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We
all met at our booked cabin at the Caravan Park in Denham on Thursday
afternoon. I picked up Judy on Wednesday afternoon after
she’d done a day's teaching and we drove as far as Dongara
for the night. My nephew, who is a keen boat fisherman, warned us about
shoals that extend out from the North East end of Dirk Hartog Island
which sometimes have large swells breaking over them forcing boats to
take large detour around if they want to get to Turtle Bay. He also
mentioned strong north running currents that sweep around both ends of
the island. We travelled on to Denham the next day after a stop in
Geraldton for last minute supplies.
Jim had spent Wednesday night in Geraldton en route. Martin left home
at 4.30am on Thursday towing the club trailer picking up Laurie, Matt
and Kevin en route.
Friday
morning we were down at the jetty at sunrise. The 10m twin hull fishing
charter boat Jim had organised to take our boats, gear and us to
Withnell Point, 10ks south of Turtle Bay, looked awfully small. How
could everything fit on? No problem. Five boats were put crossways on
the overhead canopy and one on top of the other lengthways on the deck
beside the hold. Fortunately the sea was calm and there was no wind. We
all piled on plus 4 or 5 paying fishing charter people and off we went.
The Skipper off loaded us onto the beach around the bay a little from a
fishing shack which had a large sea eagle's nest on the flimsy looking
roof. We each paid $170 for the ride over.
By
the time we set up camp and had lunch there didn’t seem to be
time to paddle the 10km across the bay and around to Turtle Bay and
10km back so we explored the bay on foot and by boat, surfed on some
small waves on the point and practiced some Eskimo rolls and self
rescue. I discovered an interesting minor complication when I tried to
do an upside down re-entry and roll. I found it took longer to thread
my legs into the cockpit under water with a 10 litre water bag strapped
to the floor suspended in the water. The things you don’t
know about until you practice! In the late afternoon the fisher people
got their gear out. Kevin took to his boat with his squid jigger, Jim
tried his luck with big hooks and heavy line and Matt and I used light
gear and small hooks. We won the tally catching small whiting,
flathead, bream and trumpeters on Friday and Saturday evenings. Fish
was on the menu for the first 2 nights.
The
most disappointing thing about our idyllic camp site was the amount of
rubbish in the bush. It was everywhere we set up camp along the island.
Everyone who camps on the island is charged $16.50 a night (we paid
$50/head) but there are no services given for the charge. Behind our
camp, among other things we found a toilet seat and a kitchen sink
which was promptly put in Judy’s boat.
Kevin
also found some drums and star pickets which he tied his tent to as
he’d forgotten to take his tent stays. The only problem was
they went bang in the night when he moved. After we went to bed the
first night the camp site was over run by small crabs. They scratched
around outside your tent and on anything metal like stoves that had
been left out. Judy kept reaching out of her tent and shouting at them
in murderess tones to go away as she attacked them with her shoe. I put
my ear plugs in and tried to ignore Judy and the crabs.
Saturday
the weather was beautiful again. Oily clear calm sea and no wind. We
set off across the bay and rounded Cape Levillian close to the beach
and into Turtle Bay. Fortunately there were no breaking waves on the
sand banks but we could see swells rising on them further out. The Cape
Inscription light house was visible across the bay above the cliffs. We
didn’t stay too long. Gray clouds were building up and the
beach had a high surge. As we paddled back Kevin was about 20mtrs from
shore when he suddenly shouted excitedly that he had paddled over a
20’ Tiger shark. He said he could see the stripes and it was
longer than his 5.8m kayak. Matt, who was paddling beside him also saw
it and said it was as long as 2 doors end to end and as wide as one.
That gave us all a reality check and put any thought of practicing
Eskimo Rolls out of our heads.
A short while later we saw Martin’s kayak wobble alarmingly
as a large Dugong dived under his kayak amid ship then headed straight
for Matt amidships creating a huge bow wave. He also had to steady his
kayak as it passed under him and headed out to sea.
As we paddled across the bay large black clouds gathered over our camp
site. As soon as we arrived back the rain bucketed down. Everyone dived
into their tents to sit it out except me. Some read and dosed, one
person decided he might as well get stuck into his cask of port while
he read. I sat out the storm having my daily ablutions in the warm sea,
keeping an eye out for fins. The rain cleared, the sun shone and we
emerged from our tents. Matt went around to the point for his daily
feed of oysters off the rocks before returning to fish. Jim put his
heavy fishing tackle away in disgust because he hadn’t caught
anything although something big did take his hook, line and sinker the
evening before when he left it set with a Trumpeter on it.
Sunday
the wind was blowing from the South East strong enough to blow the dog
off the chain. Kevin checked the bay south of the Point and declared
the wind was too strong to paddle into. We gladly agreed to sit it out
for the day. All of us except Martin set out to see how far we could
walk across the island. We slipped and sloshed along a track across a
birridah, a salt clay pan, that had water in it from the previous
evening thunderstorm then up a rise for a while before deciding some
people didn’t have suitable foot wear or long trousers to
bush bash across the island so we returned to camp. Martin had his kite
out and flew it successfully for a short while. The wind was so strong
it broke a string so he had to put it away. We read and watched the sea
life in the bay. A 2m shark with a long thin dorsal fin entertained us
chasing fish on a sand bank not far from shore. Turtles popped their
heads up to look at us occasionally. Judy and Kevin listened to the
Dockers game on my little radio which always had good reception. At
night we sat around Martins candles standing in sand in plastic
sandwich bags and had a “show and tell” of our
first aid kits.
Our
11 neighbours in the nearby fishing camp who had arrived on Saturday in
5 boats awoke on Sunday to find one boat missing from it’s
mooring. They found it over the far side of the bay on the beach and
towed it back with one of the boats. Apart from that we
didn’t see them venture out in their boats all day.
Monday
the wind was still ferocious but we packed our boats with all our gear
which included water and food for the week, tent, chair, stove, fuel,
repair kit, first aid, clothes etc. We rounded the point to be hit by
20 knot SE winds on our left front quarter. Judy’s shoulder
started to give her terrible pain so Kevin quickly hooked up a tow rope
and all the guys took it in turn for 10 to 15 minutes to tow her. By
the end of the second rotation they were all really tired. We landed at
a wide white sheltered beach for lunch beside a sheep loading race
presumably used by the station owners to load their sheep onto the
barge to take to Denham. We discussed various contingency plans of what
to do about Judy and her sore shoulder. She had been paddling with a
high bag on her fore deck with her sail propped up on the bag so her
paddling action looked very awkward. She re arranged the bag to her aft
deck, put the sail flat on the fore deck and fortunately had no more
trouble. We asked some guys fishing off the beach for a weather
forecast just as one pulled in a whiting as thick and as long as my
arm. Unfortunately they weren’t forth coming with either a
free fish or a forecast. The wind had eased slightly but we still made
slow progress arriving at Louisa Bay at 5pm. We had started at
8.30am.We reckon we must have had a current running against us as well
as the wind. We were all exhausted and in bed by 7.30pm.
Tuesday.
We were on the water by 8.30 again. We rounded the point to be hit by
20 knot SE winds on our left front quarter again. We struggled along
beside the cliffs with steep sharp waves over head high rising up on
our left. You no sooner got over one wave and others rebounded back off
the cliff on your right. It was like being in a washing machine. Kevin
and I discuss turning back until the wind abated but it would have been
too dangerous having those conditions as a following sea so we
struggled on. After a couple of hours of these conditions we saw a
small beach in a gap in the cliffs. Martin was the strongest paddler
and always out in front with a bright orange hat. We were all very
pleased to see the orange hat bob over the water towards the beach to
investigate the possibility of landing. After careful inspection he
waved us in. There were rocks on the shore line and rocks in the water
so all the heavy boats had to be lifted out of the water by 4 people at
a time onto the beach behind. It was estimated we had been going
2.5km/hour.
After
refreshment and rest Jim, Matt and Kevin climbed the cliffs to check
the way ahead and try VHF marine radios and mobile phones but there was
no reception. There was no sign of the wind abating so we struggled on.
We lunched on a beautiful sheltered beach at Quoin Head on the southern
end of Herald Bay. Before we rounded the point Kevin paddled out to a
luxury launch anchored in the shelter and asked them if they had a
weather forecast but they didn’t. The wind had mercifully
eased as we paddled past Egg Island over clear water where hundreds of
cormorants took to the sky as we passed. Unfortunately we were down
wind of their acrid aroma. We crossed the entrance to Tetrodon Loop and
found a lovely sheltered camping area at Notch point. (In the
dictionary tetra means four. The Loop does look a bit square on the
chart. Maybe that’s how it got the name). [Tetrodon,
which means 4 teeth, is an old Latin name for puffer fish, so the Loop
was probably named for an abundance of them - Ed]
Wednesday.
The wind had eased considerably the next morning as we paddled across
the bay to the homestead. We were given a warm welcome by Ann and Tory
Wardle with her 2 little boys. Geoff Wardle returned from the mill run
joined us for tea and Anzac biscuits bought out by Ann. Tory printed
off an up to date weather forecast from the computer for us. The
weather was looking good for the following day so we decided to take
the window of opportunity to paddle back to Denham the next day. We
paddled from the homestead across to Cape Bellefin where we had lunch.
Matt and I took childish delight jumping in the strong, cold, out
flowing tidal current on one side of the point to be quickly carried
around the other side. Then it was an hour to paddle to Cape Heirisson
to camp the night. It was a nice sheltered camp site but the flies were
thick until the sun went down. Some of us climbed the headland and had
a good view of Denham and the aerial on the hill behind the town across
the 19.5ks of water we had to paddle the next day. To the right you
could see the super structure of the ship loading salt at Useless Loop
we had seen passing down the channel during the day. Once again we
cooked our evening meal together and dined under a canopy of stars by
candle light with the last of our cask wines to help conversation and
laughter and relax tired muscles. Laurie never ceased to surprise us
with stories about his long and full life. We all agreed we’d
be doing pretty well if we could paddle as well as him when we reach
our three score year and ten.
Thursday.
Once again we were on the water by 8.30. As we rounded the point we
noted the tide was going out with a strong current sweeping from east
to west around the point. There was a light Easterly wind on our right
front quarter which gradually swung around to a south easterly by the
time we got to Denham. We had to re group on several occasions because
discrepancy kept developing between those who were following the
compass bearing of 63 degrees and line of site on the aerial and wind
turbine towers and Martin on the GPS course who we were instructed to
follow. He had his head down watching his GPS screen and dropping down
wind on a more northerly bearing. (I’m curious to know why
the difference occurs. Maybe we could ask Les to give the club a talk
on navigation)
The weather
Gods were kind to us and we were back in Denham by 11.45. While Martin,
Jim and I went to get our vehicles from the caravan park a Marine Parks
Officer quickly pounced on our group unloading their boats questioning
Kevin about where we’d been.
Thankfully
a cabin had been booked for us for the first and last night so we
didn’t have to put our tents up again as we did last year in
the howling wind after the Denham to Monkey Mia trip. We had talked
about having a soak in the artesian bore tank at Peron Station but
somehow once you got out of your wet paddling gear you didn’t
want to get wet again. We spent the afternoon replacing carbohydrates
and fluids, visiting the new Heritage centre and relaxing before
enjoying a final dinner together at a restaurant in the town.
It was a great
trip. Kevin did a great job organising it and looking after us. Thanks
Kevin.
Next time I must
remember to take a detailed radio programme of times to hear the
weather reports.
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