Indian Ocean Invasion - 23. IOI Chapter 23

“Might be hard to drive if it is gift wrapped, would you like to take it for a test drive now?” Paul asked as he lead the way towards the main building where he retrieved the keys for the SUV car, and once Paul had driven it out of the display lot, after unlocking the gates, he let me take over driving, and we went through town for about twenty minutes, before returning to the car dealership.

The vehicle already had roof bars, a tow hitch, front bumpers, fog lights and side steps, so it had everything that I needed, and the vehicle drives very well, so I told Paul that I was interested in buying this vehicle. What surprised me, was that he said that he could do the paper work with me now, and I can collect the vehicle in the morning.

The problem was that I did not have a residential address yet, so while Paul was getting the paperwork organised, I gave the twins a quick call, and explained the situation. Joachim suggested that I put care of the post office at Kalbarri, and that I can change it to a more permanent address when a good place has been found.

Paul said that it would be fine to have the post office as a temporary address for now, and I filled in all my personal details, presented my driver’s licence, which was Western Australian, with my Chagos Archipelago address, as I have not had a chance to change it, because I have been overseas.

When I explained this to Paul, he seemed happy with it, and once he had filled in everything that he needed to do, I handed over the credit card, to pay for the vehicle, letting him know that I was staying at the hotel across the road. With the transaction finalised, I was handed my copies of the paperwork, and we set a time of 10am to collect the vehicle in the morning.

Happy with my vehicle purchase, I went up to my suite, and I prepared for bed, as it had been quite a busy day, and I slept very soundly, even being in a strange bed, which is surprising for me. The following morning, after a bit of a sleep in, I packed my overnight bag, and headed downstairs to check out of my suite, before having some breakfast in the dining room.

At 10am exactly I arrived at the dealership, where my new vehicle had been freshly washed, and Paul was waiting in the reception area for my arrival. “Good morning sir, did you have a good rest?” he asked me as I approached, “Yes thanks, all ready for my two-hour journey back home, after I’ve done some shopping” I replied. Five minutes later, I had the keys for my new vehicle and I drove out of the dealership.

Less than ten minutes later, I pulled up in the carpark of the local boating and camping store, on the main highway just north of the centre of town. When I exited the store about forty minutes later, I had a car fridge/freezer, a Pro Fisher Kayak, with PFD vest, comfy seat and double paddle, a roof rack and straps, kayak straps, a side vehicle awning, a king singe swag, with self-inflating mattress, and a sleeping bag.

Once I had fitted the roof rack onto the vehicle, I put the kayak on the rack and strapped it down, then I attached the awning to the side of the roof rack on the passenger side, and the paddle, PFD vest, sleeping bag and swag were stowed away in the back of the vehicle, while the fridge was strapped into a back seat, and plugged into one of the power sockets.

Happy with all of my new purchases, I stopped at the service station to fill up the fuel tank, before beginning the journey north west to Kalbarri, arriving shortly after 2pm, and I went straight back to the apartment, where I changed and went for a walk to find a snack to eat, before heading to bed for a short nap, as I was tired from all the driving.

I woke up to the sound of my mobile ringing, and sleepily I answered it. “Hello, is that Mr Shaw?” the caller asked, “Yes, I am he, how can I help you?” I replied, Mr Shaw, this is Ms Davies, I am the executive assistant to the Minister of Environment, I am sorry to inform you, that the minister himself does not approve of having a tall ship stuck in a creek bed, and he has given you 14 days to have the tall ship removed from its current position” the caller said to me.

“Very well, thank you for letting me know”, I said before ending the call. I called Sebastian, knowing that it was sometime in the later morning in Europe, to let him know of the situation, and I mentioned the idea of finding a block of land in town, and placing the tall ship on the property, and he thought it was a brilliant idea.

Seeing that it was 4.30pm, I quickly changed and dashed out the door of the apartment, and walked down the street, to where the two Real Estate agents are located, and I glanced at the window listings of the first office, before entering.

“Good afternoon, I would like to purchase some properties that you have listed” I said as I approached the reception counter, and a gentleman appeared from a back office, before the receptionist had a chance to respond. “Hello, I am the Principal Real Estate Manager, which properties are you interested in sir?” the man said to me as he stuck out his hand.

When I stated that I was interested in purchasing all 6 of the Riverfront Budget cottages on Grey street, and the land immediately behind it, that fronts onto Hackney street, the real estate agent’s eyes widen dramatically, and he became more eager when I informed him that I was willing to pay 10% above the valued cost of the properties, if it was taken off the market immediately, and sold to me.

By 5.45pm that afternoon, I had secured the purchase of the holiday units, plus the property behind it, with the holiday units currently booked for the next three weeks, due to holidays.

All other bookings would be cancelled, and refunds given to those who had booked a month or more ahead. When I arrived back at the apartment, I telephone Sebastian to let him know of the purchases, and that in the morning, he would submit permission to demolish the 6 holiday cabins, keeping the existing shady trees, and build 12 modern holiday units, on the back block of land which has virtually no trees on it, making it possible to build bigger units, more suitable for families.

After the call to Sebastian, I called Joachim and Louis, and mentioned the same to them about the purchases, and my ideas of what to do with the land. Once the six cottages are demolished, I planned to move the tall ship into position in the centre of the front part of the property, between all the shady trees, although this was going to be a bit of a logistics nightmare, with having to move the tall ship to the new property.

Although, there was one major problem with the height of the masts of the ship and power supply pole scattered around town. Removing the two masts and all the rest, would take a lot more, than the twelve days allotted to remove the ship from the creek, but I decided to have some discussions with the local council, to see if we can come up with a better solution to the problem.

The following morning, after a quick breakfast, and the clock now counting down for the removal of the tall ship, I headed over to the local council office, to see if we could come up with an amicable solution. Just as I was arriving at the office, my telephone rang, with a local number calling, so I answered it.

“G’day, is this Mr Shaw, the guy who came to see me the other day about buying our property on Red Bluff Beach Road” the caller asked, “Yes speaking, have you come to a decision?” I responded, “Yes, we don’t want to sell the whole property to you, but we are willing to sell the front half of the property, which is approximately 8 acres in area, would that be acceptable to you?” the caller asked.

“Yes sir, on the condition that you give us approval to place the tall ship, on that piece of land as a tourist attraction and accommodation for guests” I replied, “…well, I didn’t expect that, I was wondering what was going to happen to that monstrosity, I am not sure… I would have to consider it and let you know, once I have discussed it with my family” the caller responded.

“Very well, but do it fast, as I have other options that I am considering, bye” I said and ended the call, before entering the council building. Ten minutes later, I was in the small conference room, with one council staff member, commencing a teleconference call with the Planning manager of the shire council, who is base in Northampton, and after half an hour of deliberations, I could see that we were not progressing very well, and I was getting very frustrated.

“Ok… can I make a suggestion, how about we call a public meeting of Kalbarri residents, to see what their views are about the tall ship, and maybe we can get some ideas from them on what to do with it?” I said to the planning manager. “Ok, I will go with that, I will leave it up to the Kalbarri office to organise it, at a time that suites me, so that I can attend, goodbye for now Mr Shaw” the Planning manager said before ending the call.

The Council staff member had a bookings calendar for the planning manager, and together we looked at the best possible times for the community meeting, and came up with 6pm the following Tuesday, at the local football club function room, which would be two days before the next full council meeting.

Once this was agreed on, I left the council office and decided to have a bit of a drive around the town, trying to find some solutions to the problem, which wouldn’t involve moving or disconnecting main power lines around town, and would be acceptable to the local council.

I was getting tired of driving around the town looking at any way to resolve this problem, but the issue of the power lines kept on coming up as the main issue. It wasn’t till I started to drive back towards town,beside the riverbank, that a possible solution appeared in front of me, and I pulled over to the side of the road and stepped out of my vehicle.

I was standing at the corner of a T junction, of Grey Street and Cotworthy Street, with the main yacht and boat anchorage less than 75 metres away. The first jetty at the anchorage, has a solid sealed area, and the road to Cotworthy street was free of any power lines crossing over the street.

On that particular street, there are two vacant plots of land, with the front one being perfect for the tall ship and the second could be used for additional accommodation and parking, I smiled as this idea started to develop in my head, and I decided to take a drive into Northampton, to the main Council building, to see if I could get hold of a copy of the town plan of Kalbarri, so I could start to formulate my idea into a presentation ready for the community meeting.

Heading back to the apartment, I packed another overnight bag, and headed for Northampton, then back down to Geraldton, booking into the same hotel that I stayed in before.

During the drive, to Northampton, using hands free, I called Louis and Joachim, and ran the idea past them, and they thought that my idea had potential to be beneficial to the Kalbarri community and to Wagner Family Corp, and I asked the twins to purchase a few items that I needed before the community meeting, which they agreed to come and attend as spectators, preferring for me to take more control of the project.

Failing to get the required town plan of Kalbarri, I had a quick bite to eat, before I headed south to Geraldton, where I hoped to have better luck, as there is a Landcorp office there, which provides maps for everything. Arriving in the middle of the afternoon, I checked into the hotel first, before heading to the Landcorp office, where I was able to get an up to date town plan of Kalbarri.

From a stationary store, I was able to buy still clear film, to cover over the town plan, so I could draw ideas over the town plan. Next, I went to a town planning firm, and managed to get an immediate appointment with the company director, and I sat down with him in the conference room, with the Kalbarri Town Plan that I had obtained.

After explaining the situation with the purchase of the stranded tall ship, and the deadline given by the state government to have it removed, I said that I was interested in making the tall ship a major tourist attraction, in the town of Kalbarri, but the location was difficult, because of power lines causing issues with transporting the ship into town.

The Director of the firm stopped me for a moment, and ducked out of the conference room, and called two other staff to join us, and once again I explained the situation to the new arrivals, before I started running the idea of having the tall ship lifted out of the creek by crane, and put into the water, with a skeleton crew, and using the ships small engine, to sail the sip up the coast and through the Murchison river mouth.

Moving upstream to just past the main yacht anchorage, where there are no power lines, we could then use the crane once more to lift it out of the water and transport it on the back of a low flat top truck & trailer, to the block of land on the corner of Grey and Cotworthy streets.

I also suggested that if the company that I work for is permitted to have the tall ship permanently on this land, that we would donate the recently purchased land, where the 6 budget cabins are located on Grey street, to create a shaded community park, and as a bonus, we would build a permanent semi-shaded grandstand, on the opposite side to the clubrooms, and possibly build an extension to the west side and back ofthe existing Football Club rooms.

This new grandstand will have 12 rows of 42 seats for a total of 504 spectator seats, including two sets of players changerooms and bathrooms, two sets of officials changerooms and bathrooms, and public bathrooms at each end, plus two large rear access sports equipment stores.

I suggested that the grandstand have 6 lots of aisles, after every 7 seats, with stairs and ramps at each end, and the front row have an extra wide access space, to allow easy access to all seats, with two seats at each end removed to allow wheelchair space, and that a curved roof cover the back half of the stadium from rain.

If approved, I suggested that we build a sheltered walkway above the two ramps, and maybe as an addition, the council may like to add a public swimming pool to the back of the grandstand.