The crayfishing dory came out of nowhere, our first sign of life in three long weeks at sea. We’d been on the helm since midnight, braving big swell off the mouth of the Escape River, and racing ahead of gale-force winds gathering quickly to the south. There was no place to hide, but as long as we didn’t lose heart, we hoped to be tucked around the tip of Cape York before the weather went to hell.
Stormy squalls hid the horizon. Suddenly the dory appeared, tossed clean out of the water, its propeller spinning atop a huge cresting wave before another wave sucked it back into the sea. The dory veered towards us for a crazy, mid-sea conversation, sidling alongside our wildly surfing 35-foot catamaran as we battled to hold course in the heaving, four metre-high swell.
Over the roar of the waves we confirmed exactly two things: yes, we were indeed all “mad bastards” and yes, we would most definitely like a catch of $100-a-pop painted crays. These were thrown over our rails as we surfed recklessly at 13 knots, Dave gripping the helm to keep the boats from colliding while I raced around the deck, scooping up the crayfish before the sea crashing over the back rail claimed them back again.
Moments later the dory peeled away, back to its mother ship rolling at anchor behind the slenderest of sand cays. With dinner in the bag, we coasted alone through Albany Passage at dusk, rounding Cape York as the sea finally calmed and toasting a ‘Top of Australia’ sunset our wild day at sea with buttery, pan-fried crays and the last of our beers.
Escaping Cairns
When you set out from Cairns, Darwin seems a distant destination – around 2652km or 1432 nautical miles, give or take. The journey might takes weeks or months, depending on how long you linger under the sea at Lizard Island and all those barely-there sand cays between Cairns and The Tip.
Finding Paradise
Girthed by 24 shimmering, white-sand beaches and luminous coral reefs, Lizard Island remains idyllic despite getting a regular hammering by tropical cyclones. Over two unforgettable weeks we swam ashore and beachcombed, climbed Cook’s Look to marvel at an Indigenous ceremonial site tucked beneath the summit, and abseiled off granite cliffs onto faraway Coconut Beach to collect perfect nautilus shells.
Mad, drunken fishermen woke us in the dead of night, begging for cigarettes and booze, but we’d already drunk ours at sunset, feet dug into the sand beneath fragrant frangipanis. Only the threat of worsening weather and the arrival of a more-than-curious bull shark beneath our boat sent us back out to sea to battle broken rudder arms and flagging motors, and rolling anchorages that stole our sleep, night after night.
Cyclones & Barra
Halfway up Cape York, the last, late cyclone of the season crossed the Coral Sea, chasing us deep into Princess Charlotte Bay to tie the boat off sturdy mangrove trees, strip the decks clear and begin the nervous wait for the wild winds to arrive.
We caught barramundi, baked pie, filmed crocs and finally, when Cyclone Ann ran out of puff, weighed anchor and sailed back to Flinders Island where dugongs surfaced mere metres from the boat and dinners were a smorgasbord of queenfish and mackerel, golden trevally and delicious flowery rock cod.
Faraway Flinders Island
Accessible to mainlanders by tinnies as well, Flinders Island National Park is a bewitching destination. Once home to the Aba Yalgayi saltwater people who fished, camped, painted and were buried on this remote group of eight sandstone isles, their Yindayin rock shelters are the best on Cape York, and the sandstone lookouts and rugged, shell-strewn beaches are a castaway’s dream.
Anchored off Flinders Island we hunkered down against yet another round of gale-force winds, joining fishing trawlers in sheltered bays and getting pummeled for days. Eventually we sailed our itchy feet up Cape York, escaping the sea’s onslaught with brief stays at Morris and cyclone-devastated Night Islands before skimming across seagrass beds into beautiful Margaret Bay.
Beachcombing Booty
With a dubious reputation as a beachcombers’ nirvana, Margaret Bay and its south-facing beach over Indian Head gather vast amounts of sea junk: fishing buoys and plastic buckets, toothbrushes and bottles. We picked up fishing lures and a wetsuit, a kayak paddle and a packet of Assorted Creams that somehow washed ashore intact. Starving, we devoured two biscuits each before declaring them inedible and left them for the pigs.
When Dave’s Teva sandal gave out, sucked away by the boggy peat marsh on the approach hike, we searched for just the right sized replacement and not surprisingly, found it on this beach heaped with an appalling amount of sea junk. From Margaret Bay we raced on north, sailing around the tip of Cape York to snap off Insta-pics beneath that still famous sign, and sticking out our thumbs in seaside Seisia for a supply run into Bamaga. Within minutes, a pair of Thursday Island elders had slowed their shiny Land Cruiser, and we savoured the air con and polite conversation on the ride into town.
Battling the Gulf
Groceries bought and beers replenished, we waited impatiently for less wind, then plunged into the treacherous Carpentaria Straits anyway, getting whipped for our restlessness by a wildly pitching, shallow sea. Flushed out into the Gulf of Carpentaria’s heaving waves and 30-knot winds, we kick-started our biggest challenge of the trip: a non-stop, 330-nautical-mile, three day sail to get to the other side.
The steep, sideward’s swell demanded an exhausting, white-knuckled grip on the helm, and the seasickness that sailors swear never affects them, hit most of us pretty hard. We snatched sleep – fully clothed – in between tiresome stints on the helm, and grabbed whatever snacks came ready-made. Brown boobys took refuge on the boat rails overnight, leaving us at sunrise with a fish-strewn deck, until finally, we shouted ‘land ahoy’ as the NT’s Arnhem Land coast loomed into view.
Lonely and Loving it
We anchored in Gove Harbour and hitched again into town, climbing in with an Indigenous elder tackling his daily commute to Nhulunbuy’s university. He was giving visiting medical students an Indigenous orientation, and scooting along with one hand on the wheel, he showed me photos of his newest grandchild and talked about sailing and boats and the time he crewed to Indonesia with his wife and the seasickness that had her bent over the rails for three days. “Nothing like crossing the Gulf though,” he said. “That sea sure is mean.”
And so it was. None of the tricky passages that followed as we pushed west towards Darwin – the raging currents and pitching seas – came close to challenging us quite like the Gulf. Instead, our cruisy sail through the NT’s Arafura Sea had us tucking behind uninhabited islands and plucking unsuspecting barramundi off great sweeps of reef-fringed beach.
We wandered with great herds of goats on deserted North Goulburn Island and caught so much tuna we had to stop fishing when the freezer was full. Our isolation was complete: no boats, no people, no chatter on the VHF and no signal on the phone; nothing but the sea, our blissful surroundings and our growing self-reliance.
Cobourg’s Crocs
Conversations finally came at Garig Gunak Barlu National Park on the Cobourg Peninsula when our daughter befriended the ranger’s youngest child and the two became firm pals. Talking a-mile-a-minute after too long at sea, we relished the chats and cold beers, and bushwalked along Caiman Creek collecting cockle shells for the campfire.
The local ranger Robbie Risk took us hunting for mud crabs and roasted ‘long bums’ on the fire, which he assured us were excellent tucker but tasted overwhelmingly like mangrove mud. Afterwards, we shared our fish and sunset ales while tallying up the enormous crocodiles lying on the beach, and set sail again with one of Robbie’s hand-made spears onboard.
Before sailing off, we motored deep into Port Essington to explore the Victoria Ruins, relics of Northern Australia’s first and boldest white settlement until disease and isolation sent what was left of the pioneers packing. Accessible only by boat, the ruin’s lush, palm-fringed hiking trails were all our own, bar the enormous buffalo we surprised near the cemetery that ran like the wind when it finally caught our scent. We anchored off Adams Head and slept all night long, snug in sheltered waters that must surely have enticed those early settlers too.
Bright Lights, Big City
By now Darwin was firmly in our sights, and once we rounded the formidable Cape Don and its steep, pitching sea spat us out on the other side of the Vernon Islands, we discovered Darwin’s bright city lights ablaze.
Motoring close on our first windless night at sea, the sense of trepidation that precedes every adventurous journey’s end was palpable. We reached Darwin at midnight in an incongruous state, craving a slice of civilised life but knowing that after the first cold beer was drunk and the congratulations died down, the pleasure of the easy life would slip away, replaced by a creeping void that only the next adventure could fill.
All adventures are like that I believe. But one as big and long and thrilling as an ocean journey is incredibly difficult to beat. So with Indonesia on our horizons, this ‘across the top’ adventure may well be just the beginning.
* A version of this feature by Catherine Lawson and David Bristow first appeared in Yachting World.
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