41 false starts (Lord Howe Island)

A post title for all the Leonardo's Bride fans out there.

I certainly didn't have 41 false starts to the day, but there were a few.  The first couple occurred during that pre-dawn period when I'm never sure if it's day or night.  It was only wind through the palms, but it is sometimes difficult to tell the difference between that and rain. Mostly it was wind and once it was a brief rain shower.  Then somebody nearby had their radio up a little too loud.  Finally at the more respectable time of 7:30am, the time by which I am usually sitting at my desk at work, and Emerald Dove flew into the glass door of the bedroom that leads to the verandah.  It was clearly a botched suicide mission although 3 hours later he was still in the recovery ward shaking his head.  He left a beautiful imprint of himself on the door as a reminder of the dangers of the Australian bush. That was enough, time to get out of bed.

The day couldn't quite decide what to do, it was cloudy then it cleared, then it was cloudy again, but the constant was the wind.  Ned's Beach or Blinky's was out of the question so a walk to the south end of the island became the activity for the day.  Rex and Louise popped in as we were heading out and we had a chat about various things, the Emerald Dove and his need for care and the rat situation. 

In the last couple of days I have seen a number of rats, some dead, some not quite dead.  We are in a two week baiting period.  Rats have long been a problem on LHI for all the usual reasons as well as the fact that they have the ability to decimate the LHI Woodhen population and a number of other ground dwelling birds and other species.  While the bait stations work well enough in the populated areas, there is a vast expanse of land which is not populated, around 90%.  The rats are eradicated around the settlement and then the rats from out of town move in and fill the void. It's a bit like organised crime.  Even moreso when you consider that there has been a solution proposed that has strong scientific backing but the naysayers (read conspiracy theorists) are against the proposal to drop baits in the unpoplulated areas.  So, in the meantime, Nero fiddles as Rome burns.  The trial aerial drop is supposed to occur this winter.

LHI Woodhen

Camera in hand and back-pack on, we began the walk to other end of the island.  Once you are past Pinetrees Lodge there is not really much else, the airstrip - which now features a kiosk that apparently does the best coffee on the island, it also does gelato and pizza, the golf club and Capella Lodge. 

The view form the above the 8th green

Beyond that is mostly farming land and the cows are fat and very content with their lives at present. Why you ask dear reader, well about three years ago some do-gooder decided that the way the animals had been slaughtered for human consumption for the past several decades was no longer good enough.  Animals may only be slaughtered in an abattoir, oh wait, LHI doesn't have an abattoir = happy cows and all meat products imported from the mainland.

A happy beast

The farming land comes to an end at the foot of those towering mountains Lidgbird and Gower.  The road ceases and becomes a walking track to the beginning of the climb.  The mountains are a no-go zone unless you have an experienced guide with you.  All there is to do at that point is to enjoy the view back to the north across the lagoon.  It is truly a spectacular landscape.

After a brief kodak moment we set off again, not heading for home but the Anchorage for lunch. Jayne asked whether Strava would work, to which I replied "yes, it is satellite based".  Strava was connected to check the distance of today's walk.  As we reached the Anchorage I calculated that we had walked close enough to 10kms.  Lunch had been walked off before we even had it.

Post lunch it was nanna nap time because it was a tad too windy for snorkelling.  The afternoon slides into evening as the clouds drift across the lagoon and the sun melts back into the ocean, then it's time to eat again.  Luckily we have the second half of that delightful trevally I caught and half of the coral cod for dinner tonight.

The discussion tonight was around what makes LHI so special.  We have stayed on Heron, Great Keppel and Fitzroy Islands, but LHI is by far the winner.  Each island has its attractions but LHI seems to bring them all together.  The other three islands are all in Queensland and either on the reef or have fringing reef - so does Lord Howe.  From our perspective the coral here is as good as we've seen anywhere, and that includes two trips to the outer reef.  The natural beauty here is unsurpassed, mountains, rain forest, surf beaches, lagoon, coral, bush walking and the world of nature - the woodhens and other species above the sea, not to meantion the myriad of life below it.  You can't help but feel relaxed on LHI and we really believe it is due to the number of people that are at any one time.  The number of tourists is strictly limited and spread across the entire settlement form north to south.  Nowhere is crowded.  Today we walked along the lagoon beach and where we were was totally deserted, you don't feel crowded, you don't feel rushed, you just feel calm and relaxed in a pasradise of natural beauty.  Yes it has gone a little more upmarket with a couple of new eateries, bread baked daily on site and the obvious presence of more vehicles but the essence of the island has remained intact. We will continue to return - not something we have ever desired to do with any other island 'paradise'.