All the Way Round (21 page)

There was something surreal about watching the footage of the Japanese tsunami on TV at Etta and Dave’s house, in a town that had experienced its own share of natural disasters recently. After staying at Eighty Mile Beach Caravan Park south of Broome, which was still rebuilding after being hit by a category-5 hurricane months before, I had been secretly curious about what it would be like to sit through a cyclone. Seeing the destruction of Hinchinbrook and the Mission Beach area, the idea of deliberately trying to experience a cyclone got taken off my bucket list.

Etty Bay Caravan Park was my next stop. This was also showing the effects of Yasi, with trashed vans and huts. It was explained to me that they hadn’t begun to tidy it up because the insurance company, who were yet to visit, would not pay if there was no evidence of the destruction. I would have thought a photo or two and a quick call to the Bureau of Meteorology would have been enough evidence for anybody to realise what had happened, but apparently the insurance company needed more convincing. I chose to stay in one of the huts that was not being displayed as evidence of a cyclone having been through.

One of the side-effects of the destructive weather is that, with all the trees being battered by the high winds, their fruits are littering the ground everywhere you look. This is great news for the cassowaries who had a bonanza for a while, but then the food runs out and they hit hard times. With no more fruit and fallen trees blocking tracks through the bush, many of these birds were using the roads to get about in their search for food and not doing so well in competition with the traffic. In the morning before I headed off from Etty Bay, a cassowary came down to say g’day. This gave me quite a thrill as it’s one of the rarest birds on the planet and here it was pecking at my kayak!

I spent the next night camped on High Island, 50 kilometres south of Cairns. While eating my evening creation of food that didn’t need chewing and carefully working out the junk food I’d be tucking into the next day at Cairns, I saw a dozen fish jump out of the water at the same time. I often saw single fish jumping to avoid predators, but these were spread over a distance the size of a football field and all leaping together. The next day, while watching the news in Cairns, I discovered that I’d been sitting through an earthquake. Although the fish felt it, I was completely ignorant that it had happened at all. Then I realised I was probably the closest person to the epicentre, which was just offshore of where I was eating my dinner. With the Japanese tsunami in the news every day, the Queensland earthquake got plenty of coverage but neither I nor the dozen fish were ever mentioned. Another missed opportunity by the popular press.

The next day, 16 March, I was lucky enough to see a dugong, turtle and sea snake, all within half a dozen paddle strokes, just before pulling into Yorkies Knob, a few kilometres from Cairns. I then headed for a burger and chips while waiting for Tim Trehurn, who had offered to help me during my stay in Cairns.

Tim and his wife are both teachers at TAFE colleges, with Tim delivering training in outdoor leadership and Mary teaching Indigenous sport, recreation and fitness. They were well aware of what I’d had to do throughout my trip and of what I needed to do while in Cairns to prepare for the next stage. As well as all the usual jobs to tackle when I got to town, I had to carefully plan my food from Cairns to Darwin. There were places where there would be a well-stocked supermarket, and then there would be hundreds of kilometres without a shop of any kind. I had to work out how many days paddling there would be between supermarkets and if I would need a resupply in-between. I would then have to find a place where I could send a food parcel, bearing in mind it was still the wet season and many roads might be closed. I was using Australia Post to deliver my food parcels, and if the roads were blocked due to the flooding the mail might not get through. With the help of Tim and the internet I decided on four food drops: Lockhart River, Seisia, Sweers Island and King Ash Bay. I knew I could find supermarkets at Weipa, Karumba and Nhulunbuy from where I could restock before the leg to Darwin.

Before filling the boxes I had to estimate how many days paddling there would be from that food drop to the next resupply, so that I knew how much to send. By now I was well aware of what I needed to eat each week, what foods worked and how much was required. I had a list for a typical week’s food embedded in my head and assuming I was at a well-stocked supermarket I could whiz around the aisles with minimal backtracking. Apart from rice pudding, which for some reason I never managed to get first time round, I was on par with a housewife as far as efficiency went, although I would often get curious looks from fellow shoppers as I threw a dozen Mars Bars into my trolley.

In four days I had three boxes packed and ready and was waiting for the post office to open. Lyn Battle at Sweers Island had generously agreed to have my list of supplies delivered with their regular food drop so I didn’t need to post anything to Sweers Island. I was pleased that I’d managed to organise everything so quickly. However, as I was gathering all the food together, I had also discovered a major problem—from Darwin I wouldn’t be able to send myself food for the Kimberley leg, as there wouldn’t be enough time for Australia Post to deliver the parcels between Darwin and Broome.

I needed help. I needed someone I could trust to get supplies to me where there are no shops, no roads and only a few spots that could store my food. One name stood out as someone who had the organisational skills and understood the needs of an expedition kayaker—Peter Osman.

Peter is a member of the New South Wales Sea Kayak Club that I had paddled with over many years. He was an enthusiastic follower of some of my previous trips and I hoped he might be able to help me out. I shot off a desperate email. To my great relief he took the task on board, saying he was pleased to help. He proved to be the perfect man for the job, his enthusiasm being matched only by his preparation and planning. For example, to let me know where my food parcel would be, Peter printed out a Google Map shot of the location, wrote down the latitude and longitude, and added the names and contact phone numbers of anybody involved. With Peter organising the logistics of the last leg, I knew I would be fine.

7

Cairns to Darwin

W
henever I had a period of successive rest days, such as those spent organising things in Cairns, I would always find the first few days back in the saddle tough going. You would think it would be the other way round, that after a rest the first few days would be easy. But what I discovered was that, even though I had rested long enough to stop aching and was recharged, well fed and motivated to get moving again, I seemed to have lost a little of whatever it is that I needed to keep working for eight hours a day. After three days on dry land it would take three days of paddling again to get back into the groove, only then would my muscles give up complaining and just resign themselves to the job they had to do.

I can’t explain it; perhaps it was all the coffee, beer and junk food I overdosed on while not paddling for a few days, but I knew the first few days back in the kayak would be a struggle. However, throughout the trip I just ignored my previous experiences and, thinking I had recovered, would always plan a big first day after a rest. Then at the end of the first day’s paddling I’d realise I’d made the mistake again. I’m not sure how long the trip would have to be for me to learn to give myself a slower start, but if I couldn’t manage to work it out after sixteen months then I guess it’s not going to happen.

I arrived at Cooktown on 24 March, after a hard four days and 300 kilometres of paddling from Cairns. There was only a slight current against me, light headwinds for a couple of the days and no swell—the traditional issues that confront a sea kayaker. What made it hard was the heat and humidity, particularly the humidity. The closer I got to Cooktown, the hotter and more humid it got, so much so that on the day I arrived I found myself reliving memories of that first day out from Broome when I was hit by heat exhaustion. With that memory rekindled I was very careful. I drank plenty, kept a steady pace and tried not to work too hard, and shortened my paddling days. Even so, with each passing day it was proving harder to keep moving as the humidity built up.

The day I arrived in Cooktown I’d only paddled 25 kilometres but was exhausted. I had to paddle a kilometre up the Endeavour River to the town. I could see all I needed from the kayak as I landed: a boat ramp, a tap, a café and a motel. What I couldn’t see was the temporary sign erected for everybody approaching the boat ramp from the other direction that warned of ‘Crocodile Activity’.

The water was dirty and there was a bit of a current running. The land was low and heavily vegetated. I was feeling a bit nervous, being close to many spots where a crocodile would feel comfortable hanging out during the day. I paddled between half a dozen boats moored in the river and with the jetty, café and main street of town just a few metres away I relaxed. I landed at the boat ramp, casually grabbed a change of clothes and my water bottle, and walked past the croc warning sign, without noticing it, to a seat in the shade. There was no thought process going on, I was wiped out. It was the only occasion during the trip I left my kayak and kit half-unpacked down by the water. Every other time I have changed, set up camp and got my food cooking before I stopped and relaxed for the day.

Getting into a change of clothes was a gradual process; sporadic attempts at dressing were interspersed with ten-minute spells when I would shut down and look vacantly out over the river. I realised the whole trouser thing was too much to handle in one go. With one leg in and the other hanging around wondering what was going on, I stopped and had another drink of water. My eyes ran absentmindedly along my abandoned kayak with its hatches open and innards hanging out, and came to rest on the gnarled eyes of a crocodile just a metre from the kayak.

I was up on the bank and knew I wasn’t in any danger. My exhausted state didn’t allow for any energy to be wasted on registering what could have happened. There was no fear, no relief, just recognition that he was there and I was on the bank in the shade. I couldn’t even put my trousers on in one go, so jumping around in excitement or taking photos wasn’t going to happen.

Later, I was told that croc had been hanging around the boat ramp for a few days because fishermen had left the remains of fish and bait around. He was a biggie at around 4 metres and was often spotted by people aboard the planes flying into Cooktown as he lay sunning himself beside the river during the day. One of the obvious concerns for kayakers in this area are the crocodiles, and with good reason.

A less glamorous, and certainly less newsworthy, danger facing a kayaker in these areas is the stifling, energy-sapping humidity. It is guaranteed to create conditions that, if not managed very carefully, could present a far greater risk to a sea kayaker than an errant crocodile. There is no quick escape from humidity, no rush of adrenalin to get you past the danger and no great stories to tell of the event. It can create conditions you are not able to endure, and then suck the life from you as you keep working to make distance. It’s much the same struggle when suffering from the effects of extreme cold, but without the sanctuary of a cosy sleeping bag at the end of the day. When you’ve struggled through the hot humid tropics, you will never complain about being cold again.

After spending two days climbing the North Face of Mont Blanc, my climbing partner and I found ourselves having to spend the night in freezing conditions just below the summit of the second-highest mountain in Europe. I couldn’t feel my toes, and later suffered from frostbite. My partner had broken some fingers and, unable to grip, had smashed in his teeth with his ice axe when it bounced off a rock. Things hadn’t gone well. We were now waiting for daylight so we could continue without walking off a cliff or dropping down a crevasse. We huddled together to keep warm. We hadn’t expected to break bones, which slowed us down and enforced a second night out at high altitude. We didn’t have enough warm clothes, no food and no fuel to heat a drink. We were travelling light to make the climbing easier and quicker and thought we would be back down in the valley drinking beers at the end of the day. I remember sitting there thinking that to die from the cold would be a simple case of falling asleep and not waking up. We had long passed the shivering stage, there was no pain. In the early hours of the morning I felt my partner’s head slump onto my shoulder and I envied him. Then I remembered this dozy sod had broken his fingers which had got us in this mess, so I jabbed him in the ribs with my ice axe until he woke up.

I’m telling this story to illustrate that I’ve had experience at both ends of the spectrum.

Cooktown is a smaller town than the large, bold font used on my map suggested, but it had everything I needed a short distance from where I landed. There was no time to play tourist, though, because I was only staying for one night. The New South Wales Sea Kayak Club had offered to pay for my travel back to Sydney to speak at the biggest annual gathering of sea kayakers in the country, the ‘Rock ’n’ Roll’ weekend. Held over three days, the event offers plenty for the sea kayaking community, including guest speakers, workshops and various activities. I was looking forward to giving a presentation about the trip, but it also gave me the chance to take a week off to see the family before heading across the Top End.

On the day I arrived at Cooktown I ate, found a place to stay, arranged to leave my kayak at the police station, ate, organised travel to Sydney and back, ate, popped into the pub to rehydrate and went to bed. The next day I flew back to Sydney. It was rather unsettling to make it home in just a few hours, spent in air-conditioned comfort, after taking three months to cover the same distance by kayak.

Sydney Rock ’n’ Roll

The Rock ’n’ Roll was held in a caravan park on the water down at Batemans Bay. The family and I had been generously given a cabin which had a commanding view of all those who were camping. By now I was starting to get used to my ‘celebrity’ status and made a point of getting on the balcony with my coffee early enough to see everybody else crawl out of their tents to stretch their aching bones. The weather was kind to those who wanted to paddle, go to one of the many presentations or try out a new kayak. I just wandered about trying hard not to get wet while socialising.

When presenting to a group of a hundred people in a semi-dark marquee tent there are wide-open eyes fixed on your words, with mouths that have forgotten to shut, others are passing comments between themselves and a few are asleep, but by far the most worrying are those taking notes. With the help of a few slides I told my story. The main objective was to entertain but I tried to inform and inspire at the same time. This was, after all, a sea kayak club.

My kids were also there and it was the first time they had heard how things are for me when I go away. I was worried that the talk would awaken them to the dangers of the trip and they would worry about me when I left to paddle across the north. My concerns evaporated as I saw them playing on their iPods throughout my talk, paying no attention to my story.

One afternoon at the Rock ’n’ Roll, I was talking to a kayaker who didn’t know who I was. He was telling me about his paddle that morning which had taken him a few kilometres down the coast, in calm conditions, with half a dozen other club members and a guide. That evening the same kayaker was present while I gave a talk about paddling the thousands of kilometres from Broome to Cooktown. The next day he felt compelled to apologise to me for taking up my time to tell me about his day’s paddle.

There was no need for the paddler to feel he had wasted my time with his story. In fact, I was actually inspired by him. When he was describing his paddle to me, his eyes lit up. He was excited about what he had achieved and where it had taken him. In his rush to explain it all, he couldn’t get the words out quickly enough; there was no hiding the fact that the paddle had put the buzz of life into him.

As we get older it’s harder to find experiences that elevate our zing factor, but it’s not so hard that we should deny ourselves the opportunity to look for them, because the rewards are forever. You can tell when a person has found this excitement because they will tell the story time and time again, never tiring of reliving the experience. They faced and overcame a challenge and were rewarded with an everlasting memory.

To be honest, I’d also felt a bit of envy. After spending much of my life going outside of my comfort zone, it starts to feel comfortable, forcing me to reach further outside the zone to secure a memory. Even then it’s hard to experience something that makes me want to describe my day to a stranger at all, let alone with the enthusiasm of a child.

This random incident and the positive vibe of the Rock ’n’ Roll, plus the chance to spend time with my family, gave me energy and enthusiasm to take back to Cooktown for the last part of my trip.

Being a celebrity was quickly all over and I was back in Cooktown on 5 April, but only just. It was still raining, the wind had picked up and the clouds were covering the airfield. All of which meant it was touch and go as to whether the plane would land or head back to Cairns. It was a small plane, twelve of us filled it. I was in the front seat looking past the pilot’s head out into the clouds hanging over the Cooktown airport. Apparently, if the pilot can’t see the landing strip he can’t land. This didn’t seem to be a real problem, we saw the tarmac when we were level with the tree canopy, then landed.

The weather made my decision to wait before setting off an easy one. So I spent the next day cleaning the mould off my gear that had been left drying at the police station then went to buy supplies and did another slow circuit of the town.

I was feeling a bit nervous about the rest of the trip. There was a lot of remote coast to cover and I’d have to get a move on if I was to finish on time. Gone was the luxury of stopping for ice cream and cakes along the east coast. Cooktown represented the biggest town for 3000 kilometres until Darwin, so food and water were my main concerns.

I knew it was unlikely I’d starve but a little more likely I’d run out of water. What concerned me most, however, was having to paddle 50 kilometres a day for the next four months while rationing my supplies. I would have to be accurate with my estimates of how long each section might take. This was not always easy, particularly in an area that I hadn’t paddled before, and it wasn’t just a few kilometres but the entire northern coastline of the continent. If I got my estimates wrong, I could be running out of both food and water. To have to ration supplies would wear me down, meaning I’d take longer to cover ground, which would increase the number of days on half rations. That is the start of a downward spiral where adequate rest, sufficient supplies and an appropriate distance covered compete with each other.

What did make my calculations easier was the predictability of the weather. Unlike the southern coast there were no low-pressure systems to confuse the prevailing winds, leaving slow-moving and predictable high pressure systems to direct the weather. This meant the wind direction was constant and in my favour, only the strength varied, from calm to 35 knots, so I knew that at worst I would lose only a few days to the weather.

The factors I took into consideration when calculating how far I would get included things like:

•
The weather—
I would have to paddle against the southeast winds as I headed down the west coast of Cape York Peninsula and I was a little unsure how much the wind would slow my progress. While it was becoming increasingly unlikely, it was still cyclone season and a cyclone hundreds of kilometres away could pin me down and wreak havoc with my plans.

•
Currents—
Would the currents slow me down? This was a particular concern around Cape York where they are known to be very strong.

•
Landings—
How much of the coast could I land on in the Gulf of Carpentaria? I’d heard stories of mangroves running for kilometres, which would make landing impossible, and of mud flats stretching for many hundreds of metres out from the shore, which would mean dragging the kayak through waist-deep muck to a camp. If there were only limited landing spots, I might have to cut short the distance I tried to make each day.