Montebello, p.26
Montebello, page 26
44
Cycling
A light wash of rain blew in our faces as Tracy and I cycled across the island. I was a year back from the Montebellos and I wanted to share Little Parrakeet Bay with her, too. She was now a widow. It was our first trip away together, finally our first time alone, and I was pleased by her suggestion for us to go to Rottnest.
The salt lakes gave off whiffs of organic matter and on their shores ducks and seagulls crowded together for warmth against the wind. Great clumps of lake foam blew across the road and through our wheels and the froth clung momentarily to the spokes and pedals and to our legs.
We rode side by side and occasionally one or the other would speed ahead, then wait for the other to catch up. The bikes had back-pedal brakes and no gears and we walked together up the steeper hills. This grey first day of spring, 1 September, we were the only cyclists on the road. It was the anniversary of my Registry Office wedding to Ruth and the beginning of the long-ago Rottnest honeymoon. Yet another coincidence that fiction disfavoured but real life seemed to be encouraging with ever-increasing gusto.
In the cool weather at this time of year, and mid-week, there had been no trouble getting a room in the island’s hotel. We had the place to ourselves though rarely left our room except to take the air and some exercise in the morning and evening.
Wherever we went for meals or a drink we were one of only three or four couples; the others were roadies and their girlfriends setting up equipment for a weekend pop concert. Their sound-checks boomed out all day but we weren’t bothered by them. We had many years to make up and many things to say and hear.
Little Parrakeet Bay reflected the non-colour of agate as a milky glare showed through the clouds. Choppy waves broke on its reefs and rolled long banks of kelp onto the shore and the sea had that ominous look that Australians on any coast like to describe as ‘sharky’. Drizzly rain soaked us as we tramped across the sand and shed our clothes. We found a weedless patch of sea and Tracy ran ahead and boldly dived in before me. We swam, but not for long or too far out.
As we rode off again she pedalled into the lead and the clouds lifted more and the sun and wind began to dry our clothes. We were returning to the hotel by the hilly coastal route. She was full of energy as she sped ahead of me down the slopes and through side-streets of deserted holiday cottages. We didn’t want to wear our helmets. We were lawless exhilarated teenagers again, yahooing and sounding our bicycle bells as we raced faster and faster around the bends and down the suddenly familiar hills of my adolescence.
I admired her speed and spirit, and was touched by her efforts, and my yells and exhilaration were meant for her and all about her. As she crouched low over the handlebars to go even quicker I could see the sunlight shining on her head. Her scalp gleamed now that the chemotherapy sessions were taking effect – she was too straightforward a person to wear a wig – and she’d had her remaining hair strands clipped close to her skull.
There seemed to be no-one else on the entire island. We yelled into the sea breeze and rang our bike bells all the way down to the bottom of the hill until we reached another bay that was sheltered from the wind, where a few boats bobbed placidly on their moorings, and then I caught up with her and we pedalled slowly back to the settlement side by side and talking quietly.
Acknowledgements
Firstly I want to thank Gerri Sutton, whose generous assistance made this book possible.
Special thanks for their patience and hospitality to Brent Johnson, former Principal Technical Officer, Fauna Conservation, and Dr Andy Smith, former Senior Research Scientist (Fauna Translocations), Wildlife Research Centre, Department of Environment and Conservation, Western Australia. And for their willingness to share their specialist conservation knowledge and Montebello experiences, I’m immensely grateful to Dr Andrew Burbidge and Peter Kendrick.
For their help, time and assorted kindnesses, I’m indebted to Dirk Avery; Carmel Bird; Robbie Burns; Dana Burrows; Patrick and Maxine Coverley; Tracy Coverley; Bill Drewe; Tony Gibson; Jack and Nancy Harrison; Janet Hocken; Mark Holden; Chris Mews; Nelson and Julie Mews; Rusty Miller and Tricia Shantz; Kim Newman; Ross Nobel; Jan Purcell; Sagaro at Lightforce Computers; Dr Catherine Samson; Moya Sayer-Jones; Brian Sierakowski; Peter Temple; and Stephen Van Mil.
For their publishing support, thanks as always to Julie Gibbs, Fiona Inglis, Jocelyn Hungerford and Bob Sessions.
Some early fragments of this book were first published in Granta; When the Wild Comes Leaping Up: Personal Encounters with Nature (edited by David Suzuki); Best Australian Essays 2006; Best Australian Short Stories 2008; Sand (with John Kinsella); Westerly; the Saturday Age; West Weekend; Sunday Life; the Bulletin; and the Weekend Australian Magazine.
The following works are acknowledged: For literature and history: New Voyage Round the World, by William Dampier; William Dampier in New Holland, by Alex S. George; ‘Youth’, by Joseph Conrad; Kangaroo, by D.H. Lawrence; The Island of Dr Moreau, by H.G. Wells; My Family and Other Animals, by Gerald Durrell; Prospero’s Cell and Reflections on a Marine Venus, by Lawrence Durrell; Henry Lawson – The People’s Poet: Women and the Bush: Forces of Desire in the Australian Cultural Tradition, by Kay Schaffer; Herzog, by Saul Bellow; A Move Abroad, by Ian McEwan; Point Omega, by Don DeLillo; Quote from Prospero’s Cell reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Group Ltd, London on behalf of the Estate of Lawrence Durrell. Copyright © Lawrence Durrell, 1945; Quote from Reflections on a Marine Venus reproduced with permission of Curtis Brown Group Ltd, London on behalf of the Estate of Lawrence Durrell. Copyright © Lawrence Durrell, 1945; Monster of God: The Man-Eating Predator in the Jungles of History and the Mind, by David Quammen; Time and Tide: History of Byron Bay, by S.J. Dening; and Byron Bay: The History, Beauty and Spirit, by Peter Duke.
On conservation matters: Landscope (Department of the Environment and Conservation, W.A.); The Western Australian Naturalist, Vol. 24, No. 2, 2003: Mass Deaths of Sea Turtles on the Montebello Islands, October 1953, Following Operation Hurricane, by Peter Kendrick; Exploiting Green and Hawksbill Turtles in Western Australia: A Case Study of Commercial Marine Turtle Fishing 1869– 1973, by Brooke Halkyard; Radiation Management Plan, Montebello Islands Conservation Park, and Management Proposals for the Montebello Islands and Surrounding Waters (Department of Conservation and Land Management, W.A.).
On nuclear testing: Max Kimber’s ABC interviews; Beyond Belief, by Roger Cross and Avon Hudson; Atomic Fallout, publication of the Atomic Ex-Servicemen’s Association; Wayward Governance: Illegality and Its Control in the Public Sector: Chapter 16: A Toxic Legacy – British Nuclear Weapons Testing in Australia, by P.N. Grabowsky (Australian Institute of Criminology); The Story of Operation Hurricane, a 1977 paper by J.J. McEnhill (National Archives of Australia); Radiation Hazard Assessment and Monitoring Programme for the Montebello Islands (Western Radiation Services).
Credits: Blueberry Hill was recorded by Fats Domino in 1956 and written by Vincent Rose, Al Lewis and Larry Stock in 1940; Groundhog Day (1993) was directed by Harold Ramis and written by Danny Rubin and Harold Ramis; and Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959) was directed by Alain Resnais and written by Marguerite Duras.
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First published by Penguin Group (Australia), 2012
Text copyright © Robert Drewe 2012
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ISBN: 978-1-74253-662-0
Robert Drewe, Montebello
