Articles published in March, 2024
For a year or so I have been digging back into the notes I kept on my journey round the world in the Seventies. Here they are, word for word, as I wrote them.
1976, and it’s a New Year in Australia
Friday, January 2nd
Finished working on the bike in the morning. Went into Cairns to get food and see Botanical Gardens. Teak, Sausage tree, Rain tree. Fine variety of hens and cockatoos.
Finally talk to London that night, to Peter Harland’s secretary, Jean. She says she will try to get Triumph to send pistons to Melbourne.
Saturday, 3rd
Off to Cape Tribulation at about 11am. Some rain. Good road as far as ferry beyond Mossman. Then wonderfully bad dirt road through gathering rain forest, dipping into coast gullies, creeks, torn up rock surfaces, sandstone of every shade of brown as closely leaved as puff pastry. We travelled close to a small truck with about 8 young men, women, boys, girls, all in swim trunks, up to the Cape for the weekend. They followed us along the road up to the notorious Cooper Creek, a wide river with a thick pebble bed that has to be negotiated along an arc swinging downstream and then up again. Carol took a lift across on the truck. I followed, but finally stopped near the opposite bank in a trough left by car wheels as they urged their load onto the bank. Three of us pushed it out and as I poured water from my boots and exhausts, they all went swimming in the creek, where I later joined them. Most delicious cold water with a deep green tinge to it as though stained by the reflection of the rain forest all around. From there we rode on looking for the sign for Noah’s Creek. But Carol’s directions were vague and she thought the drive-in was after the creek. We eventually crossed a bridge of squared off tree trunks, and she’d caught of glimpse of something before the bridge that might have been the white Toyota described by Brian – but I went on until we came to another formidable creek. At this point I would, reluctantly, have gone back to look had a car not driven up with a man and two children. We asked him and he said it was further ahead. It never occurred to us to doubt him as he was going there himself to repair a tractor. So once again I set off into two feet of water, got stuck, was pulled out, emptied my boots, and waited a while as the man drove off. Almost immediately a Landrover came after across the creek to ask us whether the other driver knew he was losing oil from his sump. They (a local couple) pointed to the oil on the road, we said no, and they drove off after him. We set off too to find them again coming out of a sidetrack to the beach (where the first truck load were camped). They said they’d thought their man might have gone down there.
“Oh no,” we said. “He’s going to Noah’s Creek to mend a tractor.”
They smiled.
“Noah Creek is back there by the bridge. He’s already passed it.”
Stupefied, we laughed and felt foolish, and I turned to face the creek again. This time I managed the crossing unaided while Carol watched petrified as it seemed I might go over the edge of the stone ridge built up by the current and disappear altogether.
Ozzie dirt
At Noah Creek we found Bill (U.S.) and Sonia (disinherited Canadian heiress) who live there, and Susie, who owns it with her husband David, who was out in the forest beating the bounds of his property with John Bisset. They were tracing the blazes made in 1898 and not seen since – most of the trek involving cutting the way with machetes.
Sonia is a very combative lady who needs to tell everybody what to do, how to do it, and then what they are doing is either wrong, stupid or dangerous. Apart from that she longs for sympathetic company. Bill is a very young guy hiding under a beard, who’s been to places and has a smattering of this and that, but not much seems to have rubbed off. He talked about Mexico and being ripped off – and said the same of Asia.
David and John appeared from the forest, David with his shirt ripped from neck to waist – like actors in a cheap adventure movie. Perhaps because D is a designer his black beard looked unconvincing. John had blonde hair, a wispy moustache, and a gammy leg, something to do with racing cars.
An Ozzie spider
Sunday, 4th
We slept on mattresses in the back of the tractor shed – built very neatly by Brian. It rained on the tin roof more heavily and loudly than I can ever remember.
We volunteered to walk to the store at Cape Tribulation to fetch whatever there might be in a rucksack. We walked the first mile to Arsenic Creek, admiring the forest around us – and walking into it a little way, trying to avoid the Stinging Bush and the Wait-a while. The S.B. has very fine needles on the underside of its leaves which break off in the skin and hurt for a month. One wonders why a plant should be equipped with such a vengeful and unpractical weapon. The W-a-W has long tendrils with fish-hook thorns at close intervals in sets of four, which attach themselves to anything. There are ferns growing out of trunks, all 20 feet or more high; lianas of all dimensions swinging down, looping round branches; creepers encircling everything; staghorn plants bulging from the crotches of tall trees many feet above, encircling them with a fringe of leaves. Later, on the beach we found a tree whose roots stood four feet above the surface in an almost vertical cluster, like pipes running down into the soil.
Blue fruit like a stone egg. A small purple one, the Davidsonian Plum, dark purple with juicy red meat and three stones, very edible.
At Arsenic – or strychnine as some call it – we met yesterday’s campers splashing about, and later they overtook us and gave us a ride to the Cape – a magnificent, and apparently unique view. This is the only place where the rain forest still runs to the edge of the ocean.
The Hewistons have an 800-acre plot of it from ocean to high ridge.
At the store a tubby middle-aged man was kneading dough with a machine (which Carol didn’t know was possible). He kept repeating that he’d come there to escape the rat-race. [Escapees are always having to account for themselves] Said I reminded him of a cop in Cairns on the drug squad. Heroin is floated ashore in large quantities on this coast, he claimed, and said he’d picked some up himself. Wife and children all seemed very happy to be there. Most people, though, say the rain eventually gets too much for them and they have to get away for a respite. ’74 was a very dry year, didn’t rain till January ’75 – but ’75 has been fairly wet all through.
Towards evening we went out with John in an aluminium dinghy to lay down two crab traps he’s made from netting.
We floated past the mangroves, with their contorted roots rising out of the mud like writhing ghosts, looking down into tannin stained water to avoid sand bars and submerged logs. The traps were placed under the mangroves in about 3ft of water and tied to the branches above by a line. The bait was small, rotten mullet. Within an hour we’d got one crab – dark, massive claws that can cut off a finger or a toe. The females are thrown back. Males show a triangular mark underneath (Check that!)
Next week, conversation with a crocodile hunter.
Early on my journey, when I was passing through Kenya I became friends, briefly (all my friendships were necessarily brief) with a man whose brother had married and gone to live in Australia. When he heard that Australia was on my route he asked me to take along two bracelets woven with the hair from an elephant’s tail. They were remarkable objects. The hair was like wire, black and polished, and he said they were supposed to confer virility on the male, and seductiveness on the female. I was already carrying a ceremonial sword from one brother in Egypt to another in Brazil, and I rather enjoyed the idea of being a sentimental postman. This brother, Brian Adams, lived near Cairns. and I had his address, in Redlynch, so naturally that was where we were headed, two years later.
Riding north after crossing the Tropic of Capricorn for the sixth time:
December 27th
Road reports say only obstruction to Cairns is flooding just before Ingham. A fairly easy day – except for pushing the bike through the flood. Above Ingham, country seems to change finally to tropical and for both of us, it seems to symbolise a sort of escape from the rigidity of Australia. Sun out a lot of the way. Bike seems to be going well and everything has dried out well before we reach Cairns at about 3pm. However, Redlynch is on the north side. The low range of mountains we’ve seen to the north-west slide in closer until we’re facing into them and pointed at the heart of a small but very black rainstorm. No matter how the road wriggles it always comes back to the same bearing and at last we ride into an absolute torrent of rain falling exclusively on Redlynch. The P.O. is shut (Why? It’s taken for granted) but two Italian brothers in the store next door – they’ve been here for decades and still can hardly manage an English sound – say they’ve heard of an Adams (Edems?) across the river, 3rd house after the cane barracks, but the creek might be up. So on we go, both with our separate premonitions.
The house is empty, but a dark young man in grey working shorts and shirt drove past the cane field on the right in a tractor and pulled up in front of his house. He was farmer and landlord of the other houses. Says Mary was in England and Brian was “up to the Cape.” They had split up. The time and distance I had travelled to get here from Kenya weighed on me. While I was riding, the world was changing – too fast for me perhaps. If I had arrived a year before with my “elephant tail charms” – virility to the male, seductiveness to the female – would it have saved the marriage? Rot!
In the tropical north strange creatures lurk behind the lush vegetation
Talked to the Adams’ friends, Jan and Jean (French). They explained a bit of what had happened. Said Brian was back from the Cape. When we DID meet Brian, red hair and beard, the sort of green marble eyes I imagine on Drake, he took our presence entirely for granted.
Tuesday 30th
First day at Cairns. Brian suggests we go with him to Port Douglas. There his friend Anne and 3 kids meet us. We eat pies and walk to the beach, the harbour, and up to the head. Sensitive mimosa on the ground. Long narrow beaches under coco palms. But can’t swim in summer because jellyfish (box jellies) are very painful and can kill.
(There were three types of jelly on a warning poster at Shute Harbour – Box, Seawasp and Bluebottle. Also Stone fish and sea snakes can kill.)
Triumph agent in Cairns is Trusty Rusty Rees. His son was at the shop when I arrived – blonde hair slicked down, young face coarsened and battered with discoloured teeth, a fancy blue denim suit flared in all directions (lapels, shoulders, skirt, legs) with raised seams all over, and a tie like a sunburst flat fish hanging at his neck and almost covering his shirtfront with dayglo. He was, incredibly, just on his way to a funeral.
Behold. the marsupial tractor
Cairns is a noughts and crosses grid of a half dozen streets, and a neat harbour. It’s a favourite place for high-powered, deep-sea fishing maniacs. (Dean Martin?) and the strange craft with scaffolding and long alloy rods like antennae are lined up along the jetty, their prestigious-looking barbers’ chairs facing back. Marlin is what brings them all here.
The town has a pub/hotel at every corner, and a number of others in-between. Men sit on stools, staring out vacantly. The facades have an aura of something exciting in the past – but even that I now feel is illusory – just monuments to a time when men’s rapacity had freer reign than now.
Those men who left the cities or country of their youth to make fortunes at the frontiers must have left terrible traumas behind them of envy, resentment. Australia seems to me to be overcast by their influence.
Minerals, sugar-cane, logging – already many kinds of timber are scarce – silky oak, cedar. Australia imports much timber from Oregon. Before the war, says Sonia (?) [Australia] sold coal to Germany for 5 cents a ton. There they found enough gold in the coal to pay for the shipping.
Wednesday 31st
Last thing I’d noticed before stopping the bike yesterday was rough noise and burning oil. Took the engine down today in the morning and took barrel into town. A lot of wear on one cylinder – and that very uneven – as if some abrasive material got in. Lot of carbon on piston crown too. But no good pistons to be had in Cairns or Brisbane. Decided that [indecipherable] pistons would see me through, and to ask Triumph to send some to Melbourne while we limped back there. Called London that night, but Peter Harland on holiday.
[THEN THIS. I DON’T KNOW WHY]
They believed a man should choose his own name, so they wanted to give their son all the initials in the alphabet. But the vicar objected to having to read the alphabet out loud at the christening. Why not call him Alphabet, he suggested? So they agreed thinking he’d change it some day. But he never did, and Alphabet Jones is what he was when he died.
New Year’s Day, 1976
Reassembled the bike. Failed again to reach London. Brian made a super curry. He’d hoped to celebrate with Anne, but she didn’t dare go out under threats of violence from her husband.
I’m away in Mexico for a few weeks, so you may not be hearing from me for a while. Just listened to “State of the Union.” I leave you in the hope and belief that Joe Biden can turn the tide. He should be able to. After all he’s a young man from where I stand. If he can’t there will be hell to pay.
When I read what I’d written half a century ago, I found it so harsh that I almost skipped over this episode, but it’s a long time ago, things have changed and Australians reading this will know how much they’ve changed. You left me last week as we were recovering from a downpour in the night.
Friday, December 26th
At first the prospect seemed awful. Everything wet, although some more so than others. Only the bags and Carol’s jacket were dryish, and her boots. My ST cuttings were hopelessly soaked, and I threw them out.
We wobbled off towards Townsville. Took on petrol – Two and a half gallons. Then took a chance on a side road to Bowen. “In for a penny – “ I muttered. Went through some shallow floodwater to come out on Bruce Highway just past Myrtle Creek where all the southbound traffic was stuck. We were lucky and it improved our morale. On to Gumlu where we took on more petrol – 1½ gallons for 99 miles – most reassuring – at 66 miles per gallon I don’t see there can be very much wrong inside the barrel. A pint of oil a bit farther on, and we ate sandwiches, prepared under Carol’s close supervision. Then spread our clothes and bags over the landscape to take advantage of the sun and wind. Dried tent, bags etc., then back on bike. To Townsville through a long succession of floods, some quite deep – where we were hailed by Jim Kennedy and Faith and invited to their place. Passed Laverrack (?) barracks, Aussie Army Task Force 3. Lots of council flats and houses round the back of the town, and with great relief guided into their RAAF house for a dry night.
We are invited to stay with the Kennedys. A box-like structure. Walls of hardboard panels joined by strips; ceiling likewise. Floor of beautiful tongue-and-groove. Varnished. Strip lighting throughout, white and pastel green. Overhead fan. Collection of uncoordinated furniture – harsh, jarring, an energy sink. The Kennedys relate to each other with violent displays of affectionate abuse, which could all too readily slip into the real thing.
Across the road, the ultimate horror toy – a $3000 electronic organ beats out a mindless, tuneless, soulless rhythm while the obsessed owner tries to finger a dance tune in a different key. The environment in terms of colour, shape, sound, smell is so hostile to anything beautiful that it hurts. At this point I’m forced to stop writing by Jim, who comes in to disturb me by explaining that he understands why I shouldn’t be disturbed.
Then comes the ride – never quite clear why – to see whether Rollingstone Creek is up, perhaps – or just to exercise the car. Jim drives us for endless miles up the same road we’re going to take when we leave. He drives too fast, explaining the while how drivers fail to follow the rules. A good deal of the time Jim’s only contact with the wheel is one wrist resting on top of it. He has a watch (Swiss) with metal work so sharp he has to have a woolen strap under it to protect his skin.
Pass the nickel plant which he wanted to show us. Pass some Aborigines at riverside to remind us of the degrading state of relations between people. Later to the RAAF base and watch television. In the Test [cricket test match] Lillie is bowling, and the crowd noise has a quality I have only heard before at all-in wrestling. Murderous. A colleague of Jim’s appeared at his house in the morning – ‘Smithy’ – a 21-year-old with a body so grossly flabby as to be obscene. Jim himself is in perfect physical shape for 33. He told us of his nervous breakdowns. His wife was 5’ 4” and 19 stone [266lbs] ¬– how he loathed the look of her – (though Faith says his loathing was implanted in him as aversion therapy after the break}. His touching confession that the two people who helped him most were a homosexual and a lesbian (both from the clinic).
The fascination and horror of being with the Kennedys is to see how people whose primary intentions are good can be trapped by their fears into a set of attitudes and circumstances which are a violation of the human potential.
Faith was married to a man who brutalised her life (violence and threats) for 14 years.
Jim is very hot on rules – firefighting, driving, relationships between people, games, always Jim is ready to lay down the rules. “If I had been asked, there’s one hotel in T’ville that would never have been built, and that’s Louth’s (the smartest one). The only way out of there is by the lift. A fire trap.” (Hints of City corruption follow inevitably).
Sad to see how ready everyone is in Aussie to pick up the political slogans and follow like sheep. “Dole bludgers,” “Abos”, etc. But perhaps Aussie only shows openly the workings of our own society.
Most of Townsville built on reclaimed swamp. Too flat to drain – and streets awash with mud. All houses raised – some more than others.
[About 40 miles by ferry from Townsville is Palm Island, which was an Aboriginal Reserve. This is what the Kennedys told us about it.]
It’s a medical fact that every girl over 3 has been molested.
If you hit ‘em on the head you can only injure yourself.
They’re not human beings really – they’re just another species of animal. They live with animals, don’t they?
You know those flagons of cheap wine that cost a dollar fifty? If you take one over there you can flog it for $45.
They’re the only people with any money in Australia.
Don’t you ever trust one. Never. They’ll lift anything off you. Good as the Arabs, they are.
I have to say that among the things I learned on my travels was the cardinal importance of prejudices in binding groups together. Hidden or open, their forms may change, but their effects can be as virulent and destructive today as they ever were. They are the levers by which we are manipulated.
I photographed these Aboriginals fishing, and he was very angry, rightly perhaps. “I’ll fucking toss yer in there,” he said.
