the lay of the land

After dropping F at yet another 13th birthday party on a Saturday afternoon I went exploring. Not far from home, but driving down a road I haven’t been on before. I wanted to get to the other side of the river mouth. The wild-looking side. We’ve often  looked across from Bruns and wondered how to reach the foreign land of over there

I tried once before, by plunging down a dirt track through the forest. The track ended abruptly at a sort of overgrown carpark, with scruffy bush, a derelict building, a lot of  rusting machinery and lobster pots and car tyres; and murky mangrove-y water with rows of  oyster farming. 

Back home, D and I looked at a map and figured out that where the road ended was at one of the creeks  that feed into the river. You have to go right around, over the bridge... 

This time I got there. To the end of another rutted puddled dirt road, where I found the walking track, which led through the forest  and out to the river mouth. It wasn’t far. I walked along the breakwater  and saw a rainbow, and some silent, serious fishermen and imagined for a moment that  I was in Scotland. Or somewhere. I looked across to the familiar ( and somehow more cheerful) side. Then walked as far as I could - only a few hundred metres - along the little beach.  There were a few people pottering in boats around the mangroves, or sitting on the damp low-tide sand of the beach.   

 This fisherman’s vehicle in the car park at the end of the road reminded me it’s not all peace love and sustainability around here.