Outdoor adventure on Lord Howe Island

By NICK SQUIRES

Sweat pouring down his face and smudging his John Lennon glasses, the Snail Man was beside himself with excitement. "That's it. That's the one I've been looking for," he squeaked.

We were at the top of Mt Gower, the highest point on Lord Howe Island, a tiny scrap of land in the blue void between Australia and New Zealand. By wandering into the bush to take a discreet comfort stop, it seems I had just made a major scientific discovery. On a leaf in front of me sat a small, glistening snail.

I casually pointed it out to Snail Man - real name Michael Shea, from the Australian Museum in Sydney. He and two colleagues - Bug Lady and Moth Guy - had joined our guided trek to the 880m-high peak to find rare species.

"You can see that his shell has almost disappeared. In evolutionary terms he's halfway between a snail and a slug," said my bearded scientist chum.

"I believe he represents a completely new family of animals." It turns out the slimy individual was only the second specimen collected alive.

It would be fair to say that hitherto my interest in snails had been less than keen. Now it seemed a bizarre stroke of luck and a weak bladder had resulted in a discovery that would rock the world of malacology.

All right, I exaggerate. But the lucky find only increased my sense of wonder for an island which, while officially a part of New South Wales, lies 644km off the coast, the epitome of a remote, unspoilt sub-tropical island, boasting summer temperatures of around 24C.

The remains of a seven-million-year-old volcano and a World Heritage-listed environment, Lord Howe is the ultimate eco-destination - an 11km-long, crescent-shaped outdoor adventure playground offering game fishing, diving, kayaking and snorkelling on the world's southern-most coral reef.

Nearly three-quarters of the island is protected as national park. There are no late-night bars, no discos, no supermarkets. There aren't even any street lights, and visitors are limited at any one time to 393. That's the number of beds available in the island's dozen or so family-run guesthouses, invariably colonial-era bungalows with wide verandas shaded by palm trees and introduced Norfolk Island pines.

The speed limit for the few people who have cars is a modest 24km/h. Most people get around by bike or on foot.

Two-thirds of the islanders are descended from the original settlers, and refer with friendly disparagement to outsiders as blow-ins.

They make a living from tourism and exporting the seeds of the endemic kentia palm, a popular house plant in Europe and North America.

The island is criss-crossed by a network of well-marked paths which weave their way through palm and pandanus tree jungle, across meadows grazed by sleepy-looking cows and along deserted beaches.

It's a kind of Southern Hemisphere Swallows and Amazons idyll. "As kids, we'd run riot here every summer," said Harry Rourke, 28, a fifth-generation islander who runs game-fishing trips. "We'd make little hideaways in the bush. There are none of the poisonous snakes and spiders you find on the mainland, so it was pretty safe."

The climb up Mt Gower is by far the longest and toughest of the island's many walks. We set out on the 14.5km round trip at 7am and returned eight hours later. The ascent must be attempted only with Lord Howe's resident guide, Jack Shick, a fifth-generation islander whose family came from Bavaria.

"It's slippery up there. You've got to concentrate every step of the way," Shick told us as we gathered at the base of the mist-clad mountain.

The walk is not for the faint-hearted. The first part passes along a narrow grassy ledge at the top of a sheer cliff more than 90m high, with waves crashing ominously below. We clung like ants to a rope bolted to the rock.

The scramble continued through groves of palm trees, which slowly gave way to a forest of mosses, ferns and stunted, twisted trees smothered in dripping lichen. Mist swirled through the Tolkienesque tangle of forest like dry ice.

Like the other dozen members of our party, by now I was smeared with mud, fighting a losing battle against leeches, and drenched in sweat.

As we munched sandwiches at the summit the cloud parted to reveal an extraordinary view of the foam-fringed island below.

The way down was no less demanding - at one point someone on the steep slope above dislodged a boulder the size of an anvil, and it came crashing down a metre or so away from me.

The next day my fellow trekkers took things easy, nursing sore legs, sprained ankles and sunburn. But with only one full day on the island left, I was determined to cram in as much possible, and set off alone before breakfast for a walk around the spectacular cliffs and hills of the island's northern end.

I started at Neds Beach, where grizzled 68-year-old fisherman Brian Carter Simpson has been feeding the fish every day for 20 years. As he hurled handfuls of left-overs into the turquoise bay, big yellow-tailed kingfish lunged into the shallows like sharks, sending sand mullet and trevally skittering across the water and hiding between our legs.

Then it was along the cliffs guarding the northern end of the island, where red-tailed tropic birds, petrels and masked boobies (gannets) conducted aerial acrobatics high above their nesting chicks.

I snorkelled at Old Gulch and had a close encounter with a large green turtle, and snorkelled again an hour later at North Bay. Both times I had the water to myself. I saw tiny, electric blue and yellow fish, moon wrasse, bright red hermit crabs and a moray eel.

A steep, exhausting climb up 585 wooden steps took me to the top of a forested ridge, and from there down to Old Settlement Beach, site of the island's first makeshift village.

Lord Howe was discovered in 1788 as a Royal Navy ship sailed from the newly established settlement of Sydney to Norfolk Island, soon to be turned into a penal colony for the most recalcitrant British convicts.

The ship's captain, Henry Lidgbird Ball, named his find in honour of the then Lord of the Admiralty.

He also took the liberty of naming two of the island's most striking features after himself - Mt Lidgbird, the second highest peak, and Ball's Pyramid, a giant, toothpick-shaped basalt island which lies 19km out to sea.

It was not until 1833 that the island was settled, with the arrival of a small band of British settlers from New Zealand, along with their Maori wives. They were later joined by emancipated black slaves, Scottish and Welsh settlers and South Sea Islanders.

For years the island was ruled as a virtual fiefdom by a retired American whaling captain, Nathan Thompson, who married a Polynesian princess.

The islanders made a living growing onions and potatoes and selling them to ships' crews, along with thousands of seabird feathers which were made into mattresses and pillows.

Lord Howe joined the ranks of other impossibly remote dots of land which had been claimed or purloined by the British Empire, from Pitcairn in the Pacific to Ascension and Tristan da Cunha in the south Atlantic.

From Old Settlement Beach I wandered along the foreshore to what the islanders generously call the Central Business District - a single paved street consisting of a post office, a couple of gift shops and a cafe. From there it was a short walk to where I was staying, Pinetrees Lodge, which dates from 1842 and is the oldest accommodation on the island.

Rooms are clustered around a tennis court, with the beach and lagoon a two-minute walk away. Guests watch the sun set over the island's pale blue lagoon while sipping drinks from a beach bar called the Boathouse. The bar operates on an honour system, as does snorkel hire at Neds Beach. The island is virtually crime free and room keys are non-existent.

On my last morning, I grabbed a bike and cycled the length of the island. I met a couple of fishermen chatting on the beach and asked them if they were working that day. "Not today, no, we're on holiday." "What's the difference?" I asked. The older of the two replied with a smile: "Now you mention it, not a lot."

How to get there

Qantas fly direct to Melbourne from Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. Prices start at $669. Phone Qantas on 0800 767 400.

Where to stay

A standard room at the Grand is A$77 ($89) single, A$110 ($128) double, including a cooked breakfast.

Ph 00 61 3 5023 0511

A five-course meal at Stefano's is A$65 ($75) a head. Bookings are essential.

Acacia Houseboats charge from A$900 ($1050) for a week's charter, plus fuel.

Ph 00 61 3 5021 0909

Visit New South Wales