And the last day has arrived. Sadly.
It was an interesting night. There were some very strange animal noises from the bush surrounding the Treehouse. My assumption is that it was a tern attempting to protect its young from a nocturnal invader, probably a rat. It went on for sometime between 2 and 4am, I hope the tern was successful. Rex later informed me that it was probably a LHI woodhen. They are very territorial and aggressive and really, really loud.
Prior to this we walked to the northern end of LHI to Milky Way for a traditional island fish-fry for dinner. King fish pieces, calamari, prawns, salad and fries. Way too much for Jayne and I to eat. It's not often that a seafood dinner stops me, but they won that round. It was a beautiful cloudless night on the walk home - and thankfully we remembered our torches. The sky was an inky black and the stars where everywhere. It takes me back to my childhood to remember the night sky so vividly alight. Discussions (arguments) around constellations identified as kids - the saucepan and where is scorpio or the pointers from the Southern Cross - sigh.
Today is turning out much like yesterday weather-wise and our agenda for the day will be similar except that it will be marred by a 4:10pm flight back to Sydney and reality. Our bags are packed and we are relaxing on the verandah for one last time taking in the lagoon and those brooding mountains to the south, both of which are wreathed in cloud.
The plan for today is to pack and place our bags in the transit lounge and then walk across to Ned's Beach for some snorkelling in that magnificent underwater garden. Then back to the transit lounge here at the Treehouse for a shower and change into our travel clothes. Following that it will be our last walk down the hill and over to the Anchorage for a leisurely lunch until Rex and Louise come to pick us up and deliver us to the airport.
And so, the concluding paragraphs are now being tapped away on our balcony in the heart of Sydney. There is a delightful breeze, the sun has set and the Darling Harbour fireworks have concluded. It's not all bad being home.
Ned's Beach was the picture it was the previous day, albeit less crowded, initially. Straight into the water, follow the sand passage out and then turn left across the rocks and coral. The surge of the waves was stronger than Friday and it was easy to buffeted one side of the bay to the other. While I could list all the fish we saw yesterday, the beauty of Ned's is that you always see something different. Today that began with the array of fish being fed close to shore, but that's not where it stopped. A crown of thorns star fish was impressive, if alone. The biggest sea slug I've seen was a surprise, but the black tip reef shark was totally unexpected. It wasn't large, maybe a metre, but it was just a little too curious. On the first pass I kicked a fin at him and he circled and came back. This time I seriously thought of punching it on the nose and actually wound up, but then I thought of that of that boy on the south coast who did that and got bitten. Anyway, we eye-balled each other and he backed down and swam out towards the blue yonder.
Just prior to the shark incident, Jayne said she was feeling cold. That was enough excuse for this real Aussie bloke to head for shore.
Following the plan, we walked back home, showered, changed, chatted with Louise and Rex and walked down to the Anchorage for lunch. Well really to burn some time before the flight home. Straight to our usual table to be served by our usual wait staff. Seven days in and we were in a rut, lucky we were going home. Curiously, we avoided the fish on the menu, we have eaten soooo much fish, ordered a bottle of wine and settled in. Louise phoned to say the plane was going to be late. No surprise, so we ordered another bottle of wine and settled in again.
We discussed ice creams for dessert to find that there was a choice of vanilla or vanilla (today is freight ship arrival day and during lunch, there was a steady stream of trucks coming down to the jetty to collect the next fortnight's supply of essentials like chocolate ice cream - yet to be available while we are on the island).
We were saved from this dessert dilemma by the arrival of Louise and Rex to take us to the airport. We enjoyed our chats about their exploits yachting around the world (literally) and our holidays reviewed on Trip Advisor (they are non-participants at this point). They have an adventurous life - time on the island punctuated by taking off on the seven seas to wherever - 3 months at home and 9 months off elsewhere. We discussed the relative merits of various islands we have all visited to decide that Lord Howe reigns supreme.
Time to depart - first on the plane, smooth trip home and excellent landing to catch a lift home with new cabbie who was on for a chat about his new job and keen to have his first day off tomorrow. Lovely guy who will no doubt harden up and become another Sydney cabbie but was a lovely departure from the norm to see us home to our Redfern apartment.
So dear reader, we are done for another trip away. Already planning the next two - one domestic and one overseas so just to keep you wanting more - another island escape to be followed by "I want to be apart of it - New York New York" ............................ and that will be worth waiting for.
And so, the concluding paragraphs are now being tapped away on our balcony in the heart of Sydney. There is a delightful breeze, the sun has set and the Darling Harbour fireworks have concluded. It's not all bad being home.
Ned's Beach was the picture it was the previous day, albeit less crowded, initially. Straight into the water, follow the sand passage out and then turn left across the rocks and coral. The surge of the waves was stronger than Friday and it was easy to buffeted one side of the bay to the other. While I could list all the fish we saw yesterday, the beauty of Ned's is that you always see something different. Today that began with the array of fish being fed close to shore, but that's not where it stopped. A crown of thorns star fish was impressive, if alone. The biggest sea slug I've seen was a surprise, but the black tip reef shark was totally unexpected. It wasn't large, maybe a metre, but it was just a little too curious. On the first pass I kicked a fin at him and he circled and came back. This time I seriously thought of punching it on the nose and actually wound up, but then I thought of that of that boy on the south coast who did that and got bitten. Anyway, we eye-balled each other and he backed down and swam out towards the blue yonder.
Just prior to the shark incident, Jayne said she was feeling cold. That was enough excuse for this real Aussie bloke to head for shore.
Following the plan, we walked back home, showered, changed, chatted with Louise and Rex and walked down to the Anchorage for lunch. Well really to burn some time before the flight home. Straight to our usual table to be served by our usual wait staff. Seven days in and we were in a rut, lucky we were going home. Curiously, we avoided the fish on the menu, we have eaten soooo much fish, ordered a bottle of wine and settled in. Louise phoned to say the plane was going to be late. No surprise, so we ordered another bottle of wine and settled in again.
We discussed ice creams for dessert to find that there was a choice of vanilla or vanilla (today is freight ship arrival day and during lunch, there was a steady stream of trucks coming down to the jetty to collect the next fortnight's supply of essentials like chocolate ice cream - yet to be available while we are on the island).
We were saved from this dessert dilemma by the arrival of Louise and Rex to take us to the airport. We enjoyed our chats about their exploits yachting around the world (literally) and our holidays reviewed on Trip Advisor (they are non-participants at this point). They have an adventurous life - time on the island punctuated by taking off on the seven seas to wherever - 3 months at home and 9 months off elsewhere. We discussed the relative merits of various islands we have all visited to decide that Lord Howe reigns supreme.
Time to depart - first on the plane, smooth trip home and excellent landing to catch a lift home with new cabbie who was on for a chat about his new job and keen to have his first day off tomorrow. Lovely guy who will no doubt harden up and become another Sydney cabbie but was a lovely departure from the norm to see us home to our Redfern apartment.
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| Goodbye LHI, for the moment. |
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| Hey, I can see our apartment block. No, really. |
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| And what a view coming into Sydney. |
So dear reader, we are done for another trip away. Already planning the next two - one domestic and one overseas so just to keep you wanting more - another island escape to be followed by "I want to be apart of it - New York New York" ............................ and that will be worth waiting for.
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