Win a prize!

Captains Log - 0015/ 30th June 2024 / 0700hrs

It has taken me a little bit of courage to offer this prize….the details are spelt out a little later on…..

What a most excellent week it has been at The Ship - Bay of Fires.

The shortest day cast it’s shadows over the ocean and the forest with pastels of red, blue, white, grey, green, black and all in between. The air washed over the waves from the Southern Ocean keeping the climate balanced with sky water (and our tanks full). For the rest of the week the days have been still, low sun warm and inviting - black cockatoos, kookaburras, parrots, pelicans, robins and a couple of currawongs (cheeky buggers) all visit during the day (along with a few other birds that I have not bothered to look up names for yet). The dam in front of The Ship is a local tavern for the birds. Most mornings the First Mate and I have our coffee on the front deck overlooking the ocean as the sun rises through the towering peppermint gums with the mist rising from Grants Lagoon before a silver and blue Tasman Sea and New Zealand somewhere in the distance.

There is not one deciduous tree in sight. Everything is green. Native white flowers are everywhere (I have a book of names, but I haven’t reached that level yet - just admiring). Wattles (I know that one!) have yellow throughout the forest. Tall grass stand majestic in between the ancient towering peppermint and white gums. Old trees that have passed feed the soil and create microcosms of landscapes with fungi, ancient colonies of ants (they bite I am told, but they seem happy enough), new growth of banksias (know that one too!) and bonsai youngsters of the bigger trees.

Mixed in with the life are the remains of wind gusts and aging of trees with bone dry branches (some thicker than my legs) as testament to power of the winds that come with living on an island at the bottom of the planet. Which of course is the source of our heating mixed with twigs, bark and a little paper for our heater that sits in our lounge room and kitchen behind double glazed windows - it is not uncommon to fall asleep in front of a good series of fiction (or the USA Presidential Debate - more on this later) deep in the recliner with track suit pants and the ever present flannelette shirt. Is there anything more satisfying than good food, wood heated space, comfortable chair and winter in Tasmania (summer and the ocean comes to mind, but at the moment, this will do!).

We have a place on our property called “Jamie’s” chair. Next door to us is the “Bay of Fires Bush Retreat”. I always seem to forget what they are called and sometimes call them the Bay of Fires Eco resort or the Bay of Fires Glamping or other variations….to save me having to retain the real name (which is “Bay of Fires Bush Retreat” - google them, they are awesome - Getaway did a program on them) I have taken to simply calling it “Tent City”. Jamie is the manager of the place. It is not unusual at least one day a week for Jamie to pop over for an ale on the deck and usually a plate of whatever we have cooked up. The track between us and them is about one hundred and fifty meters long through the bush, there are no fences, but there is a sign at the start of their end of the track that says “Private Property” although some of the letters have fallen off. Jamie told us that from time to time he wanders up that track to have some space before the next bunch of tent dwelling tourists come in for their stay. One day whilst at the Tip Shop at St Helen’s I found an old wooden chair ($2.00 baby!) and plonked it at a spot on the track for Jamie’s “space time”. Over the last few months I have made this location my firewood not requiring a chainsaw collection location. I wander up there with my red wheelbarrow and spend some time collecting strategic sizes of wood for ease of fire starting. It usually takes about ten minutes. The other day however I ended up there for over two hours and transformed Jamie’s Chair into a native garden.

This will continue to evolve - maybe an outdoor bath if Jamie get’s his way.

I had a phone call during the week. The days of phone calls about ships and geopolitics and KPI’s and budgets are a thing of the past that I am getting very used too. So, phone calls are different these days. This one came from the owner of “Easy Tiger Brewery” in St Helens. The same place Debi and I had our little live appearance in at an open mike session one Sunday. I was asked if I would be available to help out at The Festival of Voices gig on Saturday (yesterday) as the fella that was going to do it broke his ankle (probably on a mountain bike track!). Sure - no worries. About an hour later i had a call with the Festival person with a title I have forgotten (sorry) and I was enlisted to be the scanner of tickets for entry to The Wolfe Brothers, pub singalong sold out to 368 people. I asked if they needed any more help and the First Mate was enlisted as well. Oh, and there was a free Festival of Voices beanie up for grabs for each of us - we were in!

Now if you haven’t read previous “logs” then you don’t know that me on the other side of QR tickets to be scanned have not gone smoothly recently (see Captains Log 0013). It is a completely different story when you have to be on point to get 368 people into a venue. Armed with a non i phone device (Android - sigh) with a program that scans the screens or crumbled up QR codes on printed paper we donned our new beanies and stood in layers of “standing outside in winter Tasmania clothing” and along with some other volunteers stood sentinel at the gap in the fence that directed you to the venue.

I couldn’t help myself. My greetings were mixed with what in any suburban setting with more than ten buildings would probably have me sued with inappropriate behavior. But here on the East Coast they still have a sense of humour and with this knowledge I was explaining to those whose phone had the QR code on the screen that with this scan I have now “accessed all your phone’s data and banking details, enjoy the show”. At one point when a quite happy punter wanted to go outside the gate for a smoke I put the stamp on his wrist so he could get back in and explained that I will need to have to scan the stamp with the phone when he came back through. Thus was the power of my authority (and beers I suspect) that when he came back he rolled up his sleeve and presented his wrist to me for scanning. Which I did and spent a minute or two trying to get the right angle for the scanner to work on his arm - before no longer being able to hide my inner laughter. He caught the laughter bug as well and I expect we are now great mates.

Excellent show that just proves beyond a doubt that people love to get together and have fun. Regardless of those southerly winds (that’s what Tasmanian tuxedos and beanies are made for).

Easy Tiger - Festival of Voices - The Wolfe Brothers - half human walking during a panorama shot.

Alright then - prize time!

Did you watch the US Presidential Debate? I did. I watched it live in that chair in front of the fire. I nearly made hotdogs for it. I mean how often do you get to see two people on a television talk about the future presidency of what a good portion of the planet consider to be the most powerful country on this floating bubble. It was not to be missed.

Oh dear.

I don’t need to give you my views on the outcomes of that event - everyone else has and I expect I agree with the consensus. At some point I thought I need to take some photos of this happening and with my trusty i phone I snapped a few random moments of the screen in front of me. In the afternoon I went back to the photos and found myself in an alternative universe where I became a tourism marketing professional and created what I believe is the next marketing campaign for Tourism Tasmania to promote Tasmania as a destination of choice for our US friends.

So here is the way for you to win a prize. Below is the image I made. It took me some time with cropping, filtering and fonts etc, but every time I look at it all I can imagine is a giant billboards on the sides of Los Angeles and New York freeways with the below image. The way to win this prize is to write back to me with 50 words or less why I should or should not post this on “X” and Zuckerburgverse with all the hashtags to make it go viral. I would have already done it, but there is a little voice inside me that says “don’t cross that line” - convince me I am wrong or convince me I am right. If the winning entry is in the affirmative I will make the post and send it out into the meta and Elon verse and watch for the eventual tide of American dollars (coupled with accents) descend on our island. If the winning entry convinces me not to do it then you saw the limited edition here and that is the end of it (which might save me from being denied a visa at some point in the future).

The prize is a night for two at The Ship - Bay of Fires including dinner, breakfast, cheese platter, free Deep South Beer and a bottle of Priory wine (pinot or Sav Blanc - your choice). I mean it is a pretty good prize! I will be posting this on Facebook as well, but the reality is that most people don’t have the will or stamina to read such a long thing these days, so the odds are in your favour! I will publish the winner’s submission in next week’s log (if anyone gives it a shot). So, without further ado - below is the photo I am talking about. Just send an email to thecaptain@theship.au with your case for or against and you may be in the running to head to to the East Coast!

I mean if you saw this on a billboard in the US now you would at least google Tasmania surely!

Thank you for reading my ramblings again – keep safe and see you next week (hopefully with a winner!).

For the record- all ramblings in this medium are solely those of The Captain and if anyone is triggered by them please accept my apologies (sort of).

The Captain.