Banana Boat

Banana Boat

Loading up the barge

We rocked up on time at 8:30am in the morning and found skipper Shane and his trainee deckhand Kieran working pretty hard at loading the barge at the Denham jetty. As part of our volunteering education we were extremely happy to go to Dirk Hartog Island on a barge run. I noticed immediately the precision and skill these guys had uploading big barrels of diesel and stood like a spare appendage at a wedding reception taking photos of it all. Ranger Chris pulled up with a trailer and started unloading some pallets on to the deck.  When we  took off it was a magic wind-free morning. Some cloud cover soon disappeared and the sun soon broke through to reveal a beautiful calm Shark Bay. The conversation was funny and full of banter as we cruised out of the harbour. Suddenly, the starboard engine started acting up. We could hear it straining and dropping out at times. When Kieran opened the engine hatch an alarming amount of grey smoke billowed up from below deck.  A large effort was made immediately by the crew and Chris to fix the problem. Again there was not much we could do.

Ranger Chris in conversation with Julie

Chris walked over to us and asked us in a concerned voice if we had brought bananas on board. He explained that throughout history sailors had been blaming bananas for bad luck on their ships. They found that bananas had all ripened at the same time and were useless to stow on a long voyage. I don’t know Chris well enough to gauge what his serious straight face looks like in comparison with his taking the 'Mick' straight face but the banana story sounded pretty bent in my ears. Guiltily we ate our bananas we had brought for lunch early in an attempt to prevent anything worse from occurring.
 

Meanwhile the boat had turned around to head back to Denham. After some repairs and assistance by phone from the mainland and the on-board crew the engine started settling down. We then turned around and headed back to Dirk Hartog. We were relieved to say the least.
 

Julie and I spotted several dolphins.  I managed to recognize the square head of the Loggerhead turtle who eyeballed me  from 10 meters away before, with amazing agility, disappeared straight down in the dark depths of the Bay, We were told that there were many whales in the bay at this moment in time and that we were likely to get close to some of them on the way back. 

 

Yep!! That's what it looked like

When we arrived at Dirk Hartog Island we had missed the high tide suitable to shift the gear to onto the beach. Another result of our banana crime committed and we had to moor the barge offshore and conquer the Island by dingy. I cannot help but think back to Dirk Hartog as he landed here 399 years ago. This crazy semi-grey Dutch nomad following him in his footsteps almost four hundred years later as we landed on a pristine white sandy beach with the most exquisite turquoise coloroured water. A massive sting ray was gliding past us in the shallow. “C’mon Dirk. What's not to like?” Three little mice shot away from the land cruiser that was left bogged on the beach waiting for our arrival. After deflating the tires Ranger Chris four wheel drove us up to the big shed on the hill. The whole shed was full of dusty camping gear in preparation for a maintenance crew to arrive next week. Ranger Chris rummaged around and came up with some instant coffee that tasted rather good to a self-confessed coffee snob under these circumstances. We sat down on the porch of the shed overlooking the magnificent bay and rugged rolling hills while more banana jokes were flying around. Waiting for the tide can take many hours we found out. Driving the ute on red sandy soil through low scrubs and amazing flowers along side Ranger Chris took us to Mystery Beach where Jules and I had the opportunity to go for a long walk. The beach was untouched by humans and deserted. Taking photos in this setting was pure joy. The sun started to set and the moon rose at the same time.

 

The barge cruising just off-shore of dirk Hartog Island

The skipper moved the barge closer to Mystery Beach but had to wait for the tide to rise by another six inches. Just after dark the crew managed to load the ship with empty diesel barrels and a trailer full of old irrigation pipes that were removed by volunteers on a previous voyage.

Loading the barge in the moonlight

The trip home was a bouncy affair. For four hours the barge danced onto the waves. We were all brave and chatted standing up for hours. When I mentioned to Jules I was feeling a little see-sick tickle in the back of the throat it was Julie that disappeared down the back of the boat for some dry heaving. She said the fumes and cold helped against that nauseating feeling that had taken hold of her. Darn bananas were about to haunt us again.


In the end we had the time of our lives and have put our names down to go again to beautiful Dirk Hartog Island.


Semi-grey nomad tips.

• Don’t bring  bananas onto a boat (EVER)!!!!!