An outlaw hermit told me this was the best place in the world - and he was right
AN outlaw hermit who chose this remote coastline as his hide-out inspires our reporter Janet Fife-Yeomans to venture into his beloved territory.
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THE Merlin-lookalike who called himself Xenex Xenex hid away from the world at Cone Bay up here off the thrillingly-titled Buccaneer Archipelago.
Named after the buccaneering pirate William Dampier, it is a wild and sublime place, a group of around 1000 islands tipping their rocky heads up in the idyllic King George Sound. We are north of Broome off the Kimberley coast and in a turquoise world in the middle of nowhere.
Xenex, so-named because he said it meant nothing, shunned the world for 14 years living in a home built from stone and tin surrounded by wild plum trees — until the armed police tactical response group dressed in black arrived at his remote bay.
In his garden, Xenex had three cannabis plants he named Vitality, Prophecy and Full Potential and he was arrested for selling cannabis to the iron ore miners on Koolan Island, 100km away.
When I covered his court case over 25 years ago as a young reporter in the historic Broome courthouse with the ceiling fans moving the hot air and the judge wearing long shorts under his outfit of wig and gown, I figured the cops who arrested him had just fancied an adventure trip to the country’s remotest coastline.
Xenex ended up in a cell for seven months and I ended up in Sydney. He told me of the many letters he had received from people he didn’t know talking about the courage he had shown living life how he wanted to.
His story has fascinated me all this time but it has taken years to get here and see what his heaven looks like.
I am doing it in the lap of luxury on board the Kimberley Quest, but it still comes with a sense of danger as it feels as though we are the only people to ever venture up here, so empty and vast is this area. I can’t see Cone Bay but we sail past the vicinity and I think of Xenex, who died three years ago, never having returned to his hermit home.
A Kimberley cruise does not come cheap. There are about a dozen ships of various sizes doing various stretches from Broome to Wyndham and back — but there are no bargains. The cruises are so popular that they book out over a year in advance. The Kimberley Quest has six crew for a maximum of 18 guests, small enough to feel like a private yacht but big enough to find a spot of your own.
I chose the eight-day journey from Broome up to the Mitchell Falls and then back via helicopter and six-seater Cesna. My cabin has a king single bed with a bunk above. I was afraid the shower would be one of those prefabricated plastic boxes, but the cabin has a full size bathroom. Another bonus of the Kimberley Quest is that passengers can bring their own alcohol and there is even a small fridge in cabins. Some boats do not allow BYO, racking up the cost of drinks on board.
Past Cone Bay and on the left is Koolan Island, another place I had wanted to see for years since a friend from the north of England worked here during its heyday and returned with tales of a lifestyle and poisonous snakes we could never have imagined. Today it’s almost abandoned but far from being a scar on the landscape, its red mined walls shooting out of the turquoise water look starkly beautiful.
Despite the iron ore mining, the Kimberley coastline remains one of the world’s last great marine wildernesses. There is a pilot whale on the bow wave, a humpback in the distance, a pod of dolphins, tawny nurse sharks, reef sharks and the ubiquitous crocodiles. And that’s only on day one.
Life here is controlled by some of the biggest tides in the world, water up to 12m high sweeping in and out twice a day. The power is awesome.
The tides also control our journey. Deep into Talbot Bay are the famous Horizontal Falls. Our skipper Brad has timed it so we are here at the 20m seaward gap in the McLarty Ranges while the tide bank is between one and two metres. Any higher and it is too dangerous to take one of the jet boats through and even now riding the flow of water rushing out of the bay beats any roller coaster.
Disney could never conjure up the adventures which occur here naturally every day. The next morning we are at Montgomery Reef on one of the boat’s three tenders heading up the channel within the country’s largest inshore reef. It appears to rise out of the water as the tide falls and green turtles swim under the tenders.
This afternoon, we are back in the tenders and motoring up to Sapphire Creek, its entrance a break hidden in the wall of mangroves which sadly I know I will never be able to find again. It is past Steep Rock and to the right of Red Cone on the eastern side of Doubtful Bay and, as Peter Pan would say, on till morning.
Four fishing lines have been thrown over the side of the tender to trawl through the soapy-looking water. I have never fished before but suddenly mine feels as though a two-tonne truck has grabbed the end and sped away through the gears, foot to the floor. A massive eagle ray leaps 2m into the air off the back of the tender — attached to the end of my fishing line. Just as Trent, who is in charge of our tender, is about to cut the line, the ray bites off the lure and swims off. I am just happy it is the one that got away.
The deep pool above Sapphire Falls is one of the three freshwaters pools in which we swim during this trip, safe from crocs who don’t like to climb the rocks. The sun is baking us but the ocean out of bounds because of the sharks and crocs.
A journey on board the Kimberley Quest is far from all about fishing but this is barramundi country and it is almost obligatory to give it a go. A few days later I catch one of the elusive giants. I thought I could never be one of those people who hold up the barra and grin at the camera and I am correct — I just let it quietly go. It is about 80cm long, the biggest that can legally caught because by this time they have become females (all barramundi are born males) and have to be allowed to reproduce.
Other passengers have kept their catch and one barramundi can feed the whole boat. As does the haul of mudcrabs we pull in another day.
Instead of catching fish, I wanted to capture the magic and the soul of this wilderness that has been two billion years in the making.
The tides once again have to be on our side as we head into St George’s Basin through the aptly named Whirlpool Passage, where the water bubbles into whirlpool as we take it slowly with the tide. Such is its power that when the tide is running out, even the Quest would have been hard pushed going against it.
Up the Prince Regent River is one of the Kimberley coast’s most famous and most photographed landmarks, King’s Cascade. It appears from nowhere in a small bay off the right of the river, a mud bath at low tide. There is the ledge on the left as we look at the falls where in 1987 American model Ginger Meadows was in knee-deep water as a croc headed for her. In panic, she threw her shoe at it but then made the fatal mistake of thinking she could outswim it and tried to make for her boat.
We scramble up the rocks to the freshwater pool above the falls.
I have seen the Kimberley from the road, sleeping in swags, and from the air. Both have been an adventure but neither was as luxurious as this cruise. I know what Xenex meant when he said it is the best place in the world.
BROOME
GETTING THERE
Qantas flies direct to Broome from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Darwin.
An eight-day Southern Quest voyage on Kimberley Quest is priced from $9180 a person for
the cabin with king single bed and bunk.
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