I'm on-board the Maria Island Ferry, sluicing through clear aqua green waves towards paradise again. A fusion of bottle-nosed dolphins escorts the small boat while tourists point and click in wonder at their speed and elegance.
I say “again” for I am returning. For years we have taken the family on an annual pilgrimage here, to create childhood memories, to replenish our depleted reservoir of nature and to keep ourselves sane.
Each summer we come to Maria to get away, to marinate ourselves in wilderness, waves and wombats instead of screens and schedules. We are here gladly to trade podcasts for pods of whales, selfies for stars and congested traffic for crested terns.
We must look like a homeless family, pulling our worldly belongings, but we are anything but homeless, immediately feeling at peace on the island; immediately feeling at home, enveloped in the natural silence of bird songs and the rhythmic slopping of the bay’s waves.
The heart can rest here and where the heart can rest there is a sense of home. I only get this sense of home and peace at a few places in the world – that sense that there is nowhere else in the world where one wants to be. Maria Island is one of those places.
My experience here is not unique, however, for I have been told by others of this curious feeling of contentment and sense of place when they come here. Home is the sailor on Maria Island.
Many people have been coming here for longer than my family has. I know of one set of friends who have celebrated New Years Eve here for more than 20 years. Another group to which we have semi-attached ourselves to over the years recently celebrated a 35th year of camping on the island. This group has seen each others’ kids grow up, celebrated weddings and shared the pain of family tragedies. Now we see their grandchildren being brought to Maria, to be indoctrinated into the island traditions.
The groups that come here do the same thing every year: they sleep beneath the stars, they swim and snorkel, they hike, fossick, read novels, bag peaks, bike, nap, drink wine and cook feasts. They enjoy the simple pleasures that never grow stale or old or need electronics. They have traded apps and espressos for appreciation and experience.
A couple of summers ago the Parks and Wildlife started a poetry competition for visitors to Maria, and I pondered this question of why so many people return again and again.
It feels like home when we return here,
This place where time has stopped, or at least paused
To allow us time to listen to the surf slide up the slick sand
And watch the sandpipers dance down the beach,
Chasing the waves on their tiptoes in the golden twilight.
Yes, this is the place that allows one to dream,
To once again lie on your back and watch the clouds billow above
Into cathedrals and canyons and dark wolves chasing white sheep.
This is the place where watch hands wind backwards
As you forget your tasks and schedules and your only ceiling is the stars.
This is the place of mountain spires and seashell whirls and starfish,
Of tall gums peppered with screeching currawongs and laughing kookaburras.
This is the place where you mark time by the tides and the moon,
And by the lope of the wombat past your tent.
This is the place where we renew our vows
To be good parents
To be good people
To look after the earth and each other.
This is the place where we renew our souls
And fall in love with life again;
This is why this island feels like home.
The poem, much to my surprise, won the inaugural competition. My prize was a cap and a few nights of free camping, both of which I used immediately.
So we have come again to Maria Island. We set up camp and run down for a swim and we think about the good hot cuppa and drinks to come. We think too about the week ahead here, of hiking, exploring the local history, daydreaming, swimming and unplanned meandering. We have already forgotten what time it is.
There is no sense of time or fences here, only ropes of sand to bind us. There is a freedom here that is unique, a place where one’s heart beats a bit gladder.
Boil the billy and let the wine breathe. It is good to be home.
Don Defenderfer is a native of San Francisco who once went on a holiday to Alaska where he met an Australian who told him to visit Tasmania. So he did, and while here he met a woman. That was 30 years ago. He was state coordinator for Landcare Tasmania for many years, a job that allowed him to be inspired by not only the beauty of the Tasmanian landscape but by the many people that are trying to repair and renew it. He has a Masters Degree in Social Ecology and a Bachelor of Environmental Studies with a minor in writing. He has published three volumes of poetry, and his work has appeared in newspapers and periodicals, including The New York Times and The Australian.
