Peter Gash OAM: Custodian of Curiosity

Not long ago, Lady Elliot Island was basically unrecognisable. In the late 1800s, it was mined for guano used as agricultural fertiliser. The island was  stripped bare. 

This is a story about what happens when one person has a vision and refuses to let hard work, qualifications or accepted definitions of 'possible' get in the way of curiosity.

Regenerating the precious coral cay Lady Elliot Island is part of Peter Gash's legacy. He is the Custodian and Managing Director of Lady Elliot Island Eco Resort and CEO of Seair Pacific Aviation. 

Peter is a licenced Pilot and has been flying tourists to the Great Barrier Reef for over 35 years. In the mid 90's, Peter took the floats off his seasplane and began flying guests to the coral cay of Lady Elliot Island on the southern end of the reef.

In 2005, Peter and his family took over the lease of the island. 

In 2018, the island was selected as the first site for the Great Barrier Reef Foundation’s Reef Islands Initiative, a bold program focused on building climate resilience across key reef habitats. 

In 2020, Peter was the recipient of an Order of Australia Medal (OAM) for his service to eco-tourism and aviation. 

Peter talked us through the unexpected interconnections between reef systems and terrestrial ecosystems, the importance of being a ‘doer’ not a gunna, the compromise of flying airplanes, and how he’s embraced his role as an “injection of enthusiasm” for visiting world leaders, decision-makers,  business folk and scientists alike  – from  King Charles to David Attenborough.

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Episode Transcript

SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
They love to see our wastewater management and our
food scrap management.
They love to see ourrevegetation.
People get inspired by a successstory in this world because we
belong to nature.
We're a part of nature.
I don't think we came from Mars.
We probably got a bit waywardfor the last two or three
hundred years.
In this excitement of growingand developing and pulling
ourselves out of poverty andpretty tough world two or three

(00:23):
hundred years ago, people loveto see that we're moving in the
right direction, that we canexist with nature.
We can have a really minimalfootprint in a place like this.
That really inspires people.
That inspires me to keep doingit.

SPEAKER_04 (00:38):
Welcome to Water People, a podcast about the
aquatic experiences that shapewho we become back on land.
I'm your host, Lauren Hill,joined by my partner Dave
Rastevich.
Here we get to talk story withsome of the most interesting and
adept water folk on the planet.
We acknowledge the BunjalongNation, the traditional
custodians of the land andwaters where we work and play,

(01:02):
who have cared for this seacountry for tens of thousands of
years.
Respect and gratitude to allFirst Nations people, including
elders, past, present, andemerging.
This season is supported byPatagonia, whose purpose-driven
mission is to use business tosave our home planet.

(01:24):
Today we're in conversation withPeter Gash, custodian and
managing director of LadyElliott Island Eco Resort and
CEO of Sea Air Pacific Aviation.
Peter is a licensed pilot andhas been flying tourists to the
Great Barrier Reef for 35 years.
In the mid-90s, Pete took thefloats off his seaplane and
started flying guests to thecoral K of Lady Elliott on the

(01:45):
southern end of the reef.
Not so long ago, Lady ElliottIsland was basically
unrecognizable.
In the late 1800s, it was minedextensively for guano that was
used as agricultural fertilizer.
By the time mining ceased, theisland had pretty much been
stripped bare.
With no topsoil and no nativevegetation remaining, Lady
Elliott Island was left exposed,dry, and inhospitable to

(02:07):
wildlife.
In 2005, Pete and his familytook over the lease of the
island.
In addition to running aworld-class ecoresort, they've
been integral in theregeneration of Lady Elliott's
unique ecosystems.
In 2018, the island was selectedas the first site for the Great
Barrier Reef Foundation's ReefIslands Initiative, a bold
program focused on buildingclimate resilience across key

(02:30):
reef habitats.
In 2020, Peter was a recipientof an Order of Australia Medal,
that's an OAM, in the GeneralDivision in the Australia Day
Honors list for his service toecotourism and aviation.
We sat down in the midday shadeof Thriving Canopy, and you'll
hear lots of bird chatter aroundus and at least one reference to
a bird's lucky strike.

(02:50):
Peter talked us through theunexpected interconnections
between reef systems andterrestrial ecosystems, the
importance of being a doer, nota gunna, and how he's embraced
his role as, quote, an injectionof enthusiasm for visiting world
leaders, business folk, andscientists alike, from King
Charles to Sir DavidAttenborough.

(03:17):
Pete, will you tell us about atime or experience after which
you were never the same?

SPEAKER_00 (03:23):
It's been many of those in my life.
I consider myself so fortunateto live and work in such a
spectacularly beautiful part ofthe world.
And so, yeah, there have beenmany, but it's a great question,
and it makes me think back to amoment in time here on Lady
Elite Island when I was out withsome friends and a mother whale
came along and she had a baby,like a little calf.

(03:46):
And she just we were all justsnorkeling, and she just pulled
up near us.
And we're in about 10 or 15metres of water and she just
stopped, and the little calfstopped, and they went to the
bottom, and we just sat thereand looked down.
Mum can hold her breath for 20or 30 minutes, the calf can only
hold it for a couple of minutes.
So the calf would come up andsplash around with us and then
go back down again.

(04:06):
Then it would come back up andsplash, and we couldn't believe
it.
And we had a couple of reallygreat photographers with us,
Cole Baker from Cannon, andactually had Robert Irwin with
me on that day, and we couldn'tbelieve this little calf's
coming and going.
Well, Mum's just decided thisain't good, I must go and have a
look.
So mum came up, and there wasprobably five of us by then that
had joined the group becauseeveryone could see we were

(04:28):
having fun, it was just off thebeach.
And the mother came up and shecame right up between us, and I
kid you not, she turned andlooked at us all.
And Colin had his camera with abig glass lens, and she had her
pectoral fins out, and sheturned like this to look at us
all.
And her pectoral fin went withina couple of inches of his glass.

(04:49):
And to this day, I swear sheknew exactly where the dimension
of that fin was.
She went around and she'sobviously thought these guys are
cool.
So down she went and sat on thebottom, and the little guy here
kept going up.
This went on for over an hour.
Over an hour.
And some of the vision, all ofus that were there, looked back
on it, and and Robert's photoshave become quite famous.

(05:10):
And Colin did worldwideinterviews about that event
because he posted that vision,like he had video of when she
went whoosh and swam around.
I just couldn't believe thepresence of that animal and the
intelligence of that animal.
And then the little guy, youknow, and she's checked us out
and she's gone, yeah, they'reokay.
So she's gone back down again,and it went on, and then she

(05:31):
came up and eventually they swamfor a little bit and they
stopped again.
It was just like, you know, youhave a whale experience now and
again, and it goes for a coupleof minutes, maybe.
I've had a lot of those, butthat one just went on and on,
and it just never stopped beingexciting.
So I think that's probably oneof the many, but instantly comes

(05:52):
to my mind is possibly becausethere's so many photos of it.
I've got some on my walls athome that a couple of the guys
that were there took and thevideo and and the memory of it
because it was it was it was Ithink the word is viral, it went
viral in the social media world.
So you heard about it and yousaw it and you remembered it,
you know, you relived it.

SPEAKER_05 (06:12):
Do you think that you felt different before and
after that in some way?

SPEAKER_00 (06:18):
Yeah, yeah.
I I mean I've always felt closeto nature, and I've always felt
that we're a part of nature.
I've always felt it's a bit likea drop of water in the ocean.
We're just a drop of water,we're just a drop in in the
natural environment, and we're apart of the environment.
And I've always felt that wayand seen that way, and you're
here now and you're seeing whatI mean.

(06:39):
It's almost a Galapagosexperience or a Lord Howe Island
experience where the wildlife isnot frightened of people.
When we first came here, thisfishing was available and spear
fishing was available.
It could do all those things.
So the wildlife here was a bitmore tense.
It was, you know, maybe a bitmore cautious of humans.
But we got it declared a greenzone.

(07:00):
No take, no fishing, nospearing, no touching, no
taking.
And besides the odd person doingsomething they perhaps don't
realise they shouldn't do, itdoesn't happen much.
So this place brings you closeto nature, and it's kind of odd
for a bloke who raced motorbikesfor a living to all of a sudden
appear to become aconservationist.
But I think deep down inside, Iwas always that way, I was

(07:22):
always a conservationist.
But when you're young, you takea while to find your feet and
find your direction and and andjust feel who you are and where
you are on this planet.
I often say it's not aboutmaking a fortune.
It's a busy little business.
This is a business, but for usit's not about making a fortune,
it's about making a difference.

(07:43):
And what we've done here, withthe resources that the tourists
that come out here give us, thetourists spend a lot of money
with us, so we use that moneywisely to protect and preserve
and conserve for our futuregenerations.
Because I often say to people,don't have your children come to
you one day and say, Hey Dad,hey mum, why didn't you do more

(08:04):
to protect the planet?
And it's not just about climatechange, it's not just about
global warming, it's about oceanrubbish, land rubbish, all the
things we're doing that we arestarting to realize we shouldn't
be.
So.

SPEAKER_04 (08:18):
And what have you seen that makes a difference for
people in connecting to the sortof sensitivities that you've
developed?

SPEAKER_00 (08:26):
People really love to see success in the form of
alternative energy.
You know, you know, we we makeall our own power here from
solar, and then we use thatpower to desalinate all our
water.
People love that.
They write you letters, they'vebeen here from all around the
world, and then they'll writeyou letters and say, wow, I
loved what you do there.
Then they'll send you somethingthey might have seen up in
Europe or up in the UK or youknow, somewhere else.

(08:48):
They love to see that.
They love to see our wastewatermanagement and our and our food
scrap management, they love tosee our re-vegetation.
People get inspired by a successstory in this world because we
belong to nature.
We're a part of nature.
I don't think we came from Mars,you know, I don't think we
appeared off another planet.
I think we evolved here, butwe've got this amazing brain.

(09:10):
And our amazing brain, which isremarkable, and we've all got
one, and I don't think any of usare better or worse, just some
of learned how to use it.
We probably got a bit waywardfor the last two or three
hundred years in this excitementof growing and developing and
pulling ourselves out ofpoverty, and you know, because
pretty tough world two or threehundred years ago.
So those people were juststruggling to survive.

(09:31):
So they did a lot of stuff thatwe now look back on and go
people love to see that we'removing in the right direction,
that we can exist with nature,we can have a really minimal
footprint in a place like this.
That really inspires people, andthat inspires me to keep doing
it.

SPEAKER_04 (09:48):
What really inspires me about the story of Lady
Elliot really comes back to youand the difference that one
person can make.
I mean, all of us think aresusceptible to the overwhelm at
a lot of the major issues goingon in the planet, be they
social, environmental,political.
But Lady Elliot for me is justsuch a beacon of hope, and that

(10:11):
comes back down to one person,you with a team, but you having
a vision and taking action andnot being daunted by something
seeming unlikely or impossible.
Can you talk us through yourrelationship with the island,
when it started and and how it'sevolved?

SPEAKER_00 (10:29):
Yeah, oh.
Well, as I said earlier, I wasracing motorcycles for a living,
motocross, you know, in thebush, brap rap, brap, and seems
like a fairly wild thing to do.
But I was a young fella and Ijust was fortunate.
And I came out here on a holidaybecause it got too hot in the
summer, so I came out with somefriends on a couple of boats.
I'd been to a couple of parts ofthe barrier reef, I'd been to

(10:51):
Green Island, I'd been to Heron,so I'd seen some of the beauty,
but I was only quite young, Iwas 21, I think, and I came here
and there were two boats, andthere was a young girl who I
knew on the other boat, and Iwas on this boat, and we came
ashore and was like, whoa.
There was virtually no trees,virtually no birds, but we went
snorkeling and it was stunningin the water, and we saw mantis.

(11:14):
But this place was like adesert.
It was barren, and there was allthis coral rock that you see
here now, and no vegetation.
And so it was rough, so wedecided to leave and we went to
Lady Musgrave, which is the nextisland across, 20 miles away,
and we stayed there, and it hadthis beautiful forest and
beautiful coral and soil.
So I've gone, why is that one sobeautiful?

(11:36):
And this one here has been sodamaged.
So I went back to my world anddid my thing for a couple more
years and did homework anddiscovered this place had been
mined, strip mined for guano,bird pook.
Took all the vegetation, twometres of guano they'd taken off
it.
So it was just this wild dream,I guess, or this almost

(11:56):
impossible dream that I'd oneday love to have a business
going there.
Just to improve the place, butto show it off, to share it, let
other people experience it.
So that went on over a period,and I quickly realized that to
do it I needed to be able to flyairplanes.
I didn't have a pilot's licence,but I'd always wanted to have
one.
So I quit racing, married thatyoung girl.

(12:18):
Still married now, 42 yearslater.

SPEAKER_04 (12:20):
Wow.

SPEAKER_00 (12:21):
And talked about this place.
Everyone laughed at me.
I said, I'm gonna run a businessup there, man.
You're gonna do that, you know.
So we had to work real hard.
I had a goal, two days work aday, seven days a week, because
I had to pay for my firstairplane and then pay for, you
know, it was just we had to makemoney to get started.
So to us, money was a tool to dowhat we wanted to do.

(12:44):
And so we started initially toMusgrave because it was someone
else here with a tiny littleresort, but they didn't even
understand the word eco.
And I was still trying tounderstand, and you're talking
the late 1980s, early 1990s,climate change was hardly a
word.
You know, coral bleaching washardly a word, hardly anybody
knew about it.
But I first saw coral bleachingin the early 90s from the air as

(13:06):
I came into land at Musgrave andwondered about it.
And this place was chipping awayin my mind, but someone else
owned it.
So how was I gonna get it?
This kid with bugger all,really.
We had an airplane, but the debtwas bigger than the airplane.
We had a business where weworked from, but we had we had
massive debt.
We were very brave in that wetook on debt because we knew
that was the only way we weregonna get to where we wanted to

(13:28):
go.
You couldn't do what we dowithout expensive assets,
expensive equipment.
Because you'd say, why don't youbring people here in boats?
Well, it's such a long way,you've just come here in a boat.
It's so it precludes a lot ofpeople from coming here.
It's still as expensive, andwhen you look at the fuel burn
per nautical mile, but thoseairplanes that we've got now,

(13:49):
they're very economical things.
So we pushed towards airplanes,we came here, and we got to know
the guy who owned it while wewere flying elsewhere.
And he was an old fella, and hewas a tough old fella.
And I was a young fella, I wasin my by then I was in my early
30s, and I'd gone to one of thethings I flew you up in a Cessna
Caravan, and it was the firstone in the country, and it was

(14:10):
one and a half million dollars.
Every airplane I'd bought up tothen was like a hundred thousand
dollars.
So I just jumped off the cliff,put everything we had on the
line.
I knew I needed a goodaeroplane, so we bought one up
to here in debt.
Massive risk because if wedidn't keep it busy, we're gonna
lose it, we're gonna lose ourhouse and everything we'd worked
for.
But I knew that if I didn't getthat decent piece of equipment,

(14:32):
I could never do it.
So we did.
And the old guy took to mebecause he said, his words were,
you got sting in your tail, son.
You remind me of me, he said.
When I was your age, I used todo that.
And he started an airline calledSun State Airlines and he sold
it to Australian Airlines and itbecame Cornislink.
So the guy who I bought thisoff, he started Cornislink.

(14:55):
And he was a bit similar.
Neither of us finished school,but we're both workers and both
just had a go.
So he he sort of dropped hisguard a bit for me and he helped
me.
And so he had aeroplanes, but hehis engineers couldn't keep them
going.
Well, then I'd become anengineer as well, an aircraft
engineer.
So I said, I'll buy yourairplanes, but you have to
finance me because I can'tborrow any more money.

(15:16):
The bank just laughs at me.
So he financed me and I wouldfix them and keep them going.
And over the next 10 years weworked together, and in 2005 we
bought the lease and away wewent, and that was 20 years ago.
It's now 2025.
And so now we're looking forwardto the next 25 or 30 years up to
2050, and we just want to domore of the same, is looking

(15:38):
after this beautiful place.
So we fell in love with it.
We saw this impossible dream.
So many people said you'll neverdo that.
Just wasting your time, you'llnever do that.
And people who were close to youwho you wouldn't have thought
would say that to you.
Because it Australia is a funnycountry, and people generally
they probably care for you whenthey're saying, Don't do that,

(16:01):
you you'll go broke or you'rethis or you're that.
Some of them will encourage you.
But what really happened that Ididn't see early was an enormous
amount of people did encourageus and supported us, and we
didn't even know.
They were behind the sceneshelping us, like even the old
fella, they were helping us,they wanted us to succeed.
So it's wonderful, and thank youfor saying one person at the

(16:22):
pointy end to make it happen,but that one person can't do it
without his team.
And that team is bigger than yourealise.
You know, you've got people thatknow you that are supporting
you, and you don't evennecessarily know they're doing
it.
Because some people don't askfor thanks.
But you know, going in thatdirection when you said vision,
so many people say to me, Oh,you must have had great vision.

(16:43):
I go, Well, yeah, I did,probably.
But so many people have greatvision.
We all have great vision.
To me, in my mind, what I thinkwas different between me and the
others with the vision, I wentbang and put the rubber on the
road and I just made it happen.
Like you, I've watched you inthe short time I've got to know
you.
You just make things happen.
You just do it.
And that's a real key in my mindis don't be a gunner, be a doer.

(17:07):
And I try and teach that toyoung people.
And as you know, we employ a lotof young people here, and half
the enjoyment to me is seeingthese young people evolve, and
they'll come and they'll startwith this, they're 18 or 19.
I've got so many young pilotsthat start with me, and they
come and they do three or fouryears, and they go off to an
airline, then they come back,oh, it was the best job I ever
had.
And you've you've you'veenthused them, you inspired them

(17:28):
to be a doer.
I think that's so important.

SPEAKER_04 (17:31):
Another part of your story that I love, Pete, is, and
you alluded to it a little bitbefore, was that you you didn't
go to university, you didn'tfinish school, you didn't study
environmental science, youdidn't have a master's degree in
conservation biology, but youhad and have a deep curiosity
and a willingness to askquestions, difficult questions,

(17:54):
and to seek out answers.
Can you talk about how thatcuriosity has shaped this place
over the years?

SPEAKER_00 (18:02):
Thank you.
That's a great question.
And you're right, there was atime when people would say,
Well, you don't have a degree,you didn't go to uni, so you
don't know anything.
People are starting to realizethat's not necessarily so.
And then interestingly, citizenscience, we see that sometimes
scientists are critical ofcitizen science.
But I read a great articlerecently, two of our most
well-known citizen scientists.

(18:24):
One was Joseph Banks, who cameout here with Captain Cook, he
had no science degree.
He's one of our most famousscientists, but he was a citizen
scientist.
But the other one who's evenmore well-known is a guy called
Charles Darwin.
He had no science degree.
So you keyed the word, it'scuriosity.
I walk around and I'm just notlooking, I'm thinking and I'm
asking questions.
And you've already picked up onthat.

(18:45):
You know, how did that work?
Why is it like that?
What's happening?
And I'm always challenging thescientists, and so we love it
because they see me, he's a bitof a bushy, but he asks lots of
questions.
So I've made them ask questions.
When we came here, science toldme that nutrient killed coral.
Nutrient kills coral.
Nitrogen, phosphorus, which wasbird put, kills coral.

(19:07):
So that's all what we all know.
And yes, it does in highconcentrations.
But what we've discovered hereis through asking questions and
through research, that thenitrogen and phosphorus, the
bird put, when the rain soaksdown through it, soaks down
through this calcium carbonatebase.
It's really like a big sponge.
The tide is under there all thetime and it moves up and down

(19:28):
about 300 mil every tide.
And the fresh water withnutrient and it sits on the top.
Every time the tide goes out, ittakes a small concentration of
this nutrient out, which is whathas grown this reef so healthily
and the wildlife around it.
So, from thinking nutrient wasbad for coral and saying to the
scientists, I think something'sgoing on.

(19:48):
Why is the reef getting better?
Because we're planting thetrees.
We're planting these trees,we've got more birds, we've got
more poop, things are improvingout there.
What's going on?
So the scientists started to doresearch.
We drilled bores and wediscovered.
That it's actually improving.
So that curiosity is soimportant.

SPEAKER_04 (20:04):
And it's relevant to everything in our lives.

SPEAKER_00 (20:08):
And it's it's almost like a childlike curiosity.
We should never grow old.

SPEAKER_05 (20:12):
Yeah, this is this is so great, Pete.
This reminds me of a livepodcast we did earlier this year
with Bob McTavish, who is afamous surfboard shaper.
He's 82.

SPEAKER_00 (20:23):
I've heard his name, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (20:25):
Incredibly enthusiastic man.
Yeah.
And he's still like every day hecan, he's surfing and designing
new ways to ride surfboards, newsurfboard designs, endlessly
curious.
And we asked him specifically,how do you keep that enthusiasm
alive, Bob?
And he said he wakes up with aweand wonder and curiosity.

(20:50):
I wonder what the surf's goingto be like today with this swell
and that swell, and oh, there'sthese new birds in town, and I
wonder, oh, I should go checkthem out, or how can I make my
wife happy today?
We've been together 50 years.
Maybe I can do something new forher, and and that was his his
gift to everyone is that.
That's how he does it.
And I I have to think that youhave that similar trait of

(21:13):
keeping that spark alive,keeping that curiosity going.
How can the rest of us do that?
What do you say when you get oneof those young people who come
to the island and they'relooking for a bit of guidance
and and they're obviouslylooking to you for that?
How do you respond to that?

SPEAKER_00 (21:32):
There's a lot of things that I think shape us,
and one of them reallyimportantly, I say to young
people, we're a part of nature,so we belong here.
Don't believe we don't.
So look after the planet as goodas you can.
But remember that the more yougive, the more you receive.
And it's not like if I give toyou, you're going to give back
to me.
It's like I do something specialfor you, and over here,

(21:54):
something special comes back tome.
It's not necessarily like that,you know.
So Lady Elliot has proven it tome, the more I look after Lady
Elliot, the more we do for thisisland, the more it does for us
as a family, as a group, as anisland, it's almost like it's
racing.
It's almost this place is almostracing, like you heard Andy say,
Whoa, I can't believe how muchgreener it's got.
It's like it's racing to getback where it was to say, hey,

(22:16):
thanks, you know.
So I try and get young people tounderstand that it's not a
one-way street, it's not abouthow much can I get in a
relationship, it's how much canI give.
Because if I give, you get anenormous amount just by giving.
Nothing more than that.
Just giving is an amazing thing.
But then there's other thingsthat happen then in your life
because of that, you know.

(22:37):
So that's one of the things Itry to inspire young people to
see.
But the other one is I talkabout a thing which kind of goes
back to what we talked aboutwith vision or making things
happen, rubber on the road.
And that is, for want of anotherword, someone, it's I think I'm
plagiarizing someone else'swords, but I've heard the words
personal power, okay?

(22:57):
And I've talked about it onlyyesterday.
I've got this young lady who'sbeen with me for years.
She started here when she was16.
She'd just become my executiveassistant back on the golf show.
She's 25 now.
And she'd been with me and awayand with me around.
She's back, and we're talking,and I said, there's a thing
called personal power.
And what that means is if yousay you're going to do
something, do it.
Don't let yourself down anddon't let other people down.

(23:19):
If you want to do something, doit.
It's personal power.
It's too easy to say, oh, I'lldo that tomorrow.
Oh, I'll do that next week.
Oh, that's a bit hard.
No, no, no.
I want to do it.
I want to build the magpie, Iwant to sail up to the barrier
reef, do it.
And that's personal power to me.
And I'm not sure if it'ssomething that some have and
some don't.

(23:39):
I I tend to feel we're allequal, but some of us for some
reason rather develop theseskills or these driving moments
a bit more than others.
So you owe it to the others totry and enthuse them to get into
it and you do better.

SPEAKER_04 (23:56):
Can you talk us through one of the times when
you exercised your personalpower and I'm thinking
specifically about compost anddragon fruit?

SPEAKER_00 (24:05):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (24:06):
Like that's a really specific example.

SPEAKER_00 (24:08):
Yeah, yeah.
Well, this place, when we tookit over, it was covered in
introduced species.
But this is a coral cave, amagnificent coral K.
Really special piece of realestate on the planet, unique
with its own unique vegetation.
But it had all been strip minedand taken away, and then they
left goats, so they ate it.
There was very little naturalvegetation here.

(24:29):
What was here was introduced.
The lighthouse keepers, Godbless their souls, they came
out, they'd probably think mostof them would come from England,
so they brought old Englishplants to make them feel at
home, which you'd get, you'dunderstand that.
It would have been a windy,barren place.
So they planted a lot ofdifferent stuff: lantana,
plumeria, what do you call it,frangipani, and dragon fruit.
We call it midnight cactus.

(24:49):
Beautiful plant, lovely flowerthat flowers at night, and some
people eat it.
We had three big crops, if youwant to call that, or outgrowths
of dragon fruit.
Looked pretty, but it didn'tbelong here.
And when we first started, noone believed we would ever get
it back to its natural state.
It was like, you're joking, man,you know, it's just not gonna
happen.
Yeah, it's gonna happen.
It might take us a while, butwe'll make it happen.

(25:11):
So this dragon fruit wasmassive.
And so we brought quite a few ofthe experts out to help us.
It was like, what are we gonnado with this stuff?
Oh, well, you'll need to pull itdown and you need to put it into
bins, we'll need to take it offthe island because it's it's
rabid, you know, it'll keepgrowing and you won't, and
you're or you can dig holes andbury it.
No, no, no, no, that's soundingtoo hard to me.

(25:31):
Nature is.
Nature looks after itself, youknow.
There's no in my mind, there'sno such thing as weeds.
It's just a plant that's not inits place at that time.
But weeds recover.
So this dragon fruit, we decidedwe're gonna give it a go.
So we pulled it down out of thetrees and we crushed it down,
and there was a bit of criticismthat this isn't gonna work, and

(25:52):
we thought, well, what have wegot to lose?
So we pushed it into piles, andthen Bo, who's been with me 25
years and lives in my house,because we've got one of the
houses up, he lives in my housewhen he's here on the island.
We talked about it and he said,I'm gonna drive over it with the
loader, I'm gonna squash all thejuice out of it, and keep going.
What are you on to, Bo?
So he's drove over it and droveover it, and all this juice came

(26:15):
running out, and about a weeklater he's drove over it again,
and it slowly crushed down,became magnificent compost.
So we just planted all thesepersonias and different
vegetation in it.
There's no dragon fruit anymore,but there's magnificent compost
for the vegetation that belongshere.
So we turned a negative into apositive.

(26:35):
And I think that's nature in somany ways.
Nature's providing for us.
We've just got to listen andlook, and that's that curiosity
thing that we talked about.

SPEAKER_04 (26:43):
And paying attention, right?
There was no guidebook, therewas no, there was no plan.
Plant this here on this side,plant that here, and then it's
all gonna work.
You had to.

SPEAKER_00 (26:52):
And some people are going like this.
There's no book, mate.
There's no book on this, noone's done this before.
We're gonna give it a go.
And the way I saw it, what wasthe worst thing that could
happen?
Yeah, we'd end up with a bigpile of stuff we had to put in
the buckets and take awayanyway.
So, yes, it costs a bit of moneyto do that, but the outcome was
fantastic.
Yeah, so now we share thatknowledge, and as you've already

(27:13):
seen, we've got a nursery overthere with over 6,000 plants in
it.
We've got an island here withover 16,000 plants we've
planted.
So the nursery's brimming withstock.
So now there are other islandsthat are saying, wow, how can we
do that?
And as I say, the door's open,my nursery's open, our minds are
open.
If you want it, come and talk tous.
Anything we can share, we will.

(27:34):
It's about collaborating andpartnerships and sharing.
Any plants you want out of thenursery, tell us what you want.
We just share because it'll goaway and it'll come back.
Because other people come andlearn off us.
Next thing they're your friend,and then they're checking and
then you're learning off them.
You know what I mean?
And then it's just like this.
You just we all get better.

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The recurring theme that I'mfeeling is like how powerful

(30:37):
small things, bird shit, dragonfruit, how small things can have
massive impacts.
It also makes me think about thesand islands that we saw when we
were flying up the coast thismorning.
Can you speak to some of themagnificence of that coastline
and maybe the relationship withLady Elliot?

SPEAKER_00 (31:00):
And that's so important, that
interconnectedness.
We humans can sometimes be alittle bit tunnel vision.
We just see Lady Elliot andthat's what it's all about.
No, no, no.
Lady Elliot wouldn't existwithout certain things that are
happening around it or nothappening around it.
So yeah, we flew up over Ghari,Fraser Island, and it's
stunning, the world's largestall-sand island, and you saw for

(31:20):
yourself, it is spectacular fromthe air, magnificently
beautiful, and a protectedenvironment, a UNESCO World
Heritage listed national park,as is this place.
So just in that short flight, weactually flew over three UNESCO
national parks.
It's amazing, Noosaheads, andthen Gari Fraser.
But but Gari Fraser is all-sand,the world's largest all-sand

(31:42):
island.
It's had some remarkablehistory.
Going back to our Aboriginalhistory, the the butchelor
people who lived there forthousands of years, and they
called it Gari, which in theirlanguage means paradise, because
it would have been paradise, youknow, not too hot, not too cold.
Someone's trying to poop on us.
You know, that's that's luckywhat happened there.

(32:02):
You know why it's lucky?
It's lucky because it didn't goin your mouth.
Anyway, yeah, but it's theinterconnectedness of it is this
too much agriculture withoutmanaging our agriculture, and
don't get me wrong, I'm notagainst agriculture.
I started in that world, and myfamily are in that world big
time.
But it's like what we do here.
This was run without necessarilythe curiosity and the and the

(32:25):
management needed to make itlast.
Agriculture needs the same.
As we get smarter, and ouryounger people are getting
smarter, and some of the olderpeople do, with our agriculture,
we're now managing the runoffand the sediment because coral
doesn't like sediment, doesn'tlike runoff.
Hence the problems you find asyou go further north, because
there's been so muchagriculture.
Sadly, the sugar and the sugarcane, we've paid a big price for

(32:48):
it.
At the time we didn't, I mean Iassume they wouldn't have known
that, but they're starting torealise it now.
But it's the interconnectedness,and that goes even further back.
You know, these rivers that feeddown here to the Great Bar Reef,
they feed way out.
So when you get big, heavyrainstorms and lots of rain, you
get big flood plumes.
The Fitzroy River at um Rocky,and then the Burdican River up

(33:11):
in Mackay and Townsville and upthrough those areas, those flood
plumes come out and thatsediment settles on the coral
and it kills it.
So whether you talk climatechange or not, coral's under a
lot of stress.
You know, it's got cyclones,heat, sedimentary damage, crown
of thorn starfish, there's a lotof things threatening it.
So we have to work together tomanage those things.

(33:34):
And it's great to see now theMarine Park Authority or Reef
Authority and the Foundation areworking with schools, teaching
kids like Minnow at a young ageto fall in love with these
places, so they'll go away andthey'll use their powerful
minds, because they've all got apowerful mind, and they'll put
it to good use and they'll comeup with ideas we haven't thought
of.
And it's like, oh wow, andprotect the place or come up

(33:57):
with protection for it.

SPEAKER_05 (33:58):
I know you want to ask a question, but I really
want to ask a question.
So to just dive into what youwere just describing, Pete,
about where you travelled thismorning to get to the island,
going over these incrediblelocations like Noosa and Gari
and up here to the island.
We've just done that similarline, but from even further

(34:18):
south, our home waters of thenorthern rivers of New South
Wales, where our rivers are veryunhealthy, very, very sick
rivers.
And we've been travelling thisclose-in track along the coast
slowly by sailboat, coming inand sleeping on the edges of
those rivers, and noticing as wecome north, Noosa River, for

(34:41):
example, is the first river thatwe crossed that was
unstraightened.
Yeah, it had a natural mouth.
And then Double Island throughto Inskip, Inskip, also
unstraightened, and then we comethrough the Sandy Straits and
then up through the inside ofGary to the island here.

SPEAKER_00 (35:02):
And the Mary River, too, as you came past.
Really?
Yeah, you came past the MaryRiver.
It's unstraight.
Unstradened.
Magnificent river.

SPEAKER_05 (35:08):
It's so I'm kind of you know building a picture in
my mind of this stretch via thesailing experience.
You have built a picture of thisstretch via your flying
experience, and I would justlike to know how you see those
places further south connectingto this place right here at the

(35:33):
very bottom of the Great BarrierReef, one of the most celebrated
loved places on the planet, butalso kind of mysterious too.
There's a lot of mysteries withthe reef.
We don't fully understandeverything that's happening out
here.
Can you yeah, just paint a bitof a picture of your
perspective?
Because I just think it's sofascinating that you've spent so
much time here, but also flyingover this with a very observant

(35:56):
mind.

SPEAKER_00 (35:57):
This is deep, but it but it's important.
Australia, to the best of myunderstanding, is the only
continent that doesn't have amountain range on the western
side.
It's on the eastern side.
So the wind travels around theplanet west to east.
So South America, Africa, NorthAmerica, as it comes and hits
those mountain ranges, it risesand cools and rains across the

(36:18):
continent or snows across thecontinent, not in Australia, it
comes straight across WesternAustralia, there's nothing.
So it comes across, heats up,dries out, we have this big, dry
central continent.
What happens is these massivebig trade winds come around the
southern part of Australia,around the southern component,
and they turn, and because it'shot out in the middle, we get
these big high pressures,anti-cyclones.
So the the wind's turning thatway, so it drives this big

(36:40):
southeasterly breeze up thateast coast that you just sailed
up, and a big swell comes upthat east coast.
And then these massive currents,we've got you know we've got
that beautiful EAC, the EastAustralian current that runs
down, but then you've got othercurrents inshore that run up.
You're a surfer, you know thisreally well.
So we've got this big surfthat's driving up, which as
Lauren saw today, some of thoselittle creeks and rivers they're

(37:02):
silted up until it rains, thenboof, and they open up and they
flow and then they silt upagain.
It's a natural cycle.
But man, is we're funny buggers,us humans.
I want to be able to take myboat out there every day.
Well, you can't, because it'ssilted up for the next three
months.
So they dredge it, and that'swhat you talked about when you
said these straight rivers, theydredge it and they put rock
walls so that we can get in andout of the river.

(37:24):
Well, sometimes we've got toaccept that we can't always get
out of the river.
And and so you worked hard toget into the Noosa River and you
worked hard to get in throughInskip Point, but it's a natural
entrance.
So you used your skill and theright boat to do that safely.
So what I'm saying is wherethere's a big population,

(37:44):
there's a lot of pressure ongovernment, a lot of pressure on
authority to make it simple,make it easy.
You get away from society, youget away from big numbers, and
people are more accepting of ohthat didn't quite work, but
that's okay, or that's a bitrough, I've got to be a bit more
careful.
So those big population centresbring a lot of pressure onto our

(38:05):
planet.
And I think that's probably, inmy view, the biggest problem we
face.
Yes, we face climate change, weglobal warming, whatever you
want to use to, it's definitelysomething's happening.
But I think more concerningly tome is population.
There's a lot of us, eight plusbillion of us.
So that puts pressure, as it'sput pressure down in southeast

(38:26):
Queensland, northern rivers.
You know, you you talk aboutthose northern rivers, the
reason they're so sick, they cutthose beautiful forests down.
It was magnificent forests, abig timber country.
There's some great books writtenabout that area that you're
talking about.
You know, Lismore Casino, downthere to Whippery and down near
to Grafton, those rivers,magnificent rivers, but they're

(38:47):
very sick because they'resurrounded by sugar cane.
Yeah, yeah.
Sadly, but it is what we'vedone.
But we humans are slow tochange.
But we will.
I I'm a big believer that wewill, whether it's Minnow that
does it or Minnow's kids that doit, we'll slowly, and we're
setting the we're setting thebase mark now.
We're saying we've got tochange.

(39:08):
That's why you're doing whatyou're doing, that's why I'm
doing.
We're trying to lead by example.
You know, you said it again, oneperson can make a difference.
One person does make adifference.
A lot of us don't believe that.
We feel oh it's hopeless, Ican't make a difference.
Yes, you can.
Everyone can.
Yeah, I've been lucky with thisplace.
I've had the ability to havethis amazing platform.
But I I saw it, I reached forit, I didn't know if I'd get it,

(39:30):
I got it.
So it's incumbent on me to makesure I do the best I can for
myself and my family and ourteam to inspire the young people
of the world.

SPEAKER_05 (39:38):
So, how do people do that, Pete?
So, how how can people learnfrom what you have co-created
here?
How do we access your story inorder to not have to reinvent
the wheel down the coast onanother sandy island or another
spot that may have similarities?
How can we get a hold of yourstory?

SPEAKER_00 (40:00):
Curiosity, inspire our own internal curiosity.
Go walk around and looking.
When I first walked around here,there wasn't much to see because
it was a mess.
But I looked and I listened andI thought, and what do we need?
And then I went to some of theother coral caves.
It's the same thing.
If you're up in the big rivercountry, which is where you are,
that means that back of thatcountry is that big river

(40:21):
country.
Go and have a look.
And what can you do?
And it might only be a smallthing in your mind, but it's
every step.
I have this saying, you're gonnalove this.
300 years ago, the planet was atthis level.
Let's use that as a really good,healthy level.
But 300 years later, it's downhere.
So what made that happen?
Was it one thing?

(40:41):
Or two things?
Or three things?
It was millions of things.
Millions of little tiny actionsgot us to here.
I'm excited to say I think we'resomewhere in the bottom of the
pit.
I believe we're coming back up.
So we want to get back to here,don't we?
So how are we going to do it?
Is it going to be one thing ortwo things or three?
I mean millions of tiny actions.

(41:03):
Every little action that eachand every one of us does,
whether it's using a bit lesspower, whether it's riding a
bike rather than a car, whateverit might be, planting a few
extra cheese, enthusing yourneighbours or your friends,
helping, volunteering, whateverit might be, it's one of those
little actions.
And we just can't go from hereto here overnight.

(41:24):
It's not realistic.
It took us quite a while to getourselves in the pickle we're
in.
It's going to take us a while toget out of it.

SPEAKER_05 (41:32):
Wonderfully said.

SPEAKER_04 (41:34):
Yeah.
We were sitting with AndyRidley, he's CEO of Citizens for
the Reef, and he was speaking solovingly about Lady Elliott
Island and the beautiful workyou've done here, and he really
considers the island as anambassador for the reef.
When I think about the GreatBarrier Reef and the predominant
global narrative around the reefright now, it's very doom and

(41:57):
gloom based.
It's heading in a what seemslike a very scary decision.
How do you hold both that storyand your lived experience of
hope and regeneration and sortof unexpected adaptation at the
same time?

SPEAKER_00 (42:17):
So that's a great example, isn't it?
Like Andy came to Australia, hisbattery was flat from his earth
hour thing, but he wanted tomake a difference.
Back in the early 2000s, therewas a whole lot of negative
about the Barrier Reef.
There was a lot of agendas aboutcoal and so on.
And Andy came out here and wemet and he got inspired.
He was inspired anyway, but hegot more inspired.

(42:38):
And look at what the differencethat Andy's making with
citizens, and now with theircensus.
He came back here a couple oftimes, almost in cheers.
I could see it in him.
He was almost a flood.
I've got to give up, don't giveup, Andy, keep going.
And now he's going and he's onfire, and that citizens is on
fire, and it'll make adifference.
So I think that's just soimportant to keep encouraging

(43:01):
each other and making sure thatwe don't give up.
We do encourage each other, wedo believe that we can make a
difference, because we can andwe are, and that's just so
important.
Our children are everything.
I can see it in you guys howmuch you love young Minnow, and
it's obvious you've been greatparents.

(43:23):
You can see it in the way theyoung fella is.
That says, speaks volumes to me.
And I'm so proud of my children.
And I was a hard-working guy, soit was hard for me to mix work,
and but I would just stop and goto their things that they were
doing, whether it was gymnasticsor whatever it might be, you
just made the time.
So your children are everything.

(43:43):
And there's a few sayings, andone of them is really good, is
that we don't we don't inheritthe earth from our parents.
We actually borrow it from ourchildren.
So we're borrowing this planetfrom our children.
We're not inheriting it from ourparents.
So if we don't look after it,what are we leaving our
children?
We have to believe the hope ofhuman beings is enormously

(44:07):
powerful.
I mean, you sadly she's justpassed away, but Jane Goodall,
one of my heroes, she talksabout that the four reasons for
hope.
And one of them she talks aboutis the enthusiasm and the energy
and the spirit of our youngpeople.
You know, they uh they wake up,they're alive, wow, I'm five,

(44:28):
I'm ten, I'm fifteen, it's myturn.
What am I going to do with theplanet?
We have to make sure we givethem something that they can do
things with.
Because the other thing shetalks about is the brilliance of
the human mind.
We all have this brilliant mind,we've touched on it before.
So that hope into our childrenis critical.
And we we're humans, so we allhave moods.

(44:51):
And we'll all go in a bit of ahole.
I have it, we all do it, youknow, don't fool ourselves, I
don't think.
It's like, oh, something thisand that.
Oh.
You just gotta trust yourself toget through it and try not to
show it too much because youdon't want to pull others down.
You've got to try and getyourself out of that hole and be
back and be positive.
We've we've survived hundreds ofthousands of years as a species,

(45:13):
and I think we'll survive for along time, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (45:16):
What do you see here on the island that gives you
hope?

SPEAKER_00 (45:19):
It's just the speed with which it wants to recover.
It's it's screaming at me,saying thank you.
It's screaming at me, it'ssaying thanks, you know.
Did you ever read Lord of theRings?

unknown (45:30):
No.

SPEAKER_02 (45:30):
No.

SPEAKER_00 (45:32):
Oh, it's awesome.
It's a great book with greatlessons and messages in it.
I probably read it eight or ninetimes.
I probably read it when I wasten my first time.
There's so many lessons in life.
Professor Tolkien was a geniusand he wrote some amazing things
in it.
But this place reminds you ofthat.
They came back from theirjourney to their home, and their

(45:53):
home was destroyed.
All the forest had been cutdown.
But along the way, this elvenqueen had given this little tiny
thing of magic sand.
And what are we going to do withthis magic sand?
Can we put it there and make onetree grow?
And they talked about it, andone of them said, no, we're
going to put one little drop ofsand at the base of every tree
in their forest that had been sodestroyed while they were away

(46:14):
by the bad forces.
So they put this little drop ofsand around all the bases of all
these trees.
The forest went crazy.
Every time I look at this, Ithink of that, and I think, this
forest is saying thank you.
You're putting us back.
And it inspires me to keep goingwhen I have my down days, like
we all do, you know.
Like life is tough.
No one gets an easy ride.

(46:34):
No one gets an easy ride.
We all battle with our owninternal demons as well as
external demons.
But I think we have to believein ourselves.
I think that's possibly one ofmy advantages, I suppose.
Because I had a fairly turbulentchildhood, I don't know why, but
I came out of it just believingin myself.
I can do that.
Don't tell me I can't do that.
Don't ever tell me I can't.

(46:54):
I have a saying, there's no suchword as can't in my life.
I can.
Don't tell me I can't.
So I just believe if I'm gonnado it, I'm gonna do it.
And if I hit a wall and I can't,it's okay.
No, hang on.
How can I?
How are we gonna find a way?
Or maybe my goal is too high,maybe we just have to reset the
bar.
And I think we need to all seethat is that we all have this

(47:17):
amazing power to do things.
And believe in yourself is soimportant, I think.
Self-belief.
You want to build a boat, youwant to sail to the reef, you
did it.

SPEAKER_05 (47:25):
Yeah, yeah, you know?
Oh, it's beautiful, mate.
I'm so grateful that you are soeloquent and open to sharing.
Because I feel like for us aspeople who just live, you know,
down the coast and envision thebarrier reef, but wonder how
we're connected.
You know, we live in differentecosystems, but actually

(47:47):
interestingly, where we dive,Nuthlung Alley, the island
Julian Rocks off Byron Bay, isthis line where we have coral
species coming down, fish comingdown and temperate species
coming up, and it's this mixingpoint, yeah.
And we're right on that edge,that subtropical edge.
So we know we're connected to uphere in this country, yeah, but

(48:10):
there's a difference betweenknowing it and feeling it and
experiencing it, and that's whatthis trip's really been about.
And so to be able to sit withyou and have the birds shit on
my shoulder and listen to yourlaugh and look in your eyes and
hear your words and feel yourspirit, it's really such a
blessing.
And I'm so grateful that we'vehad this moment because I know

(48:30):
you're a gung-ho fellow andyou've got lots going on, and
yeah, it's just really an honourfor us to do this and to share
this with water people, people,coastal people all over the
world, and hope that we yeah,skill share and learn from each
other and learn from someonewho's who's walked the talk,
man.
Like you really have, and that'ssuper inspiring for us.

SPEAKER_00 (48:50):
Thank you, and and and it's likewise, it's it's for
me, it's inspiring to see thereare people that think the same.
But we did share those values,share you know that that
eloquent caring for each other,that spirit, it it encourages
you because sometimes you feellike you're the Lone Ranger, you
know, and because not everyonesees the world that way, and I

(49:11):
and I feel sad for people whodon't.
You try and inspire them to say,hey, it doesn't need to be like
that, it can be like this.
And a lot of people do get it,but occasionally people don't
get it.
So it's fantastic to meetwonderful people and share some
time together out here.
We had a wonderful flight upthis morning, Lauren and and and
and Andy and Lil Minnow.

SPEAKER_02 (49:31):
It's just crazy.

SPEAKER_00 (49:33):
But you know, one of the things we do with our
airplanes, this is diverging alittle bit because you talk
about connectedness.
We talked about this mountainrange on the east coast of
Australia.
So the wind comes around theeast side, comes up, climbs up
those mountains and rains andruns back down those rivers,
those big rivers you weretalking about.
So we have our high rainfall onthis east coast.
So those big rivers run fromthat, whereas on other

(49:56):
continents it's on the westcoast.
So Australia's unique.
The Great Dividing Range, it'squite unique.
So all our weather is here whereour population is.
But go on the other side of itand you go out to the most
amazing rivers, the DiamantinaRiver and Cooper Creek and the
Paru and the Bulu.
And so I take people out therewith my airplanes to inspire

(50:16):
them about the centre ofAustralia.
So different to here.
But it's connected, man, becausethe air's coming past and it's
coming to here and it's raining,and then the rain that falls up
there is going into the GreatArtesian Basin and travelling
right underneath the continentand bubbling up out there near
Alice Springs.
It's so connected, it's just soexciting, and then it's bubbling
and they, you know, wow.

SPEAKER_05 (50:38):
Man, I want to get my pilot's license if I can get
that perspective right there.

SPEAKER_04 (50:42):
That would be unbelievable.
Another story that I was reallystruck by today, Pete, was you
were talking about how thisisland is rising.
Can you share that story?

SPEAKER_01 (50:53):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 (50:54):
Because I feel like that is something beyond our
imagination in a way that theplanet is adapting in ways that
we can't even fathom.

SPEAKER_00 (51:02):
So I think that's one of the things that really
triggered my enthusiasm was howdid this island get here?
You know, like how did it gethere?
So 10,000 years ago, sea levelwas approximately 30 meters
lower.
30 metres a long way.
So did the island stick up 30metres?
No.
The island didn't even exist.
The island did not exist.
So the Tarabalang Bunda peopleand the Baelis and the

(51:26):
Aboriginal people that livedthrough this area, they walked
around out there because sealevel was off the edge of the
continental shelf and droppedoff there, and this was dry
land, only 30, 20 to 30 metresdown.
So we had this big interglacialperiod, this ice age, and the
sea level rose, but on the edgeof the shelf was some corals,
but it wasn't ideal, so theywere corals, but they weren't

(51:48):
the Great Barrier Reef.
So the sea level came up andover the top, and it and it
pushed the Aboriginal peopleback to where the coastline now
is.
So they left this area and thesea level rose, but what became
was this perfect environment forcoral reef.
So coral loves lots of sunlight,warm water, shallow water, and

(52:08):
no sediment, no runoff.
So all of a sudden, bam, we're80 kilometers from the coast,
it's shallow, it's sunny, it'swarm, and so these corals
migrated up onto the top, andthey made the reef 2,000
kilometres, it's crazy, allalong that edge.
But some places, as the reef wasfurther out, because it had no
sediment, no runoff, some of theplaces, just because that same

(52:32):
thing we talked about, theconnectedness of that big
continent and these big windscoming around, these big swells
coming up, crashed down on thisliving coral, broke the coral
into the pieces that you seearound us.
So on the living coral sittingin the shallow water, as because
the sea level didn't just go upone night, it went up about
three millimetres a year,roughly, corals got thrown on

(52:52):
the top.
Dead corals got thrown on thetop, and living corals were
around the outside.
So, what do you think happened?
Oh, the birds came along.
Oh, that's a good spot, I'llland here.
So the birds pooped, the birdsbrought seeds in their feathers,
in their bellies, they died,their bodies became seed pods,
so they started to create alayer of fertilizer.

(53:13):
And then the sea level keptrising and more coral got thrown
up and more birds.
So, guess what happened?
About three millimetres a year,some places just stayed
underwater, most of the reef isunderwater, but these randomly
stunningly beautiful places likeLady Elliot and Lady Musgrave
and Fairfax and Heron, thereasons that we still don't yet
understand why this one get a Kbut another one didn't, is K

(53:38):
formed.
K, C-A-Y, coral K.
And so the bird pup mixed withthe crushed up coral, because
crushed up coral is calciumcarbonate, so bird pup is
nitrogen, phosphorus, calciumcarbonate is the coral, three
elements of cement.
Rain, waves, stirred it all up,went hard.
Created a thing called beachrock or K rock or coral rock,

(53:58):
same stuff.
Went really hard.
So when cyclones came, it didn'twash away.
But then it might have been over10,000 years, this little island
grew and grew and grew.
So here she sat, here's thisbeautiful little island.
And if you go out there and diveout on the blowhole, and I think
you heard me say it, there's theold island down there.
We dive, and hopefully you mightbe able to do it while you're

(54:18):
here.
We dive on a place called theblowhole, where the old island
is about 15 metres down.
Because sea level, it wasn't alinear rise, it kind of went up
and down and up and down, andyou can find places here where
it was over the top and it'sgone down again.
Because that's what sea leveldoes.
And so the island formed,created blowholes, stabilized
for a while, then all of asudden up she came again, and

(54:40):
then it's stabilized, and it'sstabilised now for about 3,000
years.
So over that approximately 3,000years, this K has stabilized.
So all that vegetation, all thatbird porp, all those dead bodies
have created this layer ofmulch.
That lay of mulch grew to thepoint it was about two metres
deep.
And that was the guano or thefertilizer that the first guano

(55:03):
miners came looking for back in1860 when the European
settlement happened inAustralia, they were looking for
fertiliser, they dug it all offthis place.
They took the trees off it,which basically doomed the
island to die.
Because there's another one justlike this on the northern end
called Rain Island.
So we're on the southern end,it's on the northern end.
Rain has been stripped, but itdidn't have the fortunate

(55:25):
benefit of tourism.
Because tourism, tourists cominghere spending their money and
giving people like me theability to make the change,
re-vegetated it.
So now the island's actuallygrowing again because the
vegetation's regrowing.
So the island will rise withrising sea level.
How crazy is that?
I mean, how crazy is that?
That's it's a dynamic, organicenvironment.

(55:47):
You can smell it.

SPEAKER_02 (55:49):
Yeah, yeah, and you can feel it.

SPEAKER_00 (55:51):
And it's pooping on you, and it's growing at one
poop at a time.

SPEAKER_05 (55:56):
That's good shit.

SPEAKER_00 (55:57):
It's good shit, eh?
No shit.
But that's that's the story of acoral cave.
Yeah.
And to me, they are such uniqueenvironments.
There's not many of them.
There's only three coral caveson the whole reef that have a
resort.
So it's Green Island up offCairns, Heron Island off
Gladstone, and Lady ElliottIsland here.

(56:19):
But there's only one of themthat has an airstrip.
And you're like, oh, what's goodabout the estuary?
The air strip makes it easy forus to get here and enables us to
have the resources to get stuffand people and Sir David
Attenborough, Prince Charles,now King Charles, these people
have been here because theycould get here in a short period
of time.
Eric Solheim, the DirectorGeneral of the United Nations

(56:41):
Environmental Department.
So many of these people havebeen here because they can fly
here.
Inspires them, enthusiasm.
They go off to their homecountry and they talk about Lady
Elliot or the things that havebeen achieved here.
Not so much about me, it's aboutwhat we've done.
The aeroplanes, yeah, I'd loveto not use aeroplanes because
yes, I get the fact that there'sa greenhouse gas emission from

(57:02):
it, but I use the best ones Ican, the most economical ones I
can.
I've invested heavily inelectric engines for them.
We've now got electric engines.
We can't yet get a fuel sourcethat will give us more than 30
minutes.
As you know, it's more than 30minutes here.
I don't want to go swimminghalfway.
So until, because we'vesupported people that are
building, we went throughbatteries, we just couldn't get

(57:23):
more than 35 to 40 minutes outof batteries.
So now they're doing hydrogen,hydrogen electric.
I keep hoping that I'm going tofly at all electric aircraft
here before I'm too old to fly.
I thought it was going to be 65,that's gone a year ago.
So now I'm saying 70.
And I keep inspiring all myfriends that are scientists to
do that stuff.
Hurry up, man.
We need an electric airplane.

(57:44):
But if we don't keep inspiringthose bikes, and they're coming
out in the next couple of weekswith their whole team, they're
spending millions on developinghydrogen and coming out.
I'm going to give them a, I callit a needle, give them an
injection of enthusiasm to getthat stuff going.

SPEAKER_05 (58:00):
I love it.
I think it's fascinating that somuch has come from flying.

SPEAKER_00 (58:04):
Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 (58:05):
I just I've thought for a long time that like our
greatest form of activism is ourgreatest loves.
Yeah.
Like even if it's obscure, likeyou're a surfer.
Like we're surfers, what canthat what use does that have in
the world?
But it's what we have, it's whatwe love, it's how we connect
with people and we use it theway we can.
And for you, it just seems likethat flying thread is through

(58:27):
the whole thing and that biggerpicture perspective.
And then you land on the groundand you're right there on the
ground.

SPEAKER_00 (58:33):
And you've seen it from the air.

SPEAKER_05 (58:34):
Oh, fascinating.

SPEAKER_00 (58:35):
And you know, those two rivers I mentioned, the
Cooper Creek and the DiamondTina, they're the last two
rivers on the planet that arehave have not been dammed, not
been filled with.
Wow.
They are magnificent rivers.
They drain the whole centralQueensland basin and down, they
end up in Lake Air.
Magnificent rivers.
So I take a lot of people everyyear.
We do about 25 to 30 trips herein the wintertime, and we take

(58:57):
them out and we show them fromthe air, and use the same
enthusiasm.
I'll land in Birdsville and I'llget them all pumped up, and I'll
go to William Creek and Lake Airand then show them these places.
So they go back and it's thesame thing.
They're putting pressure ontheir government or their
people.
Stop thinking about mining thoserivers or damming those rivers.
Now that's not the reef, butit's it's interconnected, you

(59:18):
know, it's interconnected soclosely.

SPEAKER_04 (59:22):
Time is precious.
Thanks for spending some ofyours listening with us today.
Our editor this season is themulti-talented Ben Jake
Alexander.
The soundtrack was composed byShannon Soul Carroll, with
additional tunes by Dave andBen.
We'll be continuing today'sconversation on Instagram, where
we're at Water People Podcast.
And you can subscribe to ourvery frequent newsletter to get

(59:44):
book recommendations, questionsfor pondering, behind the scenes
glimpses into recording thepodcast, and more via our
website, waterpeoplepodcast.com.