Heavenly Beverley : To Cooktown, With Love

We have been home for thirty-six hours after an action-packed nine days away. After a sound sleep, I am feeling much more human. Still a bit tired, which is why I have just picked up a latte from Red Vault across the road. This afternoon is warm and lazy. A few guests have been in the Gallery, but I have had plenty of time to reflect on our latest adventure.

I am not missing the Wet. At all. The temperature here is around thirty-four degrees Centigrade (about ninety-three Fahrenheit) but feels cooler due to the low humidity. Sitting with the fan on, I am not even breaking into a moist glow. No more issues with glasses - they are neither fogging up nor falling off a sweaty nose. Instead, they are firmly attached to my face without a skerrick of movement. Bliss.

And yet, I am particularly missing Cooktown, for any number of reasons. Cooktown frequently has a fairly stiff breeze, which makes the humidity more bearable. My brother Michael (otherwise known as B2) is there, along with his daughter Rebekah and grandchildren Kate, Tyler and Rachael. Kate is an exceptional young girl of eleven and I hope to maintain regular contact with her through her Mum. Tyler is a handsome little chap of three and Rachael is a highly energetic two-year-old dynamo.

Cooktown still has an atmosphere of God's Own Country. People mostly live in the town because they want to live there. We met a bunch of entertaining characters, mostly through our dinners in the Bowl's Club, the River of Gold Motel and the Sovereign Hotel. The Saturday morning markets on the foreshore operate rain or shine. Views of the Coral Sea took my breath away. The surrounding country is stunning, with big rivers, waterfalls and rock pools, some of which do not have crocodiles as residents. Going to Isabella Creek and Falls was an afternoon to remember.

The town is proud of her heritage. There are museums, including the magnificent James Cook Museum housed in the now restored convent. There is a wonderful art gallery, the Elizabeth Guzsely Gallery, which houses the Cooktown School of the Arts. There are other quirky art and craft studios. The local Botanic Gardens are a must-see. The cemetery is fascinating. Finch Bay is a beautiful spot for further vistas of the Coral Sea, as is the lighthouse. There are cafes and a bakery. Our only tragedy was that Jackey-Jackey's Thai Restaurant was taking a break until April.

Stories abound. Exploration and discovery, tales of Country, early European settlement, the Palmer River gold rush, Cooktown's vital role in the Second World War and the hardy and inventive men, women and children who made Cooktown their home in the Far North. There were some dark events in Cooktown's history as well as great achievement, such as the renovation of the former convent in under a year back in 1969 and 1970.

So, Cooktown will keep calling me back. Next year is the two-hundred-and-fiftieth anniversary of Cook's successful repair of his ship "Endeavour" at Cooktown after a nasty reef tore a bloody big hole in the bottom. His forty-eight days of an enforced stopover in the area is to be commemorated. I hope to be in Cooktown right smack in the middle of this celebratory period. My birthday falls on 17 July, my brother's on 30 July. I can't think of a better place to be then.

And Cooktown, specifically the James Cook Museum was the site of my latest book purchase. "Girt - The Unauthorised History of Australia" by David Hunt and should be mandatory reading. Side-splittingly funny and ruthlessly scornful of the colonial masses, the characters and the often bizarre, ridiculous and disastrous events, this is not the boring Australian history that I remember as a school student. The frequent footnotes are a delight by themselves. "Girt" covers the period of Aboriginal settlement a very long time ago to the ascendency of Governor Macquarie. I started reading "Girt" on the flight home and have been laughing ever since. I have promised myself that when we are next in Cooktown, I shall buy the next volume entitled "True Girt".

If I can hold out that long...