Carnivorous Nights_ On the Trail of the Tasmanian Tiger - Margaret Mittelbach [11]
Les saw our eyes popping and told us not to worry. There had only been one serious shark attack in Port Hacking's history. “In 1927, a young boy dived off a boat and was eaten amongst his friends. By the time they got him ashore, he'd lost an arm and a leg and a large lump out of his side. He died on the way to the hospital.” The attack had inspired a Sydney balladeer to write a verse about it:
The day was fine, the water clear,
And as smooth as a pond;
But the surfers never thought of
What danger lurked beyond.
It was a shark, some twelve feet long
And in shallow water,
His eyes were bulging from his head,
Anxious for the slaughter.
Water/slaughter. We had to admit it was a good rhyme. By the time we reached Tiger Shark Hole, the little engine had begun to complain and spew smoke fitfully. “I'm just going to try and get us anchored here,” Les said. The shallow green water was full of jumping fish. We scanned the surface for fins.
The tide was so low that the exposed part of the sandstone shore was covered with clumps of live oysters. Les jumped out of the boat, pried one loose with his pocketknife, and ate it raw. “This is gorgeous real estate,” he said surveying the scene. “There was so much game here.” Les delighted in the idea of living off the land. “When I was a kid, my family would do that for a month every year.” And when he was working on the rock art survey in Royal, he had spent months camping out beneath the stars, hiking to his heart's content, paddling a canoe, and dining on fish.
We all walked along the rocky shore, stepping over fallen eucalyptus branches. Though Dorothy was wearing a sarong, she seemed to maneuver over the obstacles with ease. Les turned up a wisp of a path—it was wide enough for a dunnart (the marsupial version of a mouse) to pass through easily—and we climbed two hundred feet up the cliffside through tangy-smelling eucalyptus and red-barked Angophora trees. Near the top, we reached a long sandstone shelf paralleling the ridgeline. It gave us a bird's-eye view of the flat, blue-green waters below. Across the inlet, a mangrove swamp shimmered in the light.
We followed Les along a sandy track covered with broken shells. The yellowish gray cliffside curled over our heads.
“Talk about Picnic at Hanging Rock,” said Alexis.
For a natural area, it seemed strangely barren. “Where are all the animals?” we asked.
Les pointed out tracks in the sand, impressions of little claws and long feet. “Wallaby,” he said. “They're active at night.”
We walked beneath the hanging cliff for about a quarter of a mile. Then Les stopped and gestured toward the underside of the shelter. The rock was stained pink, brown, and white, and it was covered in dark, swirling lines. “This is it,” he said.
At first we couldn't see anything. But then the dark lines seemed to shift and reassemble themselves. They formed a picture of three animals: a menagerie à trois.
We could make out a python with a thick, coiled body, its head pointed upward, its tongue in mid-flick. There was a kangaroo that had a long muzzle and short, pointed ears. It was looking to the right with an almost arrogant expression on its face. The third animal was Les's tiger—was it a tiger? It had a big, doggy head with triangular ears (one facing forward and one back), a skinny neck, two stumpy front legs, and dark stripes across its elongated body. It appeared to be speared through by the tail of the haughty kangaroo.
The drawings were made using charcoal. Les showed us a large oval of ash on the ground. It was an ancient fire pit, one of three in this rock shelter, and it was thousands of years old. Les thought two, maybe three aboriginal families had spent their evenings at this spot regularly. “These fire mounds