Splendid isolation ... the lighthouse above the rocks.
With seabirds and seals for company, Gemma Deavin explores Montague Island from lodgings in a lighthouse.
I'm treading water looking up at a pod of fur seals lying on Montague Island's rocky shoreline through my mask and snorkel. "Swim gently and don't splash," our guide, Mark Westwood, says. "They come very close."
The water is a clear, emerald green. We're told it's the island's eight-kilometre proximity to the edge of the continental shelf that makes the water so transparent.
I look down and see forests of seaweed floating weightlessly above lilac-coloured boulders. The visibility stretches a good 30 metres.
Today there are 300 seals here but every spring the northern tip of the island is home to about 1800.
We wait. A pup is the first to jump in, shooting past like a missile, leaving a magic trail of bubbles. It happens so quickly. She's out into the blue in a flash, then returns to investigate.
A minute later, a big bull flops from the rocks - surging, rather than swimming. It's an unforgettable introduction to an island on which we haven't yet set foot.
As we putter away in our boat, a few seals still in the water roll on their sides, waving flippers in the air. I imagine they're saying goodbye.
There are six of us headed for a self-guided stay at the island's lighthouse-keeper's quarters. Previously available only to visitors signed up on a conservation volunteer program, this package has been introduced recently by the island's custodian, the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service, to allow groups of up to 12 to stay, play and self-cater.
We're only nine kilometres from Narooma on the NSW South Coast but the island bears no resemblance to the forested mainland. As we approach the jetty on the Dreamtime, skippered by Darryl Stuart from Narooma Charters, I can see a mass of fiery, lichen-covered granite boulders and patches of green topped by an imposing lighthouse.
We're lucky with the weather. Renowned as a treacherous crossing, it takes only 20 knots of wind and a two-metre swell for the trip to be cancelled. After 20 years at the helm, Stuart knows this stretch well. "Montague has its own, distinctive weather pattern," he says.
We witness this only a few hours after reaching our lodgings. A storm sweeps in with a two-toned sky: dark and jagged on top, lighter at the bottom, like icing dripping down on the sides of a cake. The horizon is clear but minutes later it looks like a blizzard has hit as sheets of water resembling fresh powdered snow ricochet off the ground. Just as quickly, the storm stops and the horizon re-emerges.
It's in moments such as these the need for a lighthouse is apparent. Built in 1881 from granite quarried from the north side of the island and designed by architect James Barnett, this was one of Australia's first lighthouses. Before the automated lamp was installed in 1989 it was lit by a first-order Chance Brothers lens - tended by keepers for more than 100 years.
Caretakers come and go intermittently. The current caretaker and his two sons are here for two weeks (we see them riding on lawnmowers and working in the shed) but otherwise we have the island to ourselves. They are staying in one of the two main buildings. We are in the other.
Whitewashed with blue trim, the guest quarters are newly renovated and comfortable. They have five richly decorated bedrooms, a dining room, sitting room, two bathrooms and a modern kitchen with a big fridge, a new cooktop and granite benches. The sitting room has tall armchairs, plump couches, bookshelves full of seafaring tales and a big window. I settle in front of it after the storm with a glass of wine, watching the sky change.
The only other visitors, a group of six, arrive the following morning to clear skies and sunshine. They're here for the day with guide Colin Sagar to take a tour of the island. I tag along. He has a broad understanding of the island but I'm particularly impressed by his knowledge of the nature reserve's flora and fauna. "All this wildlife close to the mainland is pretty unusual," he says. "There are not a lot of places where you get seals, whales and penguins in one place."
Sagar says it is specifically the 90 species of birds on the island that qualify it as a nature reserve. Six bird species breed on the island. Three species of shearwater (15,000 pairs) and the little penguin (6000 pairs) are burrowers. The silver gulls (3000 pairs) and the crested terns (1000 pairs) nest on the ground.
Other migrants include peregrine falcons, swamp harriers, hawks, harriers, sooty oystercatchers, Australian kestrels, black-shouldered kites, whistling kites, cormorants and white-bellied sea eagles.
For the little penguins - a big drawcard - there are 85 landing sites. Pulling up to shore, the main viewing platform is the first thing you see. Half-day evening tours gather here to watch the penguins emerge from the sea. From the landing sites, they move through the vegetation - the waxy and strap-like mat-rush grass - to their burrows. The nesting boxes installed by the Parks and Wildlife Service increase survival rates. My favourite is a brightly painted blue house with "Ralph" painted above the door. Tracks cut through the grass serve as mini highways for Ralph and his colleagues. We wander down one night after dinner and spy a few emerging, even though it's out of season.
It's not whale-spotting season, either, but I'm intrigued by Stuart's stories on the way to the island. Many of the 6000 people he transports on Dreamtime each year come to see the humpbacks that pass Montague Island on their annual migration between the winter breeding grounds off the Queensland coast and their summer feeding grounds in the Southern Ocean. Earlier this year, he saw pods of about 60 whales every day for six consecutive weeks. "It's been four seasons now in a row that we've never missed a whale on a trip," he says. "You can almost touch them they're so close to the boat."
About the same time the whales are at their peak, the number of seals also swells. Montague Island is the only remaining site where Australian and New Zealand fur seals settle along the NSW coast.
But it's also the indigenous history that makes Montague Island unique. Westwood explains that, according to legend, all the features of the surrounding environment have a character. Mount Dromedary, or Gulaga, which rises behind Narooma on the mainland and was officially handed back to its traditional owners in 2006 - had two sons, who left her to travel east. When they got to the sea she called them back. The youngest listened and is Najanuga, or Little Dromedary. The oldest was less obedient. He is Barunguba, Montague Island.
Shell middens, stone artefacts, two springs and the sources of food available - fish, penguins, eggs, shearwaters and possibly seals - indicate Aboriginal people made seasonal and extended visits here; it's thought no one settled here. . I find traces of this history - dry white shells - scattered around the shoreline of the wading beach.
Sagar takes us to the top of the lighthouse. As I ascend, I take a moment to peek out each of the small, salt-stained windows. I stop in front of one window framing only the smooth granite boulders, sky and steel-grey sea - surely the same scene viewed by a generation of lighthouse keepers a century ago.
Gemma Deavin travelled courtesy of the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service.
FAST FACTS
Getting there
Narooma is a five-hour drive south of Sydney. Rex flies daily between Sydney and Moruya, which is a 30-minute drive from Narooma. The peak seasons for seeing whales, little penguins and fur seals is September to November but the penguins and seals are here almost all year round.
Touring there
Visitors can experience Montague Island in several ways. The writer's visit was a self-guided stay, the newest in a range of options:
Half-day tours of Montague Island are run by the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service. Morning tours run year-round, evening penguin tours are available in spring and summer. It costs $130 for an adult, $99 for children under 15, family $430. Phone Narooma Visitor Centre on 1800 240 003; see eurobodalla.com.au.
Hosted penguin survey stays are run year-round by the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service and Conservation Volunteers Australia, in which visitors can take part in little penguin conservation work and stay in the lighthouse quarters.
It costs $600 a person for two nights, which includes island transfers, guides, all meals and equipment. Phone 1800 032 501; see naturewise.com.au.
Self-guided stays are now available for groups, who can stay in the lighthouse quarters year-round. It costs from $3600 for two nights for the entire house, accommodating up to 12 people, including island transfers. BYO food and beverages. Linen and towels are provided. Bookings for hosted penguin survey stays will take precedence from September to December. See Montague Island Tours, montagueisland .com.au.
Narooma Charters runs snorkelling trips among the island's seal colony for visitors in hosted and self-guided stays.
It costs $33 a person; see naroomacharters.com.au.
Sign up for the Traveller Deals newsletter
Get exclusive travel deals delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up now.