Of shipwrecks and hooped skirts
Ships have been linked to Australian history through an
umbilical cord. And so have been shipwrecks. Sail by the coasts
of Australia, and you are sure to find one or two submerged
hulks peeping out of the ocean surface. Sail by the North East
coast, and chances are you will join the host of submerged hulks
in the Great Barrier Reef, a magical stretch of ocean that has
brought down many. There are many enchanting and romantic tales
of such bravado, ill-fate, or sheer pig-headedness around such
wrecks. This is one such.
Early in 20th century, 1911 to be precise, Magnetic Island was a
rising centre of commerce. Doctor McCabe had a lavish paradise,
aptly named Arcadia, where his rich female friends and
acquaintances could visit. It was also the high time for
bloomers and hooped skirts. The windy bay was precarious to the
women's modesty and Doctor McCabe, a dentist by profession,
wanted to indulge the dignity of the women. He decided to
install a breakwater, thus softening the windy ambience so
threatening to his female friends. The idea was to tug along
Moltke, an 827 ton vessel that had seen better days, which had
ran aground on a reef at the northern end of Flinders Passage,
between Townsville and Cape Bowling Green. Our doctor brought in
a local bloke who claimed some expertise in explosives. They
attached the Moltke to a tugboat, planning to blow the
explosives on the Moltke when it was situated properly to act as
a breakwater for Arcadia's jetty, the prospective abode of our
modest ladies. Our explosive bloke lit the fuse a little bit too
soon, and seeing this tug-boat skipper cut the rope leaving
Moltke on its own. To make virtue out of a situation gone
hilariously wrong, the bloke and the doctor jump against an
impressive firework, and they survive to 'drill and fill another
day'. Moltke went straight in the wrong place, and in shallow
water. She did provide a sheltered anchorage for small crafts
for many years, although she was no use as a breakwater for
McCabe's jetty, and the merry citizens of Magnetic Island still
remember the day a dentist blew the Moltke away. Today, many
ferry services carry tourists to a concrete ramp only hundred
metres away from where the Moltke gloriously sank.
The stretches around the Great Barrier Reef is the graveyard of
many more such glorious wreckages. A little further away from
where Moltke sank, is the remains of another vessel called Maria
- but it is another nice tale to be told another day. Lieutenant
James Cook famously came along this route only, and discovered
an island continent. In his train he brought criminal inmates,
plundering gold prospectors, and today's tourists. They come,
they see, and they leave with enchanting tales of submerged
hulks peeping out of historical times, shaking hands with a
precarious present.
Magnetic Island lies off Townsville. It is well connected by
ferries from the mainland. Unless you plan to stay in Townsville
you may stay in nearby Cairns, Reef Palms which
provides vacation rental special offers with Cairns vacation
accommodation, Great Barrier
Reef trip and rainforest tour.