Aussisms for today:

• Stinker – 1. A very hot day 2. Anything very difficult or unpleasant
• Bottler – An expression of delight or absolute approval. A synonym for beauty!
• Acre – The buttocks or backside: ’sitting on his acre’

One man’s life long dream is about to become reality – I love that.

That’s how my Afritrex expedition around Africa last year happened, five years of planning and finally it happened.

The same goes for Tim Reigel who’s continuing the project his father started 31 years ago – to build  low impact resort entitled Turtle Street Beach Resort on the land he owns on Curtis Island near Gladstone. Back then he dreamt of having a small resort built on the headland offering exclusive living and holidays utilising the land around for cattle grazing, raising stud horses and a different style of living from the islands which I’ve become used to seeing.

As we arrived back in Gladstone from Heron Island there was a surprise waiting for us; another helicopter flight for Bre and I! Tim had organised for us to fly out to his land to see first hand what his vision was and where it’d all start to take place in just a few months time…..finally.

We flew along the creek, over the ocean and touched down on the hook of the headland where this……

Will become this…..

After years of battling bureaucracy, handing land back as national park and waiting patiently for the right plans and time the shovels will hit the dirt very soon and in eighteen months time the first of the residents will move into their new properties.

I’ve been subject wholly to island life since arriving so having the chance to see 4WD tracks twisting through the forest, the cattle forming lines across the vast flood plains and to gawp at the massive orange sand dunes by the river was a real eye opener. This is the Australia I’ll discover after the ‘Best Job in the World’ – a very different and wild environment but just as exciting.

…and Tim’s vision for the future? He wants to become the Activities Manager offering to take clients on horse rides, teach them to throw a lasso or walk the beach passing on his knowledge.

Now that to me is a retirement plan to work for, even if it does involve 31 years of trying…..