souls for the church. But it soon became apparent that he was, as Eskridge put it, “trying to slip a Catholic soul into a Polynesian body with the shoehorn of fanaticism”. It was disastrous from the moment he sailed into the lagoon.
In a short time, through trickery and cunning, Laval convinced the joyful pagan population that the word of Jesus Christ was the law. Through the hard labour forced upon them to build his egomaniac empire, their spirits were wrecked and they began to die. The population, once 5,000 strong and peaceful (if we overlook that a human was occasionally on the menu, of course), fast disappeared, never to return.
The next morning, I’m keen to explore. Because there are no hotels or tour companies on the island, Benoît and Bianca operate their own outings and activities for guests. With Benoît as a guide, and a few of his family members and some French tourists in tow, we head out for a full-day boat tour of the lagoon and the other Gambier Islands.
Although the expression ‘middle-of-nowhere’ might be insulting to those who call ‘nowhere’ home, it’s a phrase that keeps coming to mind when we first get out on the water among the Gambier Islands. This archipelago doesn’t even earn a dot on many world maps. Isolation is an understatement.
On board the boat, Benoît takes us to discover a good sample of all that the lagoon holds. Enveloped in the 90-kilometre reef are 10 volcanic islands and 25 sandy islets. Most of the islands are now uninhabited or only have a few families on them.
Laval’s reach extended beyond just Mangareva. But for all of his despotic ways, the man’s taste and location scouting skills are beyond reproach. Granted, saying that an archipelago in French Polynesia is beautiful is to state the proverbial obvious, but this place is a notch above all else. Eskridge, a man prone to understatement, is forever gushing about the colours and the magnificence of the lagoon.
“Blue, emerald, mauve and violet interplayed beneath the arched blue of the austral skies…
Such blue and cerulean, emerald and emeraud, never existed anywhere outside the South Seas.”
Throughout the day, Benoît ensures that we’re treated to a good mix of culture, nature, history, action, food and relaxation. We find grand churches on islands whose population probably isn’t more than 20. Being a Sunday, we come across one with a service underway. Thirty or so pairs of thongs are plonked at the arched door. Rich vocal harmonies drift out the stained-glass windows and float down a broad avenue of coconut palms and across the still lagoon. Inside, I take a pew and watch the thickset men and women sing and clap for the lord above. For longer than a moment, I forget my own aversion to Catholicism and lose myself in the warm sounds of the singers.
Further into the lagoon, Benoît takes us to Akamaru Island. The colour of the water here is worthy of every superlative in the book.
“Blue like Bora Bora, no?” says Benoît.
For him, this is just another day at the office. For me, I’ve just arrived at a place that, in an instant, makes me question why I live in a city and wonder what I can sell to live here forever. Yes, it’s blue like Bora Bora, but there’s nobody about. Not one bug-eyed French couple flicking their Gauloises ciggie butts into the water from their five-grand-a-night overwater bungalows.
Lunch, a seafood barbeque and banquet, is eaten on a long islet at the edge of the lagoon. We eat, swim, snorkel and sleep in the sand.
We spend the afternoon island hopping, walking and learning (in very broken English) the history of these places. At the end of the day, I let Benoît know it’s one of the best day trips I’ve ever done.
Nights back at the pension quickly slip into their own little routine. There’s reading on the deck of my bungalow, watching for shooting stars in the boundless Austral sky, eating with Benoît and Bianca and the rest of the family and sleeping at an early hour.
In the early mornings, I amble around the island exploring the haunted ruins of Laval’s mad ambition. The whispering ghosts, who Eskridge frequently met with in the 1920s, are always on my mind. Every noise makes me jump. A chicken scratching in the scrub near an abandoned church I’m in has me running out the door.
Each day brings something new. I hike with the French tourists to the top of Mangareva’s highest point, Mount Duff, to find a most impressive vista. We also visit an overwater pearl farm, producing world-class Mangarevan black pearls. We eat baguettes in the village and swim and snorkel in the lagoon.
The idyllic simplicity and lack of rush here is contagious. It seems unbelievable that I have this place mostly to myself. I am shocked when Bianca tells me I am the first Australian she has ever hosted in all her years at one of only a few pensions on Mangareva.
Every journey has its most memorable moment. On Mangareva, it comes in the late afternoon as the sun prepares to slump behind Mount Duff and it turns all it touches to a radiant gold. I’m out in the lagoon on a surf ski, drifting and watching the world around me while in a happy daze. Kids snorkel and spear for fish. Pearl farmers relax and laugh on the verandahs of their overwater offices after the day’s work. White birds, like long-tailed doves, glide across the reddening sky in pairs.
Back on shore, people walk to their houses after whatever it is they’ve been doing to fill their days – no doubt they wave and chat and laugh as they go. There is magic threaded through every molecule in this place. As I float there in a lagoon on the edge of the earth, I can’t help but grin like a moron. This is the soul of Polynesia. Everything is exactly as it ought to be.
A sharp crack sends a feathered missile, who is screeching obscenities about trespassers from above the treetops, hurtling from its guard. The cockatoo isn’t the only one spooked. Nothing in this bushland makes that type of noise without a helping hand. Rationalisations fire around my skull as I scramble over the last of the boulders separating me from the edge of the ridge. Was it a bursting balloon? Firecracker? Gun? This is bushranger land, after all.
In 1870 under the cover of a wild storm, troopers crept between these peppermint trees and candle bark gums on the hunt for the infamous Harry Power. Sixteen months prior, the Irish convict had escaped his road gang and taken to highway robbery to occupy his time. Power tallied more than 30 crimes while on the run, and even took an apprentice named Edward under his wing, before his trainee’s uncle dobbed him in for a £500 reward.
Warnings from Power’s trusted security squad – a noisy peacock and hounds from the homestead below – were muffled by the gale. The coppers uncovered him snoozing in his hideout, now known as Power’s Lookout, in the wee hours of the morning. They celebrated their catch with a feast from the thief’s well-stocked supplies before tossing him under lock and key. Despite being one of Australia’s most flagrant bushrangers his legacy faded, while his student rose to such fame he remains a household name almost 150 years later. Good luck finding an Aussie who hasn’t heard of Ned Kelly.
Metal clings to the side of the ridge, extending a platform over the lichen-covered rocks that once formed a riverbed 350 million years ago. It’s easy to see why Power chose this spot as a hideaway – it’s tough to reach on foot or horseback, and has sweeping views of Victoria’s upper King Valley. My guide for this Girls Trekking Adventures trip, Frith Graham, stands on the podium next to a cluster of walkers, a chilled bottle of Mumm in hand. Its exploding cork is the source of the bird-banishing bang. We may not have found an outlaw with a juicy bounty up here, but as we sip from champagne flutes the moonlight illuminates the valley and I’m feeling as smug as those coppers the night they nabbed Power.
Our three-day expedition started that morning among the giant umbrella-like tree ferns and eucalyptus on the O’Shannassy Aqueduct Trail near the Yarra Valley. We set off in a mini-van, passing farmland and the transmission towers of Bonnie Doon, immortalised as the holiday destination of the Kerrigan family in the classic Australian flick The Castle.
It doesn’t take long to figure out this isn’t a carry-your-own-tent-and-dehydrated-curry kind of hike. “I get off the plane, meet up, and don’t have to make a decision for the next few days,” says Fiona, one of my fellow hikers. I have to admit, handing over the reins of organisation is incredibly liberating. Our days are to be spent decision free, wandering through some of the most picturesque parts of King Valley and working up a thirst for the region’s most famous product, wine.
Without a single traffic light, Whitfield, our home base in the valley, is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it kind of town. “Officially, the population is 421, but I don’t know where they all live!” says Anna-Kate Pizzini, cheesemaker, member of the Pizzini Wines family and one of our guides on this trip.
Despite its tiny population, the town boasts a cafe, an epicurean larder and our accommodation: the award-winning gastropub, Mountain View Hotel. It’s far from the type of establishment Kelly would have boozed in, I muse, as German chef Ben Bergmann greets us before our five-course degustation. Bergmann worked in Michelin-starred restaurants around the world before being drawn to the kitchen of the Pizzini-owned hotel two-and-a-half years ago.
Between courses of duck breast with rhubarb chips, twice-cooked red snapper, and black quinoa-crusted wagyu beef sourced from the next town over, I find myself plundering the contents of the little hessian sack on the table, which resembles a bushranger’s moneybag. The biodynamic sourdough within is best slathered with smoked and salted French butter and washed down with a glass of King Valley sangiovese.
Almost as soon as a dish stars on the menu Bergmann sets out to create something new, so the fleeting existence of the masterpieces we devour makes them all the more impressive.
Next morning, we stamp up a sweat and work off last night’s sweet finale – a deconstructed black forest strudel served under a veil of dry ice smoke. Anna-Kate reels off names of vineyards – Murtagh Brothers, Boggy Creek, Gracebrook and La Cantina – all visible as we stride higher into the hills, dodging burrows and block-shaped droppings.
“That’s wombat poo, because it’s got a square sphincter,” explains Frith, when I ask what type of critter could leave behind so much muck. Our days may be studded with gourmet food and bookended by hot showers and comfortable beds, but none of these women – a group of long-time friends from Toowoomba – are afraid of getting their trail shoes dirty or slogging up a mountain.
We stop to gulp down views of the hazy valley. Later, we stroll through an avenue of 80-year-old chestnut trees where we roll pods beneath our feet, freeing the glossy nuts from within. I drink up that feeling of smugness once more as Anna-Kate tells us we’re trekking through private properties normally closed to the public. These vistas are exclusive.
Back when rangers looted gold and horses, this area was bush and just a few rolling farms. “Even when Nonna and the Italians came it was called the sleepy valley,” says Anna-Kate.
Nonna Rosetta and Roberto Pizzini arrived from Italy in 1955, establishing tobacco farms before their sons switched to growing grapes. Since then King Valley has become one of Australia’s premier wine-producing regions. With its high altitude, microclimates and healthy rainfall, it’s an ideal place to cultivate a wide variety of grapes, particularly those of Mediterranean heritage.
The Pizzinis first planted riesling back in 1978 to sell to Brown Brothers, and chardonnay, sauvignon blanc and shiraz soon followed. It wasn’t long before they started experimenting with lesser-known grapes from Italy, and sangiovese and nebbiolo snuck into the soil.
“The region is really good for those varieties. They love the warmth of the day and the coolness of the night,” says Alfredo ‘Fred’ Pizzini, founder of the winery and father-in-law to Anna-Kate, while we cool off from our morning’s stint with a glass of refreshing prosecco. Tallying 6.5 grams of sugar per litre, compared to the usual 10, it’s far less sweet than any prosecco I’ve ever tasted, and might just be my new favourite drop. It sure beats the usual post-hike electrolyte drink.
Not content with their collection, Fred and his son Joel, now head winemaker, kept planting, and the vineyard boasts 16 types of grapes, as well as a little patch with three more they’re experimenting with. “It’s a bit like a pantry. You don’t just have salt and pepper, do you?” he says, explaining that each new variety gives them the chance to make a new blend or improve an existing style. It’s clear why chef Bergmann, with his ever-changing degustation menu, is such a good fit for their hotel in town.
With some reluctance we haul our bellies, loaded with fine Italian cuisine, away from the dining table sprawling outside the Pizzinis’ former tobacco-drying kilns, now converted into the cellar door. This is technically a hike, after all, and we’ve got another winery to march towards. Plus, Frith promises we’ll return tomorrow to taste plenty more vino and test our culinary skills during a cooking class with winery co-owner and Fred’s wife, Katrina Pizzini.
We trundle past rows of vines, their autumnal leaves flushed like splashes of aged riesling and pinot noir. Cappuccino-coloured horses and a family of sheep graze by the street, aptly dubbed Prosecco Road, which we follow to Dal Zotto Wines, the first vineyard in the King Valley to create the bubbly drop.
For the second time in a day we wrap our mouths around more Italian varietals. The 2015 pinot grigio offers notes of pear and I enjoy the nutty flavour of the 2014 garganega, but it’s the reds that make me wish I had the strength of a highwayman to carry home a few cases.
Erik Nap, the trattoria manager, sploshes nebbiolo into our glasses, describing how the drop is lighter than you’ll find in the motherland. “If you order it in Italy, they serve it with a knife and fork,” he chuckles.
Apparently the 2012 we’re sipping requires a few more years sealed in a cellar to smooth out the tannins, but it seems a bit cruel to keep such a tasty drop under lock and key. This is bushranger land, after all, and I’m ready to ransack the bounty.
My safety helmet has been knocked sideways over one eye. Below me – a long way below me – is a foaming pool of frigid water and tumbled boulders. To my left, a waterfall shudders, sending spray into my eyes. I scramble over the rock ledge to lie moaning in the mud. I’d never realized Tahiti could be such a challenging place. My knees are grazed and my thigh muscles ache. But I also have a big grin on my face. Who needs a mud spa? I want to crawl through lava tubes and swim with sharks. In French Polynesia, adventure awaits – provided you ignore every resort brochure ever produced.
My visit started on the island of Tahiti, which most visitors only pass through on the way to more alluring islands. Can’t imagine why. Turn away from the ocean and you see dramatic peaks and valleys. I wanted to explore, taking the unsealed roads where red flowers brush the sides of the car and bamboo creaks. Tibo of Mato Nui Excursions accompanied me. He is one of a new breed of small tour operators in Tahiti willing to give visitors more than a tiare flower behind the ear and a cocktail.
For two days, Tibo took me trekking across Tahiti Iti. We camped on an empty beach and ate raw snails. He took me abseiling down waterfalls at Vaipurau and Poutoa. I drew the line at the biggest rappel, which is only for the experienced. There was ample opportunity to recover my manhood by leaping off rocks into pools far below, pummelling my chest as I went. In the hinterland behind Hitia, I clung to another rock ledge and crawled through lava tubes. Lava tubes are tunnel-like caves formed by ancient volcanic action. At Hitia there are three, linked by a series of little valleys landscaped by waterfalls. Basic fitness and sure-footed agility will get you scrambling and wading through the first two lava tubes, tested mainly by a couple of small abseils.
The third lava tube is more challenging. It is black and labyrinthine with Gollum-deep pools, smooth rock surfaces and lit only by the drunken dancing of a potholer’s lamp. I passed the narrow opening on my belly in puddles of muddy water. Upon reaching the valley however, the scenery was glorious and the waterfalls like something from a shampoo ad. I mark lava tubing down as a great new challenge that has been successfully completed.
The following day I travelled to Huahine, a small, overlooked island between Tahiti and Bora Bora. The plane skimmed a turquoise lagoon and out over the ocean, where puffy white clouds wandered like lost sheep on a vast blue plain. Huahine revealed itself like a spectacular magic trick: a wonderland of voluptuous emerald peaks with necklaces of turquoise lagoons and palm trees.
The little plane waggled its wings in pure joy and we set down at the airport. It was little more than a hut with two doors – arrives and departs – and the heat enveloped me like a hug from a maiden aunt.
If you happen to be a postcard manufacturer, these islands are the stuff of palm-fringed fantasy. The more intrepid will discover that Huahine has great jagged rocks and is haunted by wild pigs. A cyclone a few years back wiped out most of its houses and a $70 million resort in a matter of minutes. You can see how rains crash down like Armageddon. As acts of God go, it suited me just fine. Few tourists come here, only adventurers, insane backpackers and lots of mosquitoes. Whether you stay in a tiny pension or a beach hut at Huahine’s lastremaining resort, you get absolute beachfront, wave-lulling tranquillity.
But enough tranquillity. I was soon hanging on to the wheel of my battered rental Jeep as the engine roared and protested and a precipice lurched around every corner. The wheels of my car rattled on bridges made of planking that spanned sluggish brown rivers. Even on the roads, driving has its challenges: dusty dogs refused to get out of the way and a falling coconut dented the bonnet and nearly caused me to end up in the ditch with a heart attack.
Four-wheel driving – survived! Lava tubes – done! Kayaking was next. In Huahine you can paddle out into the lagoon and not see another soul. Follow the boom of the surf to a gap in the reef however and you’ll spot the surfers. The consistently large swells of Huahine make the island second only to Tahiti for attracting those in search of waves. Locals are reportedly not taking too kindly to foreigners muscling in on their territory. At least not until you’ve met them, knocked back copious amounts of alcohol together, beaten your chest and talked the surfing talk.
A confession: I did spend a couple of days on a beach looking at the sunset and sipping cocktails. After my days of camping, kayaking and mud crawling, I figured that I had earned a stint at the Te Tiare Beach Resort, the only international standard resort on the island. To reach it, a local wearing flip-flops and a flowered shirt picked me up in a boat from a tiny pontoon, where a dog snored and fish glittered in the water. There’s no road access to Te Tiare and by the time I reached my bungalow even the TV and phone seemed like strange artefacts from another civilization.
Once my abused muscles were sufficiently recovered, I was ready for more adventure. This came courtesy of an outrigger boat piloted by a local guy named Moana, who grinned like a cat in a fish shop and played the ukulele. There was a tattoo of a turtle on his left shoulder and he had the brown belly of a happy Buddha. We travelled around the island, skipping over the pale blue waters of the lagoon. When I felt too hot I simply dropped off the boat with a mask and a hunk of baguette. A shoal of hungry butterfly fish promptly surrounded me, flaunting black and white stripes and vivid yellow tails. I could hear them chomping on the bread while Moana’s ukulele twanged above somewhere.
By afternoon I was swimming with black-fin reef sharks. Moana introduced me to Claude, a local who has developed a unique relationship with the big fish over the years.
Most afternoons at 3pm, Claude can be found aboard a floating platform in the lagoon preparing hacked-up fish heads for the sharks, who turn up like clockwork for the feast. Claude invites anyone willing to get into the water with a frenzy of up to 20 sharks. I was soon overboard and stepping, chest-deep along the seabed, anxious about getting a cut on the sharp coral lest a shark mistake me for a hunk of bleeding fish. The sleek and sinister sharks are a thrill up close, especially when you’re in the water with them.
Mesmerised by their power and grace, my heart flipped as they cruised within arm’s reach. They turned slowly in the water, perfectly balanced and propelling themselves with indolent flicks of their tails.
Back on dry land in time for another postcard sunset, I was weary from my day spent swimming with the sharks but in no doubt that French Polynesia has more to offer than beaches and breakfast buffets.
For the life of me I can’t imagine why she wants me to put my face in the water. We’ve just struggled into the mother lode of neoprene gear – a double layer of wetsuits, plus a hood, gloves and boots – on the shoreline and have waded into the bay. My mask and fins are still looped over my arm, and since Swantje has already done this hundreds of times, I’m not going to argue.
“Oh, shit,” I splutter-yelp seconds later. All those layers of rubber have shielded me from the reality of the water temperature, which is only about 10ºC, but my bare visage feels as though it has been flash frozen.
“You need to get used to it before we go in,” Swantje – pronounced Swanny – tells me, and makes me go face first again. Then I do it with my mask on and at my feet I can see them. We’re only in about 150 centimetres of water, but on the rocky bottom they are dancing and displaying. Thank goodness, because I’ve just spent three days in Whyalla waiting for the wind to change so I can make the acquaintance of the giant Australian cuttlefish (Sepia apama).
On the edge of town, there’s a huge sign that reads: “Where the outback meets the sea.” The coastline where the Southern Ocean ducks into the Spencer Gulf between Port Lincoln and Marion Bay is unlike anywhere else in the country. The shore at Fitzgerald Bay, just out of town, is covered in ridges of ochre-red shingles – it’s a one-off in South Australia. North of the bay, the Freycinet Peninsula Circuit starts at Douglas Point and hugs the waterline. Join it at Fitzgerald Bay and you can 4WD, hike or cycle to Point Lowly, where there’s a lighthouse. But as we stare out over the sea, buffeted by wild winds, there’s not another soul to be seen.
Generally, Whyalla is known for two things: its steel industry and the problems it’s having at the moment, with employment decimated over the past two decades. When you’ve got some time to kill, a tour of the steelworks is an interesting diversion and gives you a taste of life in an industrial town. Our minibus pulls up beside a huge construction and Marge, who’s hosting the tour, tells us to look for plumes of steam that give away things are happening in this part of the complex. We see an automated carriage moving, high up on its rails. When it stops, glowing molten rock is poured into the car. This is the coke oven push and it’s one of the most spectacular processes in the transformation of ore to steel.
After a quick trip to the adjacent HMAS Whyalla, the first ship to come off the line when the town became a major player for the Broken Hill Pty Co Ltd, I find a pamphlet advertising the local Elvis Museum.
Peter Bleeze lives on the outskirts of Whyalla and he’s not just a fan of the King, he’s a super fan. His entire house is emblazoned with memorabilia, from rare posters to life-size statues. “A young police cadet lived down the street and used to babysit me,” Peter tells me in his front room, where Aloha from Hawaii plays on the television. “He had a little record player and used to play me Elvis records. I thought he was god’s gift to singing.
“I got my first t-shirt when I was about 10, then started collecting seriously when I began working.”
He wanders around his house wearing a Graceland hoodie, telling stories of people who’ve visited, before opening the back door so I can check out his piece de resistance. Out in the backyard, beneath the Hills Hoist, is a gold Cadillac, a replica of Elvis’s own. Peter’s quite happy for visitors to don the Elvis sunglasses in the glove compartment and pose in the front seat for photographs.
By this stage, having seen pretty much everything Whyalla has to offer, I decide to check in with Tony Bramley, owner of the local dive shop. Perhaps there’s a chance he’ll green light a quick dive.
“When it’s rough and windy, the cuttles go deeper and hide in the algae,” he tells me in a room lined with racks of wetsuits and diving gear. “They just won’t be doing anything.” That’ll be a no then.
Just a few days before, Tony tells me, they’d had about 600 people visit the congregation over the course of four days for an Experiencing Marine Sanctuaries event. Exact numbers of swimmers are hard to pin down, since the site is easily accessible by anyone with a wetsuit and snorkel. Now there’s a BBC documentary crew in town also waiting for the wind to subside.
It’s not just me, Tony and the BBC dudes excited about Whyalla’s giant cuttlefish. Divers from around the world come here between May and August to witness the only known congregation – not just in Australia, but anywhere – of the underwater creatures.
So far, this has been a good year. “We haven’t seen an aggregation like this since 1998,” Tony tells me. The South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI) has estimated the biomass this year to be up to 200,000 kilograms. In 2013 it had been as low as 16,500 kilograms and there were grave fears for the future of the species.
Apart from that, the Spencer Gulf cuttlefish remain something of a mystery. Bronwyn Gillanders of Flinders University has been studying them since the early 2000s and has established the Point Lowly cuttlefish are a subspecies – it’s probably their genetic material that brings them back each year. Female cuttles need a rock ledge to lay their eggs – each is like a large white teardrop hanging beneath a protective shelf – and this is one of the few places offering multiple natural shelters. “The rest of the gulf is mud and mangroves,” says Tony.
He then gets a call. There’s a dolphin in the fenced-off swimming area in the marina, and whoever’s on the other end wants Tony to coax it back out to sea. “There are 30 or so in the Whyalla-Edithburgh pod,” Tony explains. “About five of them are habituated and interact with people.” This is one of them, and he often makes a nuisance of himself. I head down to the shore and, sure enough, there’s a dolphin bobbing about, but the wind is so strong I almost get blown off the pontoon trying to get a better look.
Finally, at the beginning of day three, we’ve come up trumps. The wind has dropped off completely and the sun is shining. Swantje and I load up the ute and head out of town. About 20 kilometres outside of Whyalla is the Santos LPG plant, and this is where anyone who wants to commune with cuttlefish needs to be. A dirt track leads down to a park bench and rocky shoreline. It’s an easy spot for anyone to find, but this hasn’t affected the cuttlefish population.
Depending on how people adjust to the temperature, Swantje tells me, dives here can last anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour. The maximum depth is about six metres.
They are everywhere, hundreds of them. The males outnumber the females, and because they pair off to mate, there’s fierce competition between the boys in the bay. This is where you’ll see them displaying their colours – versions of purple, brown and cream – patterns rippling through their bodies as they do an underwater mating dance. Some of the smaller males will change their patterns to mimic a female then, when they have the big boys’ attention, move in for a bit of action with the actual females. Cheeky buggers!
As we fin around the shallow bay, we see nothing but cuttlefish. Oh, and one lone squid who pulses through the water, possibly wondering where its friends have gone. Occasionally a curious creature swims close, observing us with its big eyes. They seem to be completely unawed by our presence.
It doesn’t seem like long, despite the fact I’ve lost all feeling in my hands and feet, before Swantje’s pointing us back towards shore. “Fifty-eight minutes,” she tells me when I enquire as to how long we’ve been below the surface. “Don’t worry, you should be able to feel your fingers again some time after lunch.”
After we’ve stripped off our gear and are sitting in the cab of the ute blowing on our hands and watching a couple of blokes getting ready to jump in, it hits me: all those amazing creatures are going to be gone in a month. And not just gone back out to sea, but gone completely. Once they breed, the giant Australian cuttlefish dies. Dolphins, Port Jackson sharks and other sea creatures come in and feed on the bodies until there’s nothing left. Not until next year, when the next generation of cuttlefish returns to breed again.
I have travelled all around the world, from Chile to Cambodia, Fiji to Nepal, and the cheapest hotel I ever stayed in was the five-star Hilton Melbourne South Wharf, which cost me $1.
When I began my journey as a backpacker, I was interested in the lives of poor people in developing countries. Now I know how they live: they keep chickens, cut out pictures from magazines and stick them on their walls, carry stuff around on their heads, and wake up very early in the morning. They often don’t have toilets in their homes. Apart from that, they’re just like us..
These days, I’m more concerned with the culture of rich people, and I’ve devoted the last couple of years to trying to discover what we can learn from these simple folk, who are only concerned with luxury and money.
Business travellers inhabit a hidden world of airport and executive lounges. They belong to frequent flyer and hotel loyalty programs, which provide them with free stuff like beer, wine and food.
Let me explain how this worked for me. A couple of years ago, I flew twice to Europe with Qantas, and also took a number of Qantas domestic flights. I became a Gold Qantas Frequent Flyer, which entitled me to use Qantas Club. These are bland and uninspiring facilities, but offer great opportunities for rich-people watching.
At about 5pm each day, the cold buffet (with one choice of soup) is augmented by a hot food selection (usually a fairly crappy pasta). As soon as this occurs, dozens of business travellers hurry to their feet and rush the servery because, even though you wouldn’t pay five dollars for the meal at the restaurant, the chance to get something for nothing is valued very highly in the uncomplicated philosophy of people who wear suits to work.
In late 2010, in an attempt to win a bigger share of the business-travel market, Virgin Australia offered to ‘status match’ Qantas Frequent Flyers. In other words, if you were Gold with Qantas, they would make you Gold with Virgin, even if, like me, you never flew Virgin because you mistakenly believed their flights were always cancelled.
And here’s the good bit: the Hilton Honors program status-matched Virgin Frequent Flyers, so I was automatically a Gold Hilton guest, although I never stayed at Hiltons either. This meant that, at Hilton hotels throughout the world, I became entitled to an automatic upgrade to an Executive Room, free wi-fi and a buffet breakfast.
I paid $165 for a room at the Hilton Melbourne South Wharf. The extras – wi-fi and breakfast – were worth about $50, which theoretically brought the price of the room itself down to $115. Realistically, however, I’d have spent only $10 on breakfast and $5 at an internet cafe, so let’s call it $150.
But Gold Hilton Honors members also have use of the Executive Lounge, which serves free beer, wine and canapés from 6pm to 8.30pm. I arrived with a friend and her daughter at 6pm on the dot. We immediately began drinking Boag’s Premium and eating plates of antipasti – bread, cheese, olives, cold meats, nuts and salads, until the hot food arrived.
The samosas were delicious, although my friend preferred the gyoza, and we could go back for more as often as we liked. I ate five small plates of hot food, which amounted to one big plate. My friend and her daughter probably had another six between them, and there was a cheeseboard for dessert. In a mid-range restaurant, we would have paid about $30 a head – and at the Hilton we had a view of the Yarra.
So, by now, the room itself had cost me only $60. To my shame, I drank six Boag’s and a glass of white wine. My friend had four drinks, her daughter drank a single Coke. At $5 for each alcoholic drink – which would be cheap – and $4 for the Coke, our drinks bill in a bar would’ve totalled $59.
That’s how my room at the Hilton cost me $1. And that’s why rich people are rich.
The helicopter skims across the bright waters of the Coral Sea, revealing a chain of emerald islands at my feet. Untrammeled nature lies in every direction, from golden sands to coconut palms and coral reefs – the embodiment of tropical north Queensland. Shadows of a couple of large late-afternoon clouds pour over the ranges like spilt paint, as an island of considerable size (the second-largest in the Palm Island group) comes into view.
Orpheus Island, where I’m about to land, is located in a region of Australia shrouded in as much mystery as there is history. It’s 80 kilometres north-west of Townsville and a 10-minute chopper ride (or 20-minute boat trip) from Palm Island, which was described as an ‘open-air jail’ for Indigenous Australians during much of the twentieth century. Between both islands lies Fantome Island – a secret leper colony right up until the end of the 1970s.
As I step out of the chopper, I’m thankful that tourism has never really taken off in these parts. A national park and a Great Barrier Reef sanctuary, Orpheus has just one boutique resort, catering for up to 34 guests on the whole 1300-hectare island. Walking across its pretty, manicured lawn, the wind sings a light melody and there’s not a souvenir seller or cork hat in sight.
Whereas XXXX Gold-guzzling Aussies flock to Magnetic Island, or ‘Maggie’, the seclusion of Orpheus has attracted the likes of Elton John, Vivien Leigh and Mickey Rooney. But don’t let that fool you into thinking this place is only for the exceedingly well heeled. Food is delivered here once a week by barge, so at other times you’re expected to get down and dirty with the cooks and catch it.
“Take a look at this!” yells Arie, a fine-dining chef from Melbourne who’s only been on the island for three weeks, yet hops around the rocks, spear in hand, like a pro. It’s been a couple of hours since my arrival and the tide is low. All the dinghies that were earlier bobbing happily in the water now look like they’ve been washed up onto the moon.
I pad after him along the shore, struggling to carry a bucket of the biggest oysters I have ever seen. “Stingray for dinner,” he says, smiling at his prize as he holds it high in the air with one hand, the bloody spear in the other.
Later that night, at a candlelit table on the deck of the outdoor restaurant, I’m thankful the Queensland heat permits me to wear a loose dress. The feast that’s laid out before me – oysters baked in sesame crust, seared Harvey Bay scallops, Burgundy-style crayfish, snapper ravioli, kangaroo fillet with smoked potato puree, and banana curry – would surely break top, middle and bottom buttons.
I pull up a log on the beach next to the campfire and take some time out to digest with the handful of other guests. We chat, laugh, drink far too many lychee martinis and watch as the sky turns a kaleidoscope of red, pink, mandarin and golden yellow. I feel a galaxy away from city life.
I wake early to the trill of little birds and rainbow lorikeets dancing in the trees. Eager to learn more about the origins of the area, I join another guest and take a 10-minute boat trip over to Fantome Island for a walk with Tom, a local guide from Palm Island.
Fantome is a startling mix of tropical paradise and prison. A leprosarium for Indigenous Australians, it was run by nuns from 1939 to 1973 and kept secret by the state government. Queensland’s answer to stopping the disease was to take Indigenous Australians from their families and confine them to this lonely outpost. When it was closed, it was purged by fire. Later it became the site of more than 200 graves.
“My grandmother is buried on this island,” Tom tells me, looking away, like he’s plucking up the courage to share what he says next. “I like to come here camping with my daughter because, on a clear day like today, you can hear all the old people talking. It was scary at first, but now it’s nice and soothing and you know they’re looking after you.”
We walk through the waist-high grass, down the ‘High St’, past an abandoned tin shed and bits of corrugated iron – remnants from Cyclone Yasi last year. We follow the bleating of goats and their little tracks in the sand. We stop every couple of strides as Tom points out a plant, tree or flower that has some important purpose, like Chinese apple trees (a sign of early Chinese settlers in the 1900s) and wild lemons. “Good for cooking – and hangovers,” says Tom, as he collects some for Arie and I pocket some for later.
Back on the boat, as we begin to head out to sea, a group of turtles joins us in the spray. A slight taint of turquoise indicates shallow water where, to our delight, they perform a ballet, while white eagles circle overhead.
Our skipper, Paul, takes us out to Coral Garden – one of his favourite reefs and a popular spot for divers. “Just remember I can marry you at sea,” he hollers above the engine as he puts the boat in full throttle and I lunge for the side rope. “Or bury you.”
We approach ‘the green zone’, a protected part of the Great Barrier Reef, pull on our masks and fins and slip off the edge into the 28-degree water. I take a breath and then swim down, kicking to the bottom and gliding over the coral-strewn seabed, as tiny, multi-coloured fish dart out of my way.
The next couple of hours somehow meld into the next couple of days. I snorkel an area inhabited by hundreds of giant clams, take a sunset cruise and watch for manta rays and humpback whales. I explore Yanks Jetty and pretty pockets of secluded beach, where guests picnic and goannas are said to stroll. Then finally, I swap flippers for flopping and perfect the art of dozing in a hammock, fruity cocktail in hand.
I’ve spent a lot of time travelling and trying to avoid the tourist traps and crowds. And in the space of just a few days I’ve discovered that the best spots are often hidden in the most unlikely spots – not too far from home.
On a scale of get-me-out-of-here white and I’m-going-to-be-ill green I’m presenting somewhere in the middle. It’s no surprise really, because I’m on the floor of a tiny tin can, 1500 metres up in the air and strapped to my back is a man with a proven track record of hurling himself out of planes. With each clip locking us together capable of lifting a truck, escape is unlikely. “It’ll either be the longest or the shortest 30 seconds of your life,” Sam, my human sinker, chuckles into my ear. “Now,” he says, “do you remember the banana position?”
On the ground, before we hurtle along the tarmac and rattle into the thick Northern Territory air, we practise curling our legs under our torsos and tilting heads towards the sky. All while wearing a pair of baggy red pants over our own – insurance perhaps, in case we make a mess in the first set. Once our banana poses – the stance we’re to hold seconds before tumbling from the plane – pass Sam’s test, a baby-faced senior pilot unshackles the plane from its parking spot at Uluru Airport and we were on our way.
At the halfway mark the mugginess dissipates and the cool air wicks away the worst of the nerves, though my mouth still feels as parched as the desert. From here Uluru, taller than the highest skyscraper in the Southern Hemisphere, rests on the rusted soil like a crumpled blanket. In the distance the boulders of Kata Tjuta erupt from the earth but it’s the ridges snaking like veins across the skin of the land that are the most striking.
Over the hammering engine Sam explains that more than 300 million years ago salt water pooled over this part of Oz, depositing coral and marine fossils into layers of soil. It’s the type of wet that explorer Captain Charles Sturt went searching for when he set off from Adelaide back in 1844, carting a whaleboat and 200 sheep on his now infamous expedition – a voyage that started millions of years too late. The dunes we see from our little plane have existed this way for the past 30,000 years, with just their crests wandering in the desert.
Our pilot, also sporting a parachute “just in case”, twirls up higher and higher. Perspective disappears. The scene below appears like a page from a map with the horizon smudging into pale blue haze. I begin to see why Sam repeats this trip time and again. Well, that and the freefall, he says. With 5000 jumps on his tally, a newbie would have to dive every day for the next 13.5 years to clock up the same lofty number.
At 3600 metres we reach altitude – high enough to plummet for 30 seconds before a parachute sprouts open and slows us to a graceful descent. Flying this high, Uluru looks unnaturally small. I’m about ready for a closer look.
NOTEL is an airstream destination. Located in the middle of Melbourne’s CBD on the rooftop of a Flinders Lane car park, these top-of-the-line airstreams come with their own decked area, queen size bed, and a virtual concierge.
NOTEL may not be a traditional hotel, it’s a unique accommodation option in the heart of this vibrant city. The basic airstream experience offers free Wi-Fi with complimentary minibar and air conditioner. Of course, you can also count on all the basic amenities you would get in a hotel, going from a comfortable queen-sized bed to a full-size shower.
NOTEL also provides upgrades on the basic airstream experience. The upgraded experience comes with your own private deck and a private sapphire spa for only a small increase on the price.
Getting lost on an island with just one sealed road and only 45 square kilometres of tropical land is no small feat, but it happens almost immediately upon my arrival at Tubuai. To lose my way, I pole across the lagoon to the surf-foamed outer reef, feeling stately and over-confident on an 11-foot paddleboard.
Polynesians famously explored the far-flung corners of the Pacific using only the stars as their guide. It is one of the most remarkable achievements in human navigation as Polynesia’s perimeters are as broad as Russia and its islands merely dots in a vast blue expanse. But as I glide about Tubuai, idly appreciating the skills of the ancient way-finders, I eventually arrive at an unfamiliar landmark with one pressing question: where the hell am I?
I paddle to land to find a pig, a horse and then a road, which can only be the road. With my back stained in saltwater streaks, I pass giggling school kids who point me further down the way toward the wipa, my family-run pension. In Tahitian, Wipa can mean wind or island, but locally it’s used as an emphatic greeting accompanied by a karate-chop hand gesture, all because of a man by the name of Willson Doom.
Willson is a silver-haired patriarch with a big belly laugh and infectious teenage enthusiasm, and my host at Wipa Lodge. A former big wave surfer, he took up skateboarding in his 40s when he returned to his home island where he would counter the lack of suitable surfaces by piloting his modified skateboard deck down mountain passes at breakneck speeds. “Yeah man,” he assures my disbelieving expression, “seventy kilometres an hour straight down.” In my mind, I could picture it, as a middle-aged man flies past startled livestock, his life hanging in the balance, and the tropical air filled with a bellowing “WIPE-AH!”
Tubuai is part of French Polynesia’s southernmost archipelago, the Austral Islands. If you’ve never heard of them, you’re in good company. Most of Tahiti’s visitors rarely stray from the popular tourist islands (Bora Bora, Moorea and Huahine) where paradise tends to be refined, enhanced and expensive. Loved up honeymooners and cashed up billionaires are catered for with extravagant dining, over-the-lagoon bungalows and attentive staff. Johnny Depp, Barack Obama and Tom Hanks are among the A-listers rumoured to have visited in the previous month alone.
Tahiti is so associated with luxury and glamour it is often dismissed as being exclusively about these things. The reality, however, is quite different. If you’re keen on unscheduled adventure, fresh fish, world-class diving and a blueprint for paradise, then French Polynesia’s abundant beauty offers a variety of rarely visited islands that can be enjoyed on a modest budget.
Tubuai, the largest of the distant Australs, has two mountains, a placid lagoon that’s almost twice the size of the island and a handful of small atolls, which hug its perimeter like pilot fish. The people of the island live simply, farming in the rich volcanic soil and fishing for protein and sport. There are just two pensions available to travellers, but I appear to be the only current visitor, which means boat rides out to the atolls for snorkelling and fishing are off. Instead, I’m forced to nose about, talk to strangers and get to know Willson. Turns out, I get to experience a lot more of the island this way.
At Wipa Lodge, I find a rusty paperweight that I’m told is a cannonball from the HMS Bounty, and I feel the heavy weight of history in my hand. It was found nearby at Bloody Bay where a mutineer, Christian Fletcher, and his followers clashed with locals on their ill-fated attempt to establish a rebel Eden. The Tubuians became hostile and managed to send the mutineers packing after five months, but not before many of them had been killed and far deadlier diseases introduced.
The cannonball is not a lone historic artefact here. Fish hooks and other ornaments Willson has found in his yard adorn the lodge, and as my host explains their likely origins, he becomes animated. Suddenly, he leaves the room, reappearing with an antique spear, which he throws expertly in my direction. Before I know it, we’re in his wife’s car gunning down the road. There’s something Willson would like me to see.
We come to a stop in a grassy field, surrounded by mango trees. Willson’s face becomes serious as he instructs me to choose three wildflowers in silence, and then invites me to lay down my offering in a cleared area beneath jungle foliage. We are alone in an ancient marae, a public sacred space used on the island as a place to consult gods and make offerings. Willson adopts an earnest tone and a stage whisper as the shadows deepen. He tells me about the gods, demons and visions, and tells me that all around me, babies were born, elders buried, spirits awoken and gods placated. This is where origin stories and hard-won knowledge have been passed down through the generations.
Before I say my goodbyes to Tubuai, I go for one last blurt around the island with Willson, who I discover was chosen to be the custodian of Tubuai’s cultural heritage, an honour that he says has transformed his life. In a final moment of solidarity, he farewells me with a bear hug and a small rock, “A piece of my island for you,” he says. I give him a final wipa salute and the special moment leaves my arms prickled with goose bumps. I leave the island with a newfound understanding of Tahitian culture, spirituality and history, but it’s the personal connection with the charismatic Willson and his passion for his cultural heritage that stays with me.
On Tahiti, the Heiva festival is in full swing. It’s one of the longest-running festivals in the world and the two-week celebration of Polynesian culture is celebrated with dancing, music, and sporting contests. I make the most of the festivities, and as I watch Tahitians dance, soar and sashay feathers and plumes across Papeete’s harbor-side auditorium, I quickly understand why European sailors risked rebellion and refused to leave this bountiful island chain.
From feathers to scales, I wing over the Pacific to Ahe, an island in the Tuamotu Archipelago. These low-lying, lightly inhabited atolls are known for their world-class diving and fishing. Ahe, a former pearl farm, is shaped like a necklace and encircles a large lagoon. White sands, aquamarine water and arched palms indulge my wildest escapist fantasies. The water is gin-clear, blood-warm and teeming with life and within hours of my arrival I’ve managed to hook a fish, sight a shark and feed a ray.
“The best fishing in Polynésie Française,” a smiling Tahitian tells me, loading our boat with supplies for our diving adventure. Unlike my soloist trip on Tubuai, there are ten of us staying at Cocoperle Lodge, one of only two pensions on Ahe. Everyone is either French or Tahitian, but they adopt me, the only English speaker, like an endearingly dim pet. I’m grateful for the translations but just as happy to let the conversation wash over me.
The boat takes us across the lagoon and through its narrow opening, the gateway to the outside reef. As my French companions and I splash into the iridescent blue and kick towards the inner reef, we see schools of bright fish and a black-tipped reef shark above a rainbow of hard and soft corals. Many dive experts rate the Tuamotus as the best place to snorkel in French Polynesia, as their lagoons and healthy reefs harbour a symphony of colours and creatures.
The fishers on our boat haul in a seafood feast as we attempt to outrun the storm dramatically building behind us. There’s a chance to return after lunch but I’m happy to laze away the afternoon, wading into the lagoon whenever my skin dries and daydreaming about absconding to Tahiti. That’s exactly what my French host, Frank, did in the 80s when he married a local girl and built Cocoperle up from the jungle.
It’s not hard to see why so many have fallen for Ahe over the years. From my hammock in the Tuamotus, the real world seems harried and hard-edged. I wonder if I could live out the rest of my days here, practising French, learning to dance and raising my children as spear fishers. Instead, I settle for bringing a little of Tahiti home with me. Along with my rock from Tubuai and local recipe for salade de poisson cru (raw tuna salad), I leave this pristine part of the world with an enhanced appreciation for the beauty of the natural world and a newfound relaxed attitude to schedules.
As my plane banks, I steal one last look at this beautiful family of islands. They become mere specks in the distance, and I reminisce, in awe of all I’ve experienced on my visit to French Polynesia’s hidden gems. My window’s view is filled with blue ripples of the Pacific Ocean, and I think to myself how wonderful it is that we may be cultures apart, but it’s the very same ocean that laps at my local beach and connects me to my new Tahitian friends.
I’m butchering an oyster in a rookie attempt to shuck my waterside snack. The shell splinters as I clumsily try to crank it open with a knife, narrowly avoiding skewering my hand in the process. Eventually it hinges open, revealing a plump nugget bathing in a small puddle of the purest Tasmanian ocean water. My salivating taste buds are not disappointed when I slurp down the freshest, saltiest oyster I’ve ever eaten.
Our delicious bounty was plucked minutes ago from Ford Bay’s shallows by Tom, one of our guides on the Bruny Island Long Weekend food and walking tour. The private farm on the island was started by a Sydney stockbroker who decided to try his hand at growing oysters after the global financial crisis of 2007. We have exclusive access to these self-serve oysters, and it’s a delicious way to cap off our first day. Tom shucks as fast as he can to keep up with the all-you-can-eat demand, but eventually he admits defeat and declares the pop-up restaurant closed. It’s a natural protein shot following the day’s five-hour hike.
Bruny Island Long Weekend taps into the beloved institution of the three-day weekend, offering a mate’s insider tour of the island’s gems. Beyond the tourist trail, it combines three days of hiking with premium local food and wine. I’m here to taste it all and hopefully burn it off. The trip is ambitiously labelled as calorie-neutral but that seems unlikely faced with the prospect of all the fine produce.
We arrived this morning via the Derwent River, skirting down the coast on a roaring spin onboard Pennicott Wilderness Journeys’ giant inflatable craft. A swift 45-minute jet ride from the Hobart docks, Bruny Island is a miniature copy of the Tasmanian mainland. It has a unique microcosm of diverse weather, wildlife, terrain and food, packed within 362 square kilometres. Today’s walk covers 12 kilometres along a squiggled coastline bordered by rugged bushland, leading us to the peak of Cape Queen Elizabeth.
Tom and our second guide, Dave, lug weighted packs, a heavy comparison to our much lighter daypacks. The group settles into a cracking pace and within minutes of leaving the van we are deep in the wilderness and totally off the tourist grid. As the sandy path gives way to a steep rubble goat track, it’s evident that this weekend is no leisurely stroll. The terrain varies between muddy sludge, crumbling rock and knee-jarring sand. I focus on negotiating my steps up the lung-straining incline over the first cape, wary of stepping on an agitated jack-jumper or a slithery surprise. It isn’t long before a piercing yelp ahead halts the group. A venomous copperhead snake blocks our track but while I fight my urge to flee, it graciously gives way.
Bruny Island treats us to four seasons in one hour. One minute my skin is sizzling under the searing Tassie sun, then rain and icy winds force a pit stop to layer up. Before long, I’m steaming and overdressed as the sun makes its return. Thankfully, bushwalking funnels your focus on just the few metres ahead, making life’s complexities and woes vanish. It’s very cathartic finding a rhythm and I let my mind drift off with the muted roar of the waves.
We are mere specks measured against the epic surrounds. The summit exposes a dramatic panorama that seems impossible to even partially conquer in just three days. Layers of peaks wrap around us, while below dozens of bays cut into the mainland. It looks remote and inhospitable under moody skies, but transforms as the sun escapes the clouds and lights up the turquoise waters and blinding white sand.
We traverse down the ocean side and hit rolling sand dunes. Sheer cliffs of mudstone and Jurassic dolomite drop straight into the water, and tessellated sculptures, beaten by centuries of weather, decorate the beach like an open-air gallery. Our shortcut home is blocked by the tide and we’re at an impasse with the cliff base, but rather than backtracking we opt for a little off-roading, climbing up and over the precarious rock formations pounded by the waves. The pace lifts during the final stretch, a silent collective push to bring forward happy hour.
The camp is tucked deep on the south island within South Bruny Forest, the island’s oldest forest. Four basic apex tents host luxurious king-sized beds within their canvas walls and a toilet hut features a long drop toilet with a dignified modern throne on top. A cubby-house nestled on the lush forest floor is in fact the outdoor shower. It is liberating being exposed in, and to, nature. Immense eucalypt trunks tower past the open front with the rustling canopy high above. I huddle under the steaming blanket of water with a front row seat to the feathered entertainment of this twitchers’ paradise, not wanting to turn the water off and give the next person their turn. I relinquish the urge to stay, knowing happy hour awaits our arrival in the dining room: a serving of Bruny cheese, crisp Sauvignon Blanc and a roaring fire. Tom and Dave impress with a feast of fresh scallops in white wine, lamb rump with chimichurri, and leatherwood honey panna cotta, filling our bellies for a night of slumber surrounded by nature.
My body awakens like a seized-up Tin Man, but is swiftly remedied with a morning shower to soothe it into submission. Today is a 15-kilometre hike through the South Bruny National Park, which starts with a long walk along Cloudy Bay. To the eye, the beach appears a short stroll, but an hour later we are still plodding along the coastline. Reaching the base of East Cloudy Head, Tom breaks the news that we now face a two-hour uphill slog. The terrain is distinctly more mountainous and rugged. We push through sharp, attacking thicket as we follow a mostly concealed overgrown track. It’s definite bush bashing with the landscape serving up its fair share of back-handers and kneecapping.
We plod one foot after the next, starting to hope each rise is our final hurdle. In my mind’s eye, our ant-line formation resembles the Von Trapp family fleeing Austria in the closing scene of The Sound of Music. It feels extremely isolated with either looming mountains above or sheer cliffs below. The powerful aura of hiking a dramatic coastline that has remained unchanged since the first European explorer, Abel Tasman, reached its shores in 1642, isn’t lost on me. At the pinnacle of the climb, I struggle to pinpoint our origin in the distance. What we’ve covered feels expansive, but in reality we’ve only trekked a tiny portion of the map.
We retrace our steps downhill in record time. Along the descent, chatter of ‘wine o’clock’ propels us forward, and a proposed ocean plunge divides the group – it’s a chilly venture considering the polar neighbour down south. I hurriedly change behind a tree, then sprint and dive before second thoughts kick in. The temperature is shocking, numbing and then outright painful, but also energising.
We collect some renowned smoked pork from chef and host of SBS series Gourmet Farmer, Ross O’Meara, before we head back to debrief on the deck. The Bruny oysters, pork rillettes, cheese and wine are fine examples of how this small island, and greater Tasmania, has firmly stamped its place on the global gourmet map. The weekend definitely tipped over into calorie-positive mode, but who am I kidding? I was never here to balance that line.
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