By the following morning, the wind was into the teens and the rain had decreased to an occasional drizzle. We decided now was our chance to get ashore and have a look around.
Prime Seal Island is the 5th largest of the 100 or so islands of the Furneaux Group. It is not currently populated, but has a flock of Merino wool sheep roaming its hills and a homestead for their visiting farmers. It was apparently not named such because it was a nice place to go ashore and watch the antics of the many adorable seals there. It seems that 19th Century explorers only knew how to do one thing when encountering animals in the wild. Maryanne did see one seal swimming in the water near Begonia as we were preparing to put the dinghy down. That is the only one we know is left for certain (Although it was reported to have a LOT of seals back in 1827).
Ashore, we joined what our topographic map showed as a trail, with the idea of making a big loop around the center of the island. The trails were really foot (and sometimes tractor) tracks that ran alongside various fences for the purpose of building and maintaining them.
We soon found ourselves unwittingly herding several shaggy Merino sheep that bolted as soon as they saw us and then did their best to stay at least a hundred meters ahead. The flock ran up the hill past our first turnoff and seemed to be very relieved that we had given up our low-speed chase. From there, it got hard to tell for sure where the trail was at all, so we just picked our way along any convenient sheep path that seemed to be going in generally the right direction. That worked for the most part. The only downside was that there was a lot of spinifex type tussock grass around and I had only worn shorts for landing the dinghy on the beach, so my poor legs got stabbed and scraped a lot.
In addition to the sheep, we also saw a few pademelons and I'm pretty sure I saw about a third of a second of a wombat diving into the bushes, I was surprised by how fast the little guy could run. {Maryanne: More hope than reality I think; we certainly didn't spot any of the characteristic cube shaped scat around, more likely a pademlon}. We also were occasionally startled by flocks of some quail-like birds that would suddenly come booming out a bush that we had approached too closely. All of the animals we encountered were exceptionally skittish. We were hoping the same was for any unseen snakes. In lots of places, we saw spent shotgun cartridges lying on the ground, which may explain it. We were hoping it wasn't some antisocial hillbilly trying to keep the tourists out. The only buildings we saw were unoccupied and there were no other boats pulled up on the beach beneath them, so we were pretty sure we were the only two people on the island.
After completing most of our loop, we took a side trail that looked like it was heading generally in the direction of the next ridge, where we figured we might get a good view. That trail was also clearly for fence maintenance, although it seems like it had not been used in a while. Lots of the adjacent fence was down and there were several places where we had to negotiate our way around downed trees. We again startled lots of sheep and a few pademelons.
Despite the recent heavy rains, the ground everywhere was dry; It was also scattered with bones, mostly from these two animals, although we did see a few from birds. As they are the last parts to degrade, they represent decades of those who were shot, injured or who couldn't make it through the winter.
At one spot, I found a fairly fresh lamb carcass. As I approached, it twitched. The poor thing was still alive. It could move a little, but seemed too stiff to stand. The only injury we could see was a bloody spot where the eye facing us had been, presumably already removed by a scavenger. As we neared, it wriggled at the sound of our approach, but seemed to have no flexibility at all. We wondered what could have happened. Was it bitten and paralyzed by a snake or is there some sort of disease that does this? Maybe it got injured during the storms we had just had.
We realized it would probably be best to put it out of its misery, but this whole section of island had no good rocks or clubs at hand. I could throw some sod at it or scrape it with a bush, but neither of those would do anything other than increase its distress. In the end, we realized we couldn't do anything other than just let it die in peace. Another storm was due that night and it seemed like it would not be making it through. {Maryanne: We did report our find, along with coordinates}.
We continued on until our map said the trail had ended. We had actually crossed the intervening ridge and had descended to the floor of the next shallow valley. At that point, Maryanne came up with a great idea: Why don't we leave the trail and try to find our way over to the newly grazed field along the coast? That way, we wouldn't have to climb over so many downed trees to get back. Sure, I thought. What's the worst that can happen?
It wasn't actually that bad. The sheep had grazed down a lot of the undergrowth. We only had a couple of places where we had to push our way through thick trees. We also may have technically got lost, but it's an island. We're bound to pop out somewhere we recognize.
When we finally did pop out for our last time, we had a much easier walk back through open fields that had long views all of the way to the beach where our dinghy was resting. After cresting a couple more rises, we were back on the sand taking the obligatory one-end-to-the-other beach walk before returning to Begonia to ride out the next storm, maybe two.
{Maryanne: We even spotted some peafowl on the island, and since we are staying in Peacock Bay, that seemed apt; we understand that they were introduced at some point in history and are clearly still thriving on the island}.
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