The generosity of strangers is absolutely amazing. After making the decision to run to land after yet another lashing at the hands of Mother Nature we beached on this beautiful sand beach at 9.30 am between rocky oyster leases. Again no footprints and little evidence of human presence except for the glimpse of a house a few kilometres down the beach. We found a camp site on top of the sand dunes in amongst the trees and set about monitoring the wind to see if it would drop away so we could progress – by 3pm we knew we were going to be staying the night. At about 4pm we saw a small 4×4 head up the beach, we flagged them down on their return run. We met Peter Ward and his 19 year old son Caden. They were somewhat surprised to see me pop out of the dunes to greet them, we were on private property and really were not supposed to be there. We spoke with Peter briefly and explained what we were doing – five minutes later we were drinking our first beer in seven days, ten minutes later we were drinking our second beer in seven days. Caden had had a great day fishing and 30 minutes later he had given us a sack full of black bream for our dinner. Peter is close friends with the owners of the property. What a greeting! Two hours later when we were about to start cooking Cadens fish we heard a vehicle, Peter had bought back Fred the owner of the property and two eskis full of beer, five beers later, lots of great conversation we headed back into the dunes with laughter and wobbly legs and an invitation to breakfast and a shower the next morning.
The next morning we showered( awesome because we stank), and dined on the best home made rissoles, bacon and eggs in the world. Evoyn and Fred Burns are the wonderful people who treated two castaway trespassers with such generosity it is hard to imagine you could find better people anywhere.
Due to the ongoing awful weather and only being ten kilometres from Stanage Peter loaded all of our equipment and drove us through to town where we are sitting comfortably in a rented house getting reprovissioned and prepared to head off Sunday morning for another five days of remote paddling.
We have made firm friends for life and will pass forward the great kindnesses shown to us to others whenever the opportunity arrives. Caden – you rock mate, we cannot thank you enough.DT
redwinekayaks 