Richard Butler | Exclusive Report by CRAIG PLATT of THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD | 17TH JULY, 2024
When I was a child growing up in the 1980s, I dreamt of tropical islands and wide oceans.
Not the relaxing paradises adults dream of, but the ones found in the great adventure stories – Treasure Island, Robinson Crusoe, Moby Dick (the latter of which I had an illustrated children’s version of, that, looking back, was far too violent and horrific for a young child).
So when I set sail, aged 10, with my parents aboard P&O’s Fairstar (“the fun ship”), one place on our Pacific itinerary stood out: Mystery Island, off Vanuatu.
“Mystery Island”? What mysteries could this place hold for a 10-year-old boy? Buried treasure? Pirates? Castaways? I didn’t know. All I knew was that we were going to visit an island that was uninhabited, with a name that set my imagination aflame.
So it was with bitter disappointment I learnt that our visit during the cruise was cancelled. With no cruise terminal at the tiny island, the only way to reach it was to be carried to shore via the ship’s tenders, but the seas were too rough that day. The highlight of my cruise was ruined. There may have been some tears.
But now, more than 35 years later, I’m finally going to visit the island I dreamt of all those years ago, this time on a cruise with my own kids.
We’ve travelled to Mystery Island on board Quantum of the Seas, one of the biggest ships to cruise from Australia, with capacity for more than 4900 passengers. We’ve sailed two days from Brisbane, stopping off in Noumea on day three, before arriving at the island on the morning of day four.
It appears tantalisingly off our starboard side, visible from our balcony as we eat a (complimentary) room-service breakfast.
From here, it lives up to my expectations. A narrow strip of sand, just 70 metres wide at its thinnest but about 900 metres long, with palm trees lined up along the edge of the beach. If a bedraggled Tom Hanks wandered out from the treeline waving a rag to get our attention, I wouldn’t be surprised.
As it happens, Mystery Island is not so remote or so mysterious. The locals know it as Inyeug, meaning “small island” in the local language, but it received the “Mystery” moniker during a visit by Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip in 1974 for reasons that remain, well, a bit of a mystery.
It’s less than a kilometre from the larger Vanuatu island of Aneityum and, while uninhabited, it’s not devoid of humans for long. We watch as locals come across in boats bringing a range of products to its shores in anticipation of the cruise passengers’ arrival: food and drinks, beach umbrellas, inflatable rafts, snorkelling gear. The castaway bubble quickly bursts.
With so many passengers heading ashore on board the ship’s tenders, I anticipate a nightmare of queuing and long waits with my two toddlers. As it turns out, it’s a quick and efficient system. I collect numbered tickets from a desk outside one of the ship’s bars and wait until the number is called, then we head down to Deck 3 (of 15), queue briefly and within 15 minutes we’re sitting comfortably on the tender and bound for the island.
The kids (both under five) who have watched too many episodes of nautical adventure series Octonauts on the ABC, are convinced pirates will be on the island. There’s no real disappointment when they find out there are none, because they discover something better – real life tropical coconuts lying on the beach.
While beach toys are available to rent (you must deal in cash only on the island, and while Australian dollars are accepted, we don’t have any) it turns out the coconuts are all the kids need. They are delighted with the fact that they float, so they spend almost our entire time ashore throwing them into the water and watching the waves carry them back.
Older kids snorkel out into the lagoon, exploring the corals and spotting colourful fish and even the occasional turtle.
Despite the hundreds of passengers deposited on to this tiny island, it’s not difficult to claim our own private piece of paradise for the duration of our visit. The sparkling beach runs the entire circumference of the island, so there’s room for everyone.
After an hour or two we start getting hungry, so head to the dock to catch a boat back to the ship and enjoy a buffet lunch.
By mid-afternoon, most of the passengers are back on board the Quantum, even though we’re not pulling up anchor until 6pm. I look back at the island and realise now would be the perfect time to go. It’s reverted to the tranquil, empty idyll we saw in the morning.
Just a handful of passengers remain on the beach and I wonder if a small part of them is wishing they could be left behind.
