Wild-Life & Swan Diving

The city of Geraldton was supposed to be our last stop before returning to Perth. A short distance from the coast are the Abrolhos Islands and the wreck site of the famous 'Batavia.' I say famous but like with most Australian history, it's all too recent for us to really give a damn. The reason why this drew my attention was that although 125 people survived the wreck, 124 of them were killed by a maniac among them. So, I figured this sounded like a lovely place to see off the end of our second road trip. The only problem was, that against popular opinion, Australia does experience some form of winter, and it had swept in while we were in the Tropics. It was now far too cold to think about getting into the water.

We had no real interest in anything else Geraldton had to offer so talked ourselves out of an arctic night in the tent and drove back to Perth to the warm hospitality and home of Mike & Sue. We still had a couple of pre-booked days with the hire car left so decided to take a little trip out to Caversham Wildlife Park in the Swan Valley region west of Perth. I know it's cheating really, but the majority of wildlife we'd seen were road kill - we'd personally taken out a Thorny Devil and were witness to a Brown Snake losing getting flattened. We'd also seen roadsides littered with kangaroos in various states of decay, and let me tell you, "Skippy" didn't have much of a spring in his step anymore.

Most of the animals here weren't moving around any faster but it was nice to see all body parts where they should be and I'm sure everyone would like to give a wombat a stroke every now and again.

After we took the hire car back, Mike and Sue kindly offered us the use of Mike's Holden V6 Ute for the weekend - now we felt like true Australians. For the last three weeks of our 2nd road trip, I had moments of thinking about the wreck diving I had missed out on in Dunsborough. My cold had disappeared within a week of the new road trip, so there should've been anything stopping me next time. However, as sod's law dictates, suggestions of a cold began again the moment we started heading south. It was as if my body didn't want me to dive, or maybe my apprehension manifested itself as a weakness in my immune system. Whatever the cause was, I was determined to not let it beat me again. On the morning of the dive, I was still sniffing, but I reasoned the fact that if I could sniff (however, restricted) with both nostrils, then I would be able to equalise. The dive would go ahead.

Right up to the point of a few metres below the surface, I was unsure if I could continue, but my stubbornness to go on, putting the danger of losing my money over my hearing, was the ruling judgment. I held my nose, blew until the noise squeezing through my ears signaled their equalisation and felt relief from both pressure and doubt.

Just like watching the whale shark appear from out of the blue, the outlines of the bow came into view, and then lines began to gradually complete it's huge frame. Images from film footage of the Titanic flooded my mind as I swan over the handrails and stood on the deck. Bizarre sensations of not actually being underwater were quashed with every school of fish that swam by.

Approximately 15ft off the starboard, lay a Wobergong Shark watching our every flipper stroke. This was his territory and we only had a temporary pass. Best behaviour would be maintained or appropriate action would be taken.

The first dive was an orientation dive where the group stayed with the instructor but I was qualified to go where my will desired on the 2nd dive. This was to go inside, to penetrate it's hull and see the rooms and corridors where 250 naval men once walked. Along with 3 others of the same disposition, I swan through a hole on the deck where a gun emplacement once sat, and flew along passageways & up stairs to see various rooms. Some were obvious as to their function, as apparatus such radar machines spoke of their history, whilst others were left to imagination. We finished our tour with a stop in the bridge, and thought about controlling this ocean giant.

The Swan was scuttled for tourism in these waters in 1997. It was rigorously prepared for this and no one died in the process of it's sinking. And yet, death seemed to cover every wall. Ironic considering that it is the life of ocean which now thrives on these walls and only dead metal was there before. The eeriness of seeing this, and being inside it, was both overwhelming and exciting. It is a new angle to my diving and has rejuvenated my interest to unimaginable levels. I can now let the cold do whatever it likes; I've 'Swan' dived.

When we arrived back at Mike & Sue's house, I thought about what we had already seen of Australia and how far we'd traveled. The total amount for all road-trips was over 7500km. In roughly 6 weeks of being in the country we had driven more than the distance from New York to Rome (or 5.5x the length of Britain). We'd seen all types of both land & marine wildlife, swam with a few of them, and eaten a few more (emu, crocodile, and kangaroo.)

Except for the wonderful interludes of staying with Mike & Sue, we'd stayed in our trusty tent the whole time. My brother asked me if we worried about all the dangerous animals that roam Australia. In truth, it does cross your mind when walking around at night only wearing sandals, and we were always careful to make sure the zip of the tent was done up so as not to return to any unwelcome guests. But apart from that, we just put those horrible thoughts out of mind or at least didn't worry. We adopted an attitude of not letting our fears stand in the way of something we wanted to do. And to be honest, living in a tent isn't all that bad - they're actually quite spacious.