A Little Further North Each Day

This was probably the part of the cruise that Jane was looking forward to most. I had been lucky enough to backpack up this stretch of lush coast in 1982, whereas Jane had only really touched on a few locations.

One such place was Gladstone. From here, when we travelled together in 1989, we took an excursion out to a sleek looking pontoon moored at the Great Barrier Reef. We did all the things that you are expected to do when visiting the Reef.

We stripped off to almost nothing for the day to start with, this is pre-breakfast, before diving into the water for a spot of snorkelling. I have never been that proficient at swimming and have always found that the element of water makes me appear dyspraxic, I could not get the hang of this snorkelling business.

I breathed in when I should have breathed out, causing me to end up with a nose and mouth full of seawater, even my mask let the damned stuff in. I felt as though I would surely drown. My flippers wanted to rotate in opposite directions at the same time, so a distinct lack of progress was made through the water.

Jane, on the other hand, was in her element, taking to it like a fish to water! I went down into the submersive lounge and watched the most fantastic creatures gliding past the window, including Jane; how the hell did she do it. I still can’t get the hang of it!

Still, there was plenty of complimentary food and drink. If I had been wearing boots I would have filled them. And I wondered why I weighed 17 stones in my early thirties?

Anyway, the last couple of hours were spent, fully exposed to the sun, on the sundeck. Later that night, in the cooling comfort of our hotel room, air cooling cranked right up, we were both in so much pain we vowed never to venture out into the sun again. Even the waves of chilled air passing over the skin made it feel like someone was dragging a cheese grater across it.

That was then and this was now. Oh, well, you know what I mean? The sea was, in the most, pretty much like a mill pond, only occasionally could waves be seen breaking onto the reefs, reminding us of the danger to shipping in these, seemingly, benign conditions. Many a ship has lost its bottom in these treacherous waters and I don’t think we were that well equipped to fother under the circumstances.

We had four ports of call along this stretch of coast: Brisbane, Airlie Beach, Cairns and Cooktown.

I can’t actually remember how many times I have been to Brisbane. I would say, at a guess, over ten and I haven’t ever really stopped to take a look. I have driven through it, changed trains or buses or, on this occasion, parked up at a quayside a fair old way from the city centre.

There was one time when I went with a gang of Irish fellas who wanted to watch their mate play in the Rugby Union Grand Final at, I think it was called, Lang Park? Yes, I just looked it up, it was Lang Park back in the day, but is now known as the Sun Corp Stadium. I think I know which I prefer.

Their mate’s team won and following a few beers on the pitch and in the stadium players’ lounge we headed back to the club’s headquarters where we consumed even more alcohol, of all types. It is a great shame I can’t remember the name of the team, I suppose I should try and look it up! What a night. I am pretty sure that we, eventually, fell asleep in the bar. You must remember that an Australian clubhouse bears more similarity to a small town than an English sports bar.

I have now looked up the names of the teams involved and, I am ashamed to say, I don’t recognise either of them. The same article made reference to the Rugby League final of the same year, Eastern Suburbs Tigers and Redcliffe. Ah, they sound more familiar so, I conclude, I actually watched a rugby league match and not a rugby union one. Never mind, I think I had a good time, and obviously managed to behave myself, for I have never been stopped at the border when entering Queensland!

What is it with sports teams’ names? Eastern Suburbs Tigers? Whilst I am not doubting the danger of leaving home in Brisbane’s eastern settlements, I can’t find reference to people being mauled to death by tigers? Leeds Rhinos is another one. When did you last see a rhino tottering around Leeds’s nightclubs?

Jane went off on an excursion on her own. Whilst we had a more secure datalink to the outside world I sat down to try and pay my tax to dear old HMRC. Due to needed input from others I had underpaid my income tax, according to the accountant in any case, who had only just got the returns done in time for the end of January. I did mean to query it on my return but never got around to it.

How, therefore, do you incur a further tax liability when you are remunerated under the PAYE system. Easy, apparently! I, somehow, managed to find myself in a higher tax band? I shan’t ever let that happen again. So, I still haven’t had a meaningful look at the Queensland capital.

I first disembarked the good ship Voyager at a small Whitsunday Passage town by the name of Airlie Beach. Why is the Whitsunday Passage so called? It’s down to Lieutenant Cook and HMB Endeavour again. What isn’t up and down the Australian east coast? He claimed to have sailed through this body of water on Whit Sunday, the seventh after Easter for those of you who didn’t know, what school did you go to? To be fair it was the good old School of Google that taught me this.

The view is truly breathtaking, as he attests to in his log. There were also a group of tropical islands in the neighbourhood, so he scratched his head a little, rubbed his chin and couldn’t sleep all night before coming up with a sensational name. For one final time he pondered his quandary over breakfast, no doubt ship’s biscuit again washed down with a bit of grog. “I know,” he suddenly blurted out. “I shall call them the Whitsunday Islands.” Well done, Jim!

Anyway, here we were in Airlie Beach and, what is more, I had been here before. I didn’t recognise a single bit of it. No matter how I searched the depths of my mind, I could not bring any of it to the fore. Some stuff, best forgotten, did pop out, though.

On the day we were here most of the Americans on board were drooling at the prospect of being cooped-up in a darkened and air cooled theatre, on a day when it was wall-to-wall sunshine with a top temperature of 30°, 86°F for the Jonathans, to watch the Super Bowl Final.

I forget who was playing as I think there were probably over a hundred activities taking place on the day, that I would find offered more stimulation. Each to their own, I suppose!

We were shoreside well before our scheduled excursion so decided to hop on a pedal powered tuk-tuk, with an electric back-up for the more challenging hills of which there were one or two.

The bloke who ran the business had immigrated from Western Australia to escape the heat. Umm? Frying pan and fire come to mind. Off we went, our driver pedalling furiously, trying to build up speed downhill to make the ups a little easier. It was great fun and kept our man pretty fit.

“I’ve been here before,” I said. “I know it was a long time ago but I don’t recognise a thing.”

He went onto explain that it was a bitch called Debbie who had caused carnage here back in 2017.

I was slightly puzzled and wondered if it was the same Debbie who did Dallas back in the eighties? Look it up if you don’t know what I’m talking about, I don’t wish to corrupt you.

He laughed and said that it wasn’t. This was Cyclone Debbie who razed the place to the ground before blowing herself out inland.

Following an accelerated rebuilding programme they have been left with a brilliant legacy of a thoroughly modern town with all the mod cons you can think of and, apparently, it is windproof. That’s useful! Horse and stable door come to mind.

When you think it was just less than three years before our tour of the town, the achievement is breathtaking. When the storm slammed into the Queensland coast, with winds up to 263km/h, officialdom feared the worst, but thanks to a robust early warning system residents heeded the alarms and sought out shelter.

There were no fatalities linked to falling buildings or flying debris. Sadly, though, fourteen people lost their lives in the ensuing floods including a young Mum with her two small children.

It just proves that Australia is not a country for snowflakes, but according to a survival expert, it is the polar opposite. He reckons that about ninety percent of the population are ill-prepared for such events and think it is down to the government to bail them out. I guess we are the same. How many of us have put together survival packs in the event of a natural disaster or an attack on infrastructure?

We continued on the bike ride and stopped in on Millionaires’ Row, not sure if the apostrophe is in the right place or not, but the word row suggests millionaires plural, where the most valuable house was listed at A$24,000,000 and, what is more, it is only a holiday home to a man from Melbourne, who only uses it for eight weeks a year.

As an aside, he also has his superyacht, “Calm,” moored in the marina. It turns out that this bloke was a teacher. Jane was a teacher too, is she hiding something from me? It transpired that he, the owner, helped a team to develop a worldwide educational computer game called Mathletics. Unfortunately, I cannot tell you which one of the men owns this particular property. I have to say that, even though this was not on our schedule at the beginning of the day it was a few dollars wisely invested. It really was great fun.

The main excursion of the day was “Airlie Beach: Then and Now,” which was a brief history tour of the town and surrounding areas.

One little gem was the Proserpine Museum, a tiny institution run by very enthusiastic volunteers. One display caught our attention, even though it most certainly was not Jane’s cup of tea. It was another pesky crocodile, dead of course, with its innards cut away so you could enjoy its internal construction. It was enough to send shivers up any spine worthy of being called a spine.

It also made one break out in a sweat when the story associated with it was told. One day, back in the day before modern communications, a pair of sisters set off on the family horse for school. When they didn’t come home a search party was put together and sent out to scour the route for any signs.

Tragedy had struck in the most brutal of ways. When attempting to cross a river, something they had done perfectly safely for hundreds of days previously, a croc erupted from the waters.

How did they know this? The horse was found, a touch dishevelled, quite happily grazing in a nearby field, with its saddle all askew. A little further away, along the river, one of the little girls was found. She had been appallingly mutilated by sharp teeth, obviously a crocodile. There was no sign of the other sister.

When, eventually, a crocodile was snagged and killed, the contents of the beast’s stomach were analysed and remains of the missing girl were discovered inside. Sorry if I have put you off your breakfast.

We have just been visited by Jane’s cousin, Keith, whilst I was writing this episode. I put it out there that crocodiles served no purpose on this planet whatsoever. Jane and Keith both said that they made good handbags and shoes. Well, I never knew, and when I take a close look, I can’t do any other type, I am astounded that they have these incredible skills in their lockers. I do wonder how they attach the straps to the bags, though?!

I called this week’s story “A Little Further North Each Day” as a nod to the Australian country singer, Graeme Connors, who recorded a tune called “A Little Further North Each Year.” I really took to his music during our visit in the late eighties. All of his songs tell of deeds linked to a, in the main, rural Australian lifestyle. They are, what I would call story songs, each one telling of events only really found in Australia.

I have particularly enjoyed “A Little Further North,” “Let the Cane Fields Burn,” “Cyclone Season,” and my favourite, “The Ringer and the Princess.” If anyone can tell me that they are not moved by the last one on the list, I fear you are not capable of being moved.

Great Massingham Fighter 5k

Running comes to my home town. Well, my village anyway. When I say home, I mean the place where I live.

I certainly don’t want to mess with little politics here, I realise that in some places you should have lived for at least a hundred years before you even dare think of yourself as, let alone call yourself, a local. Only another 92 to go!

Last weekend we had the Fighter 5k on the old RAF Bomber Command Airfield on the edge of the village. Yes, it has been pointed out to me that they flew Bombers out of RAF Great Massingham and not fighters; it is not my fault, alright; I was not involved in the naming of the event, I merely took part.

Having got used to starting Parkrun each week at nine in the morning, the slightly delayed start of ten was a little confusing when it came to judging the right time to eat and take coffee onboard. In the end, pancakes with blueberries and bananas washed down by a huge mug of coffee did the trick at seven. Just about got that one right.

We all lined up at the start and we were off to the firing of a gun. 285 runners managed to complete the one lap course, I don’t know how many started but didn’t hear of anyone dropping out, so there were no bottlenecks like there were at the recent GEAR 10k in Kings Lynn.

I really was chasing a PB, the route was level and in pretty good nick, only the occasional pothole and grass tussock! Not bad for over eighty years old. If I look like that at eighty I’ll be happy!

Can I just pick folks up on a language inaccuracy here? I know this is bordering on pedantism, but can we stop using the word “flat?” Just remember something can be flat but still have an incline of 45°. Only telling you! Level, alright!

The PB went out of the window at about the kilometre-and-a-half point. Someone obviously nipped out of the hedge and stabbed me in the hamstring with a knife or, at least, that’s what it felt like! My VI Guide, the ever patient Nik, said that for a man of words he never expected FFS to come out of my mouth. Dear-oh-dear, Nik, I know we spend time tethered together each week but you still have some things to learn about me. Admittedly, it was unbecoming, though!

It was a shame as we had gone off down the runway like a Typhoon chasing Putin. Thanks to the grumpy old hamstring we were slowed, but given that I was dragging my leg around, we completed the race in a creditable 31 minutes. Sorry, Nik.

If I have one complaint, it is that spectators aren’t allowed around the course. When you are running in the outer reaches it is gladdening to hear the odd cheer as you go by. The other complaint, although this is not, strictly speaking, of the organisers’ making, it was damnably chilly. Try and book the sunshine for next year, please, if you don’t mind!

The spectator thing was borne out when I told other villages, they might have included locals, I don’t know, no-one seemed to have heard about it. When I asked these folk if they might have taken part if they had known, the answer was a big fat NO! Despite these minor shortcomings, it would be wonderful if this event could become an annual fixture in the running calendar.

This running thing really has gotten a hold of me now. Despite the infernal injuries I am forever looking forward to the next one.