One of the things that people have often asked Glen and me during the pandemic has been how we’re coping with not being able to get on a plane. To which I usually reply, “There’s nowhere safe to go even if we could get out of the country.” And with Perth being one of the safest places in the world right now, wanderlust took a back seat.

But now it’s back and we’ve taken our first overseas holiday since getting back to Australia in March — Christmas Island.

In September Narelle let us know she was going just before a Christmas. This was back when we were locked in Fortress WA so I struggled to believe that even with border closures, Western Australians were allowed to fly to Christmas Island and Cocos (Keeling) Islands without quarantining on their return. So we booked, the main reason being to see the red crab migration. The second, because it was somewhere to go.

During the months between booking and departure, WA’s borders reopened so there was some degree of normality returning to the state. We left on Tuesday 15 December, undergoing a discombobulating experience at Perth Airport.

I’d requested the driver take us to Terminal 1 because that’s what the Perth airport website had said was the departing terminal for flights to Christmas Island. The driver said Terminal 1 was closed and everything was leaving from Terminal 2. Despite my misgivings, I figured he’d been coming here a lot more than I had of late so we got dropped off at Terminal 2.

No, that was not where we were meant to check in. So we walked across to a Terminal 1 and checked in there, on the international side. The woman behind the counter gave us our boarding passes and bid us farewell, but didn’t actually tell us where we had to go. 

Being a a Virgin flight I figured we’d go up to the Virgin side of the Terminal but then the security woman ordered us to go to a Terminal 2 so we went back to Terminal 2, where we were then told to go to Terminal 1 international. We finally find the right place to go, bought four bottles of half priced booze to settle our nerves, and sat at the gate.

Despite all the run around we were still at least 90 minutes early for our flight. It turns out though that we weren’t the only ones who had got into difficult, as Narelle and Catherine, and Justin and Voey also ran the gauntlet between the two terminals. Ahh travel!

We boarded the half-full plane and left almost an hour late due to luggage being loaded. There were a lot of people taking big polystyrene eskies with them because of the food costs on the islands. The only people wearing masks on the plane were the flight attendants. I felt like we were doing the wrong thing, and also that we’ve missed out on learning how to get comfortable with masks because we’ve had it so good in WA.

We landed at Christmas Island’s dinky airport where we picked up our luggage off the back of the flatbed trucks. We picked up our cars, these bush-bashed Rav4’s that struggle when going uphill. But we had our cars and set off for our accommodation in the township. 

Christmas Island lies very close to the equator and only about 300km from Indonesia. It’s tropical and mostly covered in rainforest (where it hasn’t been strip mined for phosphate). Itks very rocky but the water looks good. The main wildlife is crabs and birds, but also some reptiles and bats. It’s also a small place with a small population, yet we got a little bit lost trying to find accommodation and tempers frayed within about thirty seconds, just like on our previous holidays.

Along the drive we encountered many red crabs scuttling across the roads, however, we were about a week late for the massive, nightmare-inducing mass migration. We were now limited to individuals, but they were still cool to see. Less cool was trying to avoid crushing them beneath my tyres. I swerved to avoid one, which prompted much yelling from Glen, but we were safe.

We were all staying near each other, barely twenty metres apart. Glen and I were at the Captain’s Lookout, a single self-contained unit with everything we need, especially air con. We arrived about 5/5:30 so there wasn’t a lot of daylight left. We relaxed then went for dinner at the Golden Bosun, which served massive meals that were also matched in price. 

After dinner we walked to the kampong in search of a supermarket we’d been told was open until 9pm. We didn’t have exact directions but it gave us the opportunity to see the town and the waterfront and jetty, and a lot more crabs. 

Glen spotted the supermarket behind a block of units. It reminded me of Singapore where people live on the floors above while beneath you have shops and restaurants. We picked up supplies, headed back to our accommodation, and went to bed.