Disputed Sea - 3. Disp Ch 3

Later in the afternoon, Joshua had arranged for a limo to take us into the city, where we would be having dinner at a restaurant, where Joshua announced that we would be taking a tour of Kakadu National Park in the morning.
“How are we getting there?” I asked, “Flying of course, I have chartered an E120 twin prop plane to take us to Jabiru Airport, which will take just over an hour to do, and it is a 7 km drive to the town of Jabiru,” Joshua replied.

“Are we staying overnight?” I asked, “Longer, you will need to pack for at least 4 days, as we will be touring some of the sights of Kakadu,” James informed me. “I have a suspicion that you are not telling me everything about our trip to Kakadu,” I said to Josh, who laughed. “Yes, that’s true. Alliston Investments owns this hotel we are staying in now, as well as a new hotel at Kakadu, where we have also greatly invested in upgrades in infrastructure at Jabiru.

This includes a new and bigger hospital, with six specialist consulting and treatment rooms and a staff accommodation village, new sports stadiums at Brockman Oval and Magela Oval, including dressing rooms, meeting rooms, a restaurant, cafés, and lighting on both grounds for night sports events, plus an upgrade on the cricket oval, and new club rooms for the golf course.

Also, an upgrade on the skate park, and the town swimming pool, plus upgrades to the Police Station and living quarters, and the courthouse, plus additional buildings for the Jabiru campus of the University and a totally brand new shopping centre, to replace the aging basic shops the town has now, with this shopping centre having space for a supermarket, ten additional shops, including a café, newsagents, post office, hairdressers, takeaway restaurant, a clothes store, and a gift store, plus bathrooms, with three shops currently vacant.

Upstairs on the upper level, there are seven business suites, with each one having a reception area, an admin office, two offices, a conference room and a staff lounge and bathrooms. Currently, we have five of those office suites leased out, to an accountancy firm, a lawyer, a psychologist, and a dentist,” Joshua informed me. “What about the ongoing issue with booze, is that a problem in Jabiru?” I asked.

“Since Alliston Investments owns the shopping Centre, there is a strict no sale of alcohol on the premises, which includes the restaurant and the supermarket, and it is a part of the tenancy agreement within the shopping centre,” Joshua said to me. “I am very pleased to hear that,” I replied.

When we landed at Jabiru the next morning, it was extremely humid, as we stepped out of the plane, “Good morning Mr Alliston and Mr Ashburton, welcome to Jabiru and Kakadu National Park, the vehicle is just in the car park, ready to take you to your hotel,” a young man said as we approached the nearest building, and he led us through the building and to a waiting V-Class Mercedes Benz van. “Wow travelling in style in the bush,” I commented, and Joshua chuckled at this, as we climbed into the luxury leather seats, and the driver loaded up our luggage.

“Was that our hotel, the tallest one that I saw as we came into land?” I asked Josh, “Yes, and it is only three storeys high, with the Crocodile Hotel being the second highest. Although Alliston Investments officially owns the hotel, it is partly owned by the local West Arnhem community, who have a 25% ownership of the hotel,” Joshua announced.

“That is very generous of you, how did your grandfather like that?” I replied, “He was not happy at first, but I insisted on it because it is their land that we built the hotel on,” Josh replied. When we arrived at the hotel, once again, Josh signed the register and we were taken up to the top floor, where there are just four executive suites, with a covered rooftop area that includes a lap pool and spa pool, a Cocktail Bar, a BBQ, and plenty of sunbathing lounges.

Once we had settled in, we changed and headed for the roof pool, which Joshua informs me is only for those in the top floor suites only, and since we are the only ones on the top floor, the area was all ours. Lunch was served to us on the patio, and we relaxed for another hour afterwards, sunbaking and swimming.

In the late afternoon, we were driven 56 kilometres down the road to Coolina, where the Yellow Waters Tours depart from, for a two-hour cruise on the Kakadu Wetlands, and wow, it was an amazing experience, cruising through the waters, seeing different birds, as well as water buffalo and plenty of crocodiles. Once we had returned to Coolina, we were driven south for fifteen minutes to Patonga Community Homestead, to experience a 4-course bush tucker dinner, which was amazing.

Once back at our suite at the hotel, we retired early to bed, after an enjoyable afternoon and evening, as Joshua had more plans for us for the next day. The following morning, we had breakfast downstairs in the hotel's main restaurant, where there are only a few other guests, and while eating I noticed a young man who was seated with a slightly older man looking in my direction, and when he saw me looking, he smiled and looked away, and began chatting to his companion.

“I wonder what that is all about?” I said more to myself than to Joshua, “Maybe he has the hots for you, but be warned if I get jealous… I am not to blame for my actions,” Joshua replied, and I chuckled at this, knowing that he won’t do anything drastic or harmful to anyone.

“Looks to me that they are a couple, and I have this strange feeling that I have seen the older one before somewhere, but I am not sure where,” I said to Joshua. Just as we were finishing our breakfast, I saw the two men stand and approach our table. “Excuse us gentlemen, I just wanted to ask if you sir happen to be part of the Lloyd Family Corporation?” the older of the two asked Joshua.

I glanced at Josh smiling, “Yes, my grandfather is Hamysh Lloyd, and you are?” Josh replied as he stood up, “Oh, I am sorry, my name is Alexander Devonport, or Xander to my friends, and this is my partner in crime and life – Langley Atkins,” came the reply and we smiled. “That is what I say when I introduce my partner in Crime and Life – Kipling Ashburton,” Josh responded, and we all laughed about this as we shook hands.

“Devonport, I think I have heard about you before! Are you related to that Swiss businessman who is often in Western Australia?” I asked, “Yes, Sebastian is my 1^st cousin once removed, his grandmother and my great-grandmother were sisters,” Xander explained as Joshua indicated for them to join us at our table.

“Are you here on holiday?” Langley asked us, “Partly holiday and partly work, my company owns this new hotel, and we did some work to improve some of the facilities in this town now that the mine is no longer in operation. The company also owns a new hotel on the northern outskirts of Darwin, and we have a major project currently in progress, as well,” Joshua replied.

“I see, and yes, we know about the new hotel in Darwin, we were staying there last week, but only for a few days, as we had to make room for a special conference of some kind,” Xander responded, “Yes, I am sorry about that, I had to clear the hotel because of a special two-day conference, I would be happy to allow you to have use of one of the family executive suites on the top floor for a few days as compensation for having to leave early,” Joshua said.

“That is mighty generous of you, thank you, Joshua, we will be here for another few days before returning to Darwin, can you make the booking for Monday through to Thursday next week please,” Xander replied, and Josh said that he was happy to arrange that, before saying that we must go now, as we have some business to attend to, so we said goodbye and headed back to our suite.

“What business do we have to attend to?” I asked once back in the privacy of our suite, “Personal time business of course,” Joshua replied, and I laughed, “What else do you have planned for us?” I added, “Well, we do need to start monitoring things up in the South China Sea, as mentioned at the conference, we will be doing a three-hour test run of the 15^th parallel section of our barrier net today,” Joshua reminded me.

“How is that being monitored again?” I asked, “The Aquaria is currently the lead vessel for this project, and they will be handling the sensors and monitoring the ocean traffic in the area, and we will be watching it all on the television screen, in here, with my laptop computer providing the video conference linkup with the Aquaria” Joshua replied as he walked over to the suite phone.

“Hello, this is Joshua Alliston, we are not to be disturbed for the next four hours, that means no phone calls or staff interruptions, do you understand me?” Joshua said to the receptionist, before ending the call. A few minutes later, Josh had his laptop connected to the large-screen television, and we were soon connected to the Aquaria, where Joshua’s stepfather – Daniel is in command 40 minutes later the net was activated, and it didn’t take long for the first offending Chinese military ship to get snagged by the net.

The ship’s major systems had been disabled, including all weaponry systems, leaving just enough power to allow the ship to continue sailing out of the region with minimal navigations and communications systems working, as it headed north back to mainland China. All communications have been monitored and with the assistance of a few translators, we were told what was being said onboard the partly disabled warship.

At the end of the three-hour test of the new system, Joshua, his grandfather and his stepfather had a debrief about the test run, which had resulted in two Chinese warships and one Chinese supply ship being affected by the test, and all other ships and vessels were unharmed, which meant the test was a total success, and the agreed notification was sent to the private offices of the leaders of the six nations who had attended the conference earlier.

“Perfect Fishing Trip, two big fish and one small fish caught… Do we continue with the next one?” and within the next four hours, we received a ‘Yes’ reply from all six nations. Later that evening on the nationwide news…