Part the Next: Arrival in Adelaide.

As we were landing in Adelaide, I tried cracking some jokes as we cautiously headed for the car rental office. We wondered whether they'd sent a confirmation while we were mid-flight or if they'd come up with some new way to throw us for a loop. Fortunately, we were arriving during business hours and we figured that someone would be in the rental office and thus, we'd have a better chance of getting the car we were supposed to have. The nice lady at the agency greeted us warmly and said something about it being odd that we'd reserved two cars instead of one.

We didn't need or want two rental cars, but I thought this was better than having no rental car at all like the last time. Once we sorted out the extra car, the rental process went like normal, and we found ourselves with a much cleaner car than the secondhand one we'd used last time around. We headed south, on our way to Kangaroo Island.

Kangaroo Island is named, in the honorable Australian tradition of Not Creative, for two things: 1) it's populated by a lot of kangaroos; and 2) it's an island. D explained how they name things down here and recalled a conversation with her friend Peter:

“Peter, what do they call those brown snakes?”
“Brown Snakes.”
“And those green frogs that live in trees?”

“Green Tree Frogs.”

 

So we drove south toward the ferry landing. I've ridden a LOT of ferries. Having lived on the watery side of British Columbia when I was a lad, we often rode the 3 hour ferry from the US to Canada, rode other ferries from the mainland to Vancouver Island, rode smaller ferries from Nanaimo to Gabriola Island (plus lots of other small islands up there), and throughout the rest of my life up to the present, rode all the ferries that go to the various San Juan Islands on the US side and even rode ferries between islands. And it's always the same: drive to the parking lot, buy a ticket at the ticket booth, park the car in the line and wait for the boat. The parking lot holds as many cars the ferry itself, so if there isn't room in the lot, you wait for the next boat. Very straightforward stuff.

 

When the boat arrives, drive aboard and either take a nap in the car or head to the above decks for the ride. Or stand on the car deck and watch the sea rush past. Given how well this works, it had never occurred to me that anyone would ever have reason to completely corrupt a perfect system and replace it with pure idiocy.

 

We pulled into the ferry line and noticed that there weren't very many cars. Cool. There also wasn't a ticket booth, which made no sense at all. The helpful guy who was letting the other cars onto the ferry explained that we had to go buy tickets at the lounge, a scant 100 yards away, across the flow of traffic that was getting off and on the ferry. Given that the unloading and loading didn't look too streamlined, I figured I had time to get tickets before this boat departed.

 

I'd been warned, about a thousand times, about the heat in Australia. January is what they call “summer.” And it was January. Everyone had made a big deal about how hot it was going to be. Turns out, though, that January here (at least this January) was almost exactly like January in Portland – low 40s, heavy rain, wind blowing sideways. Not knowing any better, I'd dressed for the thing we Americans call summer and was wearing a pair of shorts, flipflops and t-shirt. This was the kind of rain that had you soaked through in moments, so by the time I made it to the lounge, I'd been thoroughly rinsed 4 or 5 times. I should've brought shampoo.

 

I went inside to buy the ticket and learned that to buy a ferry ticket in Australia, you have to provide the names and ages of the passengers (this I knew off the top of my head), the license number of the car (of course, I had no idea what this might be), proof that you have travel insurance (safely tucked away in D's purse back in the car), evidence that you have accommodations arranged ahead of time (ditto that) and enough money to spend while you're on the island that you won't create some kind of fiscal burden for the locals.

 

Once you do all of that, and even after you pay, you still don't get your ticket.

 

This 'proof of everything' process allows you to buy a voucher which you can then exchange for the actual tickets. After a trip back to the car through the sideways rain, I was able to secure all of the necessary information we'd need to trade the voucher I'd just bought for the tickets we actually needed. We did manage to negotiate passage on the boat that was coming in another hour, then arranged for our return trip because that also had to be scheduled ahead of time. Otherwise, I was warned, we might find ourselves stranded on Kangaroo Island for several days while we waited for an empty slot on their apparently always full ferries. Once that was done, I asked to trade our voucher for our tickets.

 

“No. You can't get your tickets until the prior boat pulls away from the dock.”

 

I was certain I'd misunderstood, so I asked for clarification. “Are you saying that I have to wait until the boat that's here right now leaves before I can get tickets for the boat that leaves in another hour?”

 

“Yes.”

 

I was now thinking that airlines might not be the most absurd and poorly staffed excuse for transportation.

 

I was also wary, though, as D had warned me about the Aussie sense of humor. Apparently it includes a lot of bullshitting, which is designed to keep you guessing which parts of any given statement might actually be true. So if someone says "watch out for Drop Bears," they might be playing a funny joke on the tourist, and if they say "watch out for man-eating crocodiles," they might really be sincere. But the delivery is exactly the same for the thing that's a joke and the thing that might kill you instantly.

 

As soon as the wrong boat pulled away from the dock, a flood of voucher-holding passengers lined up to get their tickets. The system ensures that everyone has to crowd into the lounge and stand in line at least twice. Apparently this is better than driving up to a ticket booth while enjoying the dry comfort of your car, buying a ticket from the friendly ferry ticket person while enjoying the dry comfort of your car and waiting in line while enjoying the dry comfort of your car like we do back home. Maybe our system is different because it rains a lot in the Pacific Northwest and Kangaroo Island is in a dry part of the world. Unless we're visiting, when the whole of South Australia becomes completely soaked everywhere.

 

The extra steps are probably related to the cost, too. The ride takes about the same amount of time as a ride from the mainland in Washington State to Orcas island... but the ticket costs SIX TIMES as much. Even with the exchange rate. For that much more scratch, I'd think they'd have a really slick system in place.

We waited in the lounge until the next boat – our boat – was pulling up to the dock, then walked through the sideways rain and cold – summer, I reminded myself – and made our way back to the car. I groused about having to walk laps across the parking lot in the cold rain while all three of us were fighting the same sinus infection that Eli had picked up on the flight from Hong Kong. We kept him well hydrated but after a few days with no improvement we'd tried out the health clinic in Albany that I mentioned earlier and found that he had an infection in his throat, sinuses and one of his ears.

And though we're loath to do it, we'd started him on another round of antibiotics. His appetite came back on about the fifth day, then his humor, then his interest in things other than just sleeping or laying in Momma's arms. But on this day, as we waited for the ferry, he was still awfully fussy and uncomfortable and not well suited to hanging around outside in the stormy weather.

And of course, shortly after he'd first showed symptoms, Daria had gotten the same bug, and then I got it too. We three have been more sick in the last two months than in the last several years. Our tissues made it clear that D and I were also powering through a substantial sinus infection. Yuk. We've also exhausted the tissue supply in South Australia.

So we got into the car, got Eli into his car seat (this is a lot like trying to put socks on an octopus whose head is full of PCP) and drove up to the guy taking the tickets. He explained that passengers aren't allowed to ride in cars that are boarding the ferry. D replied:

“I have a child in the car seat.”
“He'll have to be carried.”

Having never had to do this before despite riding a hundred different ferries, I quickly realized that the Aussie system for embarking on ferries is, simply, a Crock of Shit.

I took our unhappy and still hollering son back out of the car and into the rain, pulled his now soaked fleece jacket over his also soaked long sleeved onesie, asked the guy exactly where we were supposed to wait, and headed to the gangplank he so helpfully pointed out. On the way, I passed another ferry employee and asked him also, just so I didn't make any further mistakes. He promptly reiterated what the first guy had said – that gangplank.

E and I went and stood on the gangplank with a couple other people. In the cold sideways raining summer morning. All the cars got on the boat. Then all the people who were traveling with dogs got on the boat. Foot passengers did not get on the boat. After a few minutes, D came to the side of the boat and hollered down to me, asking why I was standing outside. Apparently it wasn't obvious and must not have appeared a smart thing to be doing with a sick kid, so I explained that this is where both of the sadist ferry operators had told me to wait. She encouraged me to go inside and wait there. I wondered whether or not we'd be allowed inside, or once inside whether we'd be allowed outside.

I went inside and walked up to the voucher-not-ticket counter and asked the woman there where I could wait for the boat.

“Right outside that door, on the gangplank.” That's where we'd been when D suggested we get out of the rain moments prior.

“If I wait inside, can I be sure I don't miss the boat?”

“You can wait inside if you want.” She emphasized 'want' the way that you do when you're giving someone permission to do something that's obviously stupid and you want to make sure they realize that they're stupid even though your position prevents you from speaking in plain terms to customers. This was alright with me, as I'd abandoned any hope of being considered anything other than a complete idiot as far as anyone who'd even heard of Australia, let alone any of the actual Australians, was concerned. There's a confidence that accompanies this 'resignation to stupidness.' Maybe you've witnessed it yourself.

So E and I waited inside for about ten seconds, and then he started trying to open the door that led to the sodden gangplank, and when I wouldn't let him open the door, he started screaming, then he banged his head against the door a few times before I could grab him and flopped down on his back and writhed around in the misery known only by sick 21 month old boys who want their nurturing Mommy instead of their lousy Daddy. Then he got up and pushed his way through the door, and we calmly waited outside.

A few minutes later, we got on the boat. For whatever reason, we walked in through the entry door and into the lounge but were directed out the aft door onto the outside deck, up a flight of stairs, then walked the length of the boat along the topside deck (which really ought to be called “the roof,” as it offered zero protection from the elements) to the forward door, down two flights of stairs, along a short hallway, and then up another set of steps until we were about 30 feet from the door we'd come in through in the first place. I thought about methods of scuttling a craft such as this.

Even now, warm and dry and unbothered, I can't make sense of the process.

There wasn't a dry spot anywhere on E or myself. D changed him in the bathroom (I could tell which bathroom, as he never stopped with the loud protests), then she dried his clothes under the hand drier. When we arrived on the other side, rather than follow whatever rules for disembarking might exist, the three of us sneaked brazenly stomped our way to the car and drove off the boat.

Welcome to Kangaroo Island.