Angeles and on to Sydney where, during a 7-hour layover, I call an
Australian journalist friend who gives me the name of one of his con-
tacts, Jeremy Tager, head of the North Queensland Conservation
Council. I catch the next flight heading up to Cairns in Australia’s
“Deep North,” a land of rain forest and reef that juts up into the soft
underbelly of Papau New Guinea.
In Cairns I rent a car and drive south on the two-lane Bruce
Highway heading toward Townsville halfway down the length of the
1,200-mile-long Great Barrier Reef, passing through verdant green val-
leys and fields of sugar cane. Thirty hours into my trip I arrive at
Mission Beach, putting up at The Horizon, a lovely spot with a wooden
pool deck overlooking Dunk Island. I have a drink at their outdoor bar,
trying to ignore Georgina, the mean-looking pheasant sitting on the
chair next to me. I drive down to the beach for dinner and spot a 3-foot
wallaby hopping through my headlight beams on the way back.
That night I finally get some sleep, despite the surrounding jungle
sounds, which include the scuttle of large lizards and a loud white
cockatoo screeching in the tree next to my bungalow. In the morning I
hike down to an eroded beach with a river outlet and a wooden sign:
“Warning: Esturine crocodiles inhabit this river.” As naturalist author
Edward Abbey said, “If there’s not something bigger and meaner than
you are out there, it’s not really a wilderness.”
A few hours later, I pull into Townsville, a waterfront city of
120,000 that bills itself as the capital of the Great Barrier Reef (even
though Cairns took away most of its tourists years ago when it opened
its big airport). Townsville is trying to make a comeback with a new
IMAX theater, reef aquarium, and casino, but also hedging its bet with
a zinc-processing plant, army base, and government offices including
the Barrier Reef Park Authority and Australia Institute of Marine
Sciences (AIMS). I call Tager, who then invites me over to his island
home, a half-hour ferry ride from Townsville. He greets me on the
dock, where he quickly fulfills his duties as a professional activist by
briefing me on some of the environmental issues that threaten the
world’s greatest marine park.
“There’s bottom trawling by commercial fishing boats still allowed
in the park, also nutrient run-off from the sugar industry, forest clear-
130 David Helvarg