Deception - 12. Dec Chapter 12

After a late breakfast on Saturday, Tom and I drove up to the township of Louth Bay, a twenty - minute drive to the north, where I had chartered a boat for the day, yesterday after work, I had gone to the local hardware store, to get supplies.

At the hardware store, I purchased some more steel pickets and a second hammer, which I loaded onto the boat, along with an esky of drinks and snacks, plus the kit bag of abseiling gear, and we made the 5 -kilometre journey to the island. Once there, we headed up to the hole of the main cavern, were we marked the edges of the ten-metre wide hole.

Once we had done that, we searched for and located the other three holes that circle the main cavern and marked all of them as well. I thought that it would be a good idea to do a thorough search of the island to check to see if there were any more holes. Starting from the southern end, and walking five metres apart, we walked towards the buildings one kilometre away, after four runs, we had covered 60 metres in width for the 1-kilometre distance.

We stopped at the shed for a late lunch break, as we had been walking for nearly two hours, we had not found any more holes so far, and we decided to do two more runs to end the day, this time we started from the western side of the island, and when we had finally returned to the sheds, with no more holes found, we loaded everything back onto the boat, and made our way back to Louth Bay.

By the time that we arrived home, we were both exhausted, so we had a light dinner and went to bed early, the next day I began researching online for buying a boat for myself, so as to be able to go over to the island at any time, the trouble was, I couldn’t see anything that would be best suited, until I accidentally came across a 2^nd hand barge for sale.

At 20 metres long and 6 metres wide, with a 1.4 metre draft, I thought that this might be the ideal vessel to use to transport the dismantled sheds and yards, and after a brief chat to Lucas by telephone, I decided to make an offer to buy the vessel. Even though it was a Sunday, I was able to contact a local building company, to enquire about having the sheds, yards and tanks dismantled from Louth Island, transported the mainland and sold as scrap wood and metal.

By the time that Tom had woken up mid-morning, I had most of the plans set and as Tom ate his breakfast, I explained what I had achieved while he was sleeping. We spent the day, just relaxing after yesterday’s long walks, and later in the afternoon, I had a call back from Lucas, informing me that he had been in contact with the owners of the barge, and they had accepted the offered price, including transporting the barge to Louth Bay.

As the start of another week began, Tom went to school each day and I spent most of this week, visiting different research monitoring sites, around the Lincoln National Park. On Thursday afternoon, soon after I arrived home, I received a call informing me that the barge had safely arrived at Louth Bay. Looking at the local newspaper, which is published Tuesdays and Thursdays each week, I was amused to see the headlines.

“Port Lincoln mayor denies that his plans for Boston Island will be disastrous” and I sat down to read the article below, “As most residents in the region are aware, the current and long-term mayor of Port Lincoln, purchased Boston Island and had it zoned for residential and tourism accommodation, but since then nothing has happened, after a state environmental study deemed the plan not suitable, and recommended a revised plan for the island.

The Mayor stated that he was reviewing his thoughts for the island, and even suggested that if a good offer was received, he would sell the island”, I smiled when I read the last bit of the article, and put the paper to one side, so it wouldn’t be thrown out. During dinner, I asked Tom, if he wanted to join me on camping trip to Louth Island, to do some more searching for more holes, and to explore any hidden caves and tunnels that have not yet been found.

Tom said he was happy to come, as he enjoyed exploring the island, and he was looking forward to spending more time checking out the caves. That evening we planned what we needed to take with us, and packed it all into the vehicle, so we are ready to go, straight after work tomorrow, as we would drive straight up to Louth Bay, drive the car onto the barge and sail over to the island.

Even though we would not be able to get the car up to the top of the island, we could still drive along the 400-metre long eastern beach, or the 650-metre long western beach. On Friday afternoon, as soon as I finished work at 3pm, I collected Tom from school, and after a quick change, we headed north to Louth Bay. I had called the boat charter company earlier in the week, to arrange for the diesel engine of the barge to be serviced and fueled ready to go, when we arrive on Friday afternoon.

Arriving just before 4pm, the barge was at the boat ramp, with the ramp down, so we were able to drive straight onto the barge, and twenty minutes later we arrived at the eastern beach, where we set the anchors into the sand to make sure the barge doesn’t drift away and drove the car onto the beach.

We set up a campsite between the slope upwards and the car, we found plenty of drift wood around to make a camp fire and began preparing our BBQ dinner. I had two skies this time, one with meat and dairy, and the other with drinks and salads, and we enjoyed a fireside dinner, and we talked about what we could do with the caves, with Tom suggesting that we cover the holes with skylights, to stop people and animals falling in, but still let sunlight in, which I thought was a brilliant idea.

It was a very mild evening, as we settled into our swags, the sky was clear, and we could see lots of stars, which was great to see, and Tom soon fell asleep. The following morning, I woke up to the sound of the small waves on the beach and the sound of sea birds, there was a slight breeze and I smiled as I stretched and listened to my surroundings.

After taking a leak, and washing my hands in the water, I got the fire going again and started cooking some breakfast, and Tom woke up soon after. Once we had eaten and cleaned up, we carried more steel pickets, the hammers and the kit bag up to the top, and we resumed our search the southern area of the island.

After two runs, starting from where we ended last week, we found no more holes, and we stopped at the sheds to rest and to have a drink, before we continued. After another 4 runs, we stopped to have some lunch down on the beach. Soon after lunch, my mobile rang, and it was Jack Masters from the building company, who informed me that a job they had organized at Louth Bay had been rescheduled, and they were wondering if I was free to show them what needs to be dismantled on the island.

I gave a short laugh, “Actually I am on the island right now, just be at the boat harbor in half an hour and we will collect you” I said and hung up the phone, before telling Tom that we had to make a trip back to Louth Bay, and I suggested that we get some more ice for the esky and a few more supplies.

We left almost straight away, leaving the car and camp site as is, and we arrived at Louth Bay twenty minutes later, and we walked to the nearby general store to buy some fruit, more ice and some soft drinks. When we arrived back at the boat ramp, I saw a Toyota Ute waiting, and three men standing nearby, “Hello Jack, nice to meet you face to face” I said as I approached the eldest of the men and shook his hand, as I took this opportunity to study him a bit more. “Tall, dark and handsome, and about ten years older than me, very nice” I thought to myself.

“Same here Mr. Langton, now where is your boat” he replied to me, “Just call me Gres, and it is the barge right in front of you, I took my vehicle over there, as my ward and I are camping there over the weekend” I replied to him. “That’s perfect, if you don’t mind waiting a little longer, we will go and get some supplies and join you, as my son’s Amos and Lloyd here, and I also have our swags with us” Jack said, and I said it would be fine. About half an hour later Jack and his sons returned, and the Toyota was driven onto the barge, and we set off to the island.

Arriving twenty minutes later. Once the anchors were set and the Toyota was driven off, Tom and I walked up to the top, and we went to the sheds to take a last look at them before it is pulled down. When Jack and his 2 sons appeared, I let them know that there are a lot of hidden deep limestone holes on the island, and not to go wandering around, and to stick to the track from the beach to the sheds. As Jack and his son’s, began work on dismantling, Tom and I resumed our search for anymore holes on the southern end of the island.

When we reached the shed at the end of our second round, Jack approached us, “What on earth are you two up to?” Jack asked, I smiled be answering him, “Well that warning that I gave you earlier, is why Tom and I are looking for and marking any holes that we find, we are doing a slow grid search, as you see there are two pegs here, two half ways down and two down the other end of the island, which we use as a guide.

Once finished we mark the next section, and keep going on” I explained, before Tom and I resumed our search. Moments later we were joined by Jack and his boys, and I stopped, “If you are joining the line, its five metres apart, and always keep your eyes on the ground, and shout stop if you find a hole” I said, before I started again, once we were in a straight line evenly spaced covering 30 metres.

When we returned to the sheds, we had covered 60 metres, which was almost as much as Tom and I had covered in two days, with 110 metres now covered, which is a little under ¼ of the southern section searched. We stopped for a short break, before we resumed our walk, and about half way down we reached a steel marker, that showed the location of one of the outer holes to the main cavern.

I showed Jack and his sons the edge of the hole, which we are looking for, and cautiously they glanced down to darkness, before continuing and coming up to a second marker soon after, which we walked around, and we came across the last hole marked on the return journey, and we stopped at the shed for a short rest, before doing another two runs.

We ended up doing four runs, and we had covered over ¾’s of the south end of the island, as it got late in the afternoon, I announced that it was time to stop for the day, and Tom and I headed down to the beach, while Jack and his sons spent an hour working on the shed before they came down, where I had the fire going well, and I was preparing our dinner.

The fire was about 5 metres away from the back of our vehicle, and Jack parked his Ute about 5 metres further down, in line with my vehicle. While we sat around the fire chatting and eating dinner, I gave a short rundown about Tom and myself. We learnt that Jack is a widower of four years, and that his sons both left school after completing year 10, to work for their father with Amos now being 19 and Lloyd being 17 years old.

After cleaning up after dinner, Tom decided to go to bed, as he was very tired, and Jack’s boys did the same, while Jack and I just chatted around the fire for a while. “So, I guess that you are the mystery owner of this and Grantham Islands” Jack said, and I just nodded my head, “I have a friend who is on the city council, I heard that the mayor had a fit when he read the article in the paper, when you bought the islands” Jack said, and I laughed, before I asked that the ownership of the island be kept secret from anyone and everyone.

“So, by the way you were checking me out, that you are gay or bi? Jack asked me in a neutral tone, I was shocked at what Jack said to me and at first, I didn’t know how to answer him, eventually I sighed loudly. “Yes, I am gay, but you are the first person that I have admitted it to, I’m sorry if I offended you in any way” I said quietly, not sure now if Jack and his boys would continue working on the island.

“I am not offended, but more honoured that you chose me to be the first, to admit that your gay, and I am supportive of LGBTQ rights, as one of my high school friends was gay, and I saw all the crap that he went through, when word got out that he was gay” Jack said to me. I didn’t know what else to say, so I said good night and I retired for the night.

The next morning Jack and his sons were up and gone before I woke up, and I got the fire started and cooked breakfast for Tom and myself. Once we had cleaned up, we walked up to the top, and found that work had progressed a lot, and I waved to them as Tom and I started another run to the bottom of the island and back. “Can we come back to the island next weekend” Jack asked as we approached, “Yes, sure that is fine, we will be driving up on Friday afternoon, leaving at about 4pm” I replied, and Tom and I headed down to the camp to relax for a while.

“Well we have covered most of the southern section of the island, and we have found no more surprise holes, I am thinking that maybe we should cheat a bit, and check a satellite map, and just check areas that look like there might be a hole, as we will be up there forever searching every metre of the ground” I said to Tom as we sat down on our swags.