Away from the sun’s glare, my eyes needed a moment to adjust. I heard my daughter and husband making their way up the rocky trail behind me through the oppressive heat. “This better be worth it,” my daughter Maia called out.
I peered through the dim light of a shallow cave and spotted an array of centuries-old paintings. There was a red ray with white dots overlapping a crocodile. Nearby, I puzzled over sea creatures with feathery fronds. Then I saw the sailing ships: painted one on top of the other in shades of yellow, red and orange, they evoked old European galleons and Indonesian sailboats. Oh, it was worth it, alright.
And yet, I was perplexed. We’d come to Stanley Island, off Australia’s Cape York Peninsula, to learn about the Aboriginal Australians who once resided here. But we found the main sign marking Flinders Group National Park concealed by mangroves and the guestbook had recorded only a handful of visitors each month. This place attracted thousands of visitors in the early 1980s. Where were they now? Why wasn’t anyone here to keep an eye on the artwork? And how had this 75-year-old park, with its historic rock art, faded into obscurity?
I suspected part of the answer had to do with the remote location. We were in a small, uninhabited island group 340km north of Cairns. Getting to Stanley Island – or Yindayin, as it’s called by the local Aboriginals – isn’t easy. While some visitors arrive here on small coastal cruise ships out of Cairns or on coastal ferries, we travelled up the coast on our own boat and anchored in Owen Channel near the spot where we thought the rock art might be. Rather than hire a tour guide through the Cooktown and Cape York Peninsula Information Centre 180km south, we explored the island on our own.
After landing our dinghy, we headed up a designated trail through a fragrant orchard, past metre-high termite mounds and rugged cliffs. When we finally reached a beach on the other side of the island, I searched for the trail leading to the rock art.
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