Gove

We timed our arrival in Gove perfect, arriving on Friday and allowing us to enjoy a great night out at the very friendly Yacht Club. Simon was taken under the wing of some local aboriginals and over the course of the night became their “brother”. They gave him the traditional name of Baroo, which means crocodile in their language. I was christened Wipti, which means lightning snake. It must have been a good night as the next evening Simon said, “Have you seen all those lights behind the boat?” It was the local mining port that is lit up every night!

All the socializing at the yacht club and sore heads the next day wore us out and we hitchhiked into town to beat our heads against a brick wall. Apply for permits to land on aboriginal land that is. None the wiser regarding our permit applications we decided to head off anyway. Just as we were sailing out of Gove we got a phone call for the Land Council advising us that we could land on Raragala Island and Elcho Island but all our other permits had been rejected right across to Darwin! Just as a test I had thrown in some requests that were not on aboriginal land – unfortunately they rejected them too???

Raragala here we come!