Shipwreck

What's left of Sygna - the largest ship ever to be wrecked along the eastern coast of Australia. This is the rusting hulk of the Sygna's stern which has been battered by the elements for 30 years while its bow has been floated and towed away for salvage.
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THE thrill of adventure is like a poem of emotions; the taste of fear blurred by the euphoria of an adrenaline rush before the wave of sensations hits a crescendo and culminating in a sense of relief. When the thin line between danger and excitement disappears, we throw all cautions to the wind and surrender ourselves to chance.

Bungee jumpers, paragliders, mountain climbers and all sorts of adrenaline junkies cherish moments when they push the envelope and go over the edge. While I may not be a risk taker, there was an opportunity for me to experience a teeth-gritting, yet deliriously exhilarating quad bike ride on the Stockton Bights sand dunes, just a two-hour drive from Sydney.

Considering that I have never ridden a Honda TRX 350, Sand Safaris managing director and instructor Tony Burrell’s almost military-like five-minute introduction to quad bike riding was sufficient to instil enough fear in me to be on my guard at all times.

“If you don’t follow instructions, you will get hurt,” Burrell barked like a drill sergeant. “If you run into the bike in front of you, you will get hurt. The bike at your back runs into you, you will get hurt …” He rattled on, ending his sentences with “you will get hurt.”

Okay, the gravity of the situation noted. Burrell then showed us how safe the bikes were if handled properly. If he hadn’t driven home the message on the importance of safety, his demonstration of the reliability of the chunky four-wheel vehicles was a graphic reminder of the danger that lied ahead.

Burrell shot his quad bike up a 60-degree slope, stopped it about 10 metres up and jammed the brakes. The bike stood still amazingly. “Don’t get off your bike, if you are caught in such a situation,” he said. “We will come and get you. If you try to get off your bike, it will topple and …” You will get hurt, I finished the sentence in my heart.

“Good gawd”, I tell myself, I didn’t travel thousands of miles to get hurt but the desire for a taste of adventure got the better of me and I soon joined a group of Malaysian journalists hurtling around the massive 2,600-year old sand dunes which formed the biggest moving sand mass in the Southern Hemisphere. They are said to be shifting inland at a rate of around 10 metres a year.

We trailed Burrell gingerly at first but soon we picked up speed as he took us up the peaks and down the valleys. When the thrill of adventure taking over and the initial fear overcame, we began to gun up the slopes at 60kmph and took leaps of faith down the sandy hills, accompanied by nervous screams and shouts of delight. What was initially stomach-churning had turned into a pleasant dash across a challenging terrain.

Just as I thought we were going too fast to appreciate the beauty of the dunes and take in the endless expanse of sand where films like Mad Max and Sahara were shot, we reached a point where the desert met the sea. The rusty ruins of a Norwegian ship, the Sygna Bergen, greeted us. The rusting hulk of its stern had been battered by the elements for 30 years while its bow was successfully floated and towed away for salvage in 1974. It was sold to a Taiwanese company for scrap metal.

The 58,000-tonne ore carrier ran aground on its maiden voyage on May 27, 1974 and broke into two. Just a day earlier, it was anchored 4km east of the Port of Newcastle waiting to ship 50.000 tonnes of coal for Europe. No lives were lost as all 30 crew members were airlifted to safety by helicopter from William RAAF Base.

As dusk descended on the dunes, we jumped on our quad bikes and left the grandeur of the mini desert environment and the panoramic view of the sun setting on the Sygna. How I wish there was time to photograph that scene.