On the road to the East Coast

2, 500 kilometres in two and a half days at 100kph and nothing to see on the way, nothing to break the monotony of driving and absolutely nothing to take a photograph of. The road is so straight that at the slightest curve, motorists stop and have a tea-party. You can drive for an hour and not see any other vehicles on the way and when you do, you wave to one another in delight.

People who know me, consider me to be somewhat of a worrier and so it will be of no surprise to learn that my anxiety levels were high. With the memory of being stranded for three days fresh in my mind, the prospect of a breakdown out there really wasn’t appealing. Happily, I can report that we made the distance and despite a few strange sounds, our car behaved as well as can be expected.

After a month or so in arid landscapes, intense heat, clouds of dry dust and hours, days on the road, we were eager to reach the East Coast. The East Coast is home to the Great Barrier Reef, the Whitsunday Islands, warm and crystal clear waters, golden beaches and modern civilisation. This is where we are going to go diving and snorkelling. This is where we will sail yachts from secluded island to secluded island. This is where we will enjoy the heat, savour fillets of freshly grilled barramundi and wash it down with cool ginger beer. This has been our ultimate goal, our holy grail and it was why we decided to come to Australia. With each hundred kilometres closer we got to the coast, our spirits rose and our excitement grew.

As we drove closer to the coast, whispers of cloud began to form more menacing shapes and gradually the habitual blue sky began to darken. When the first drops of rain started to fall onto the windscreen, our mood changed profoundly. The occasional drop was replaced by a furious onslaught of rain and our old, squeaky windscreen wipers squeaked and groaned from side to side. They were clearly past their best and we were asking too much of them, but they soldiered on. We were glum and resigned to the fact that the rain had finally found our location and would now, and forever more, follow us until gills formed on our necks.

I’m pleased, however, to report that as soon as we reached the coast, the rain ceased and the clouds dispersed. The drive north was pleasant with magnificent sugar cane plantations and lush, rolling hills on either side of the road.

The East Coast

I’m now writing to you from our beach. I’m sitting on my camp chair with the computer on my lap. In front of me is golden sand and a sea filled with colourful reefs and enthusiastic fish. I’m hiding from the sun under the shade of a coconut tree. Apparently, this is a campsite, but really it is simply a stretch of magnificent beach. We spent the morning walking on the golden sand and a la Robinson Crusoe, we collected some coconuts.

It is one thing to collect them and quite another to open them. They are, literally, a tough nut. It took me half an hour to open one. I tried hurling it onto a rock, I attempted to saw away at it with my Leatherman, I tried smashing it against another coconut and I even tried using a piece of sharpened wood to tear away at the husk. All with no success and quite frankly, something that is capable of floating in the sea for three thousand miles and still germinate when it hits land, deserves respect. So I tried one more strategy prior to resorting to driving my 4X 4 over it, and that was to take a rather heavy claw hammer to it and obliterate it big style. A little uncouth, but it worked. Unfortunately, the swine had the last laugh. The milk was rotten and the white was brown. Not to be put off by this, we tried my new technique on one of its brothers and by god it was worth it. The milk was cool and wonderfully sweet. The flesh was both moist and crunchy. It was exceptionally good and took me right back to my childhood when I would win one at the local fair and my dad would take a screwdriver and hammer to open it up and release its flavours. I had totally forgotten just how good a fresh coconut really is... if a little hard work.