The Secrets of Mystery Island:

Generations of Australians have spent "one day in paradise" on Vanuatu's Mystery Island, but few know the many secrets of this stunning coral atoll.

Since 1980 cruise ships have been anchoring in the pristine waters of the island and treating literally millions of Australians to a taste of a genuine paradise.

If you are visiting this amazing, unspoiled place on a cruise, you will enchanted by its white sand beaches, warm waters and friendly locals,.

Even the name of the island is a mystery, but I am one of the few people who can solve that riddle.

You see, Mystery Island is known to the locals as Inyeug, but it gained its fame and more popular European name by sheer chance. PR man Ron Connelly was hosting a group of travel writers on board the legendary Fairstar when the ship made one of its rare visits to the island.

Pressed by members of his press group about the tiny gem, he said: "I have to admit I have never been there; the ship often can't drop anchor…it's a mystery to me." And Mystery Island it became ever after.

Sitmar, owners of Fairstar, were quick to pick up the name and turn it into a clever marketing gimmick.

I suffered the same fate on my first visit to Mystery Island on board that very same ship. Captain Luigi Nappa could not anchor because of the large swell from the south.

The next time I went there, the ship did anchor, but the swell became very treacherous and it was a battle to get everyone aboard in the late afternoon as the seas picked up.  That evening there were nine broken arms and wrists being treated at the ship's hospital.

Today's ships are much bigger and much more maneuverable than the Fairstar and most visits to the island are performed without incident

The most striking feature of the 1.5sqkm Island is the large grassed airstrip that takes up most of the land area. I have heard it described as everything from a WWII bomber base to a fighter base for the Americans.

In fact, one of the locals, Robert, told me it was built as emergency strip in WWII for military aircraft transiting the area. At that time Japan was dominating the war in the Solomon Islands to the north and Mystery Island had the potential to become a major player if they advanced into Vanuatu, which was called the New Hebrides in those days.

Today, the strip is used twice a week as the airport for nearby major island of Aneityum. Robert told me the flights could be quite adventurous as boxes of very much alive lobsters and crabs were stacked beside passengers on board, all bound for the restaurants of Port Vila.

 On rough flights it has been known for the boxes to break open and live crustaceans to cause havoc amongst the well heeled clients. I thought it was just a good story until one day I saw crates of live lobsters being lifted aboard a tiny twin engine commuter plane followed by two very reluctant government officials who were heading back to the big smoke.

Mystery Island's reputation goes far beyond its name. At night, the locals swear that the island is haunted by the mysterious spirits of their ancestors. They won't have a bar of going there after dark.

This had the unexpected advantage of making it a safe haven for European visitors in the 19th century who feared the fierce cannibals on the adjacent mainland.

An array of Europeans happened upon Aneityum with its vast sandalwood forests and a flock of 12,000 locals who just had to be turned into law abiding, god fearing Christians. Other visitors had more sinister motives, capturing or "blackbirding" the local men for work as slaves in the sugar cane fields of Queensland. Whalers first appeared in the 1850s and also found safe haven on the tiny oasis.

Rather than being saved by the well meaning Presbyterian fire and brimstone preachers, the native population was also decimated by introduced illnesses such as smallpox and measles. Within a generation or two, just 500 people were left. Even the massive1000 seat stone church built on the island was gone, destroyed by a tsunami.

Aneityum's main mountain, a dormant volcano, towers almost 1000m above the rainforest which still has mysteries of its own yet to be discovered. Ancient and mysterious totemic petroglyphs have been found carved into the island's volcanic rock.

Recent research has revealed that a sophisticated lifestyle was enjoyed by locals living in an unspoilt paradise in the days before the Europeans arrived. Far from being "primitive cannibals", the various tribes had an intricate community lifestyle.

However, because there no written histories kept amongst those people, the only knowledge was passed down by traditions. This means we will never know what life was like in this isolated part of the world in ancient times or who first populated the region.

Aneityum's equally fascinating flora is also yet to be fully discovered. At this time, there are a recorded 80 species of stunning orchids and the island also has hot springs and substantial waterfalls, thanks to the seemingly perpetual rainfall.

Aneityum's kauri forests were also decimated by visitors, but have since been replanted by the New Zealand government and are a valuable logging resource,

Now, there is fascinating history to be learnt from a much more recent visit. If you know where to look on Mystery Island, you will find a monument to the most famous visitor to the island.

Queen Elizabeth enjoyed an unscheduled beach barbecue on Mystery Island in 1974, en route from Port Vila to Sydney aboard the Royal Yacht Britannia. Strangely yet again, I could find no-one amongst the locals who remembered the visit, however on Aneityum there are photos of the big day proudly brought out for guests.

Looking at the island from a ship, it looks inconsequential compared to its towering neighbor. However as you go ashore in the ship's tender you will be captivated by the crystal clear waters and waving coconut palms. As you near the jetty you will hear singing and music.

Stepping ashore you will suddenly be standing on a white sand beach that will take your breath away. It is named after its most famous visitor, Queen Elizabeth II Beach.

And you will at last be in paradise, as close as you will ever get to a perfect tropical escape.

Words and images by Dallas Sherringham

Feature supplied by: www.wtfmedia.com.au

CAPTIONS:

1. An enthusiastic local at the main terminal of Mystery Island airport

2. Boisterous singing in island harmonies is a feature of island life

3 Queen Elizabeth's stunning personal beach with Aneityum in the background

4 The amazing lagoon as enchanted millions of visitors down through the years

5 A shady tropical oasis welcomes Australian cruise passengers

Struth! The wurst of Berlin street food

SAUCING THE BEST OUT OF THE WURST

David Ellis

BERLIN street food-vendor Herta Heuwer would never have thought back in 1949 that a snack she ran up after swapping some hard-to-get booze (for which she had remarkably fortuitous access,) for equally hard-to-get tomato sauce and curry powder that grog-thirsty British troops still stationed in the city after the war had plenty of supplies of, would one day become a virtual German national dish.

For Herta went home and beat-together the sauce and curry powder, and a few other spices she had as well, and several days later began offering her concoction slathered over grilled pork sausages she sold to construction worker customers re-building the war-ravaged city. She dubbed her dish currywurst (wurst being the German word for a sausage,) and by the end of that week the cheap, filling and tasty snack had patrons lining the pavement at every meal break.

Other street vendors quickly mimicked Herta's recipe, so that within a couple of years currywurst was not only the Number One street snack in Berlin, but in several other German cities as well – Herta herself selling a mind-blowing 10,000 every week. Today currywurst is so popular across Germany with locals and foreign visitors alike, that some 800 million are downed annually, 70 million of them just in Berlin…and these days usually accompanied by French fries.

And a museum that opened in Berlin in 2009 dedicated somewhat bizarrely to the snack, the Deutsches Currywurst Museum, today gets 350,000 visitors a year… who each receives a hot currywurst as a Thank You for visiting.


[] A PICTORIAL dedication in Berlin's Deutsches Currywurst Museum to Herta Heuwer who created the currywurst snack for her Berlin street food-stall in 1949; today 800,000,000 currywursts are sold in Germany annually. (Deutsches Currywurst Museum)

Faded elegance of Montevideo

If you asked me yesterday what I knew about Uruguay and its capital, Montevideo, I would have little to tell you, so my maiden visit to this elegant South American city was sure to be an eye-opener.

With extensive beachside boulevards and fading 19th and 20th century European architecture, it is a picturesque city with lots of parks and city squares following locations like Buenos Aires (just across the River Plate) and Santiago. The whole country supports a population of a little more than 3 million people, half of whom reside in this bustling, compact metropolis.

With just 48 hours to explore, there is scant time to immerse yourself in the rich surroundings, but some things certainly caught my eye on my four-hour coach tour around the beaches and boulevards in glorious autumn sunshine.

Hotel Sofitel Montevideo Casino Carrasco and Spa

The first building that caught my attention was the imposing Hotel Sofitel Montevideo Casino Carrasco and Spa, a grand French-styled palais with a perfect waterfront position. Opened in 1921, it slowly fell into disrepair and closed for a time in 1990s before reopening in 2013 in its current guise. Regrettably, I didn't have time to explore it.

The other building no one can fail to miss is the massive Salvo Palace right in the middle of the city on Independence Square. When completed in 1928, it stood at 100m and was once the largest and tallest building in South America. Designed by the architect Mario Palanti, an Italian immigrant living in Buenos Aires, it is based on a similar design for his Palacio Barolo in Buenos Aires. Planned as a hotel that never eventuated, it is now a mix of residential and commercial and is still largely unrestored, at least externally.

Palacio Salvo

Anyone who knows me will know the temptation to have a look inside was too much, so I crept in to inspect what I could. I was able to take the lift to the 10th floor and climb the stairs to the top floor, level 22. All exits were, unfortunately (and wisely) locked and outward windows boarded up, but much of the old interior remains. I passed an elderly gent in a wheelchair who had been walking his dog and could see inside the windows of the tiny apartments as residents took their dinner. The original elevator cages remain, but new lifts have been installed.

You can even book one of these as a 'vacation rental'

Perhaps I should go back tomorrow and take one of the guided tours?

Struth! Hookers Lips land judge in hot water

PUCKER UP TO THESE IF YOU DARE

David Ellis

TALKING in one's sleep can be fraught with problems – as many a night mumbler will attest.

Splashing out at Puttin’ On The Ritz

David Ellis

WHAT do you do when it's your first Christmas Day on duty as Concierge at London's very swanky The Ritz Hotel, and a V-VIP Guest tells you he has a longing for the salty waters of famed Brighton Beach, but that being mid-winter it's too cold – and can you be a good chap and fetch a few pails of the stuff for him to plunge into in his room's bathtub?

In the case of Michael De Cozar you, of course, say "Yes, Sir, of course."

Now Chief Concierge and in his 44th year at The Ritz, Michael still remembers it like yesterday. "One of our porters named Freddie had brought his little Morris Minor motor-car to work that day, so we loaded it up with 25-litre pails and sent him off on the 200km round-trip down to Brighton.

"It took him two-and-three-quarter hours in each direction, and what anyone on the beach on Christmas Day and the middle of winter must have thought at the sight of Freddie in his Ritz uniform, shoes and socks off, pants rolled up and trudging across the pebbles of Brighton fetching pails of seawater, is anyone's guess!


"And I still wonder to this day whether our guest added hot water – or did he just slide into his Brighton seawater bath cold after we'd filled it up for him?

"Whatever, he did thank us most effusively later, telling us how wonderful it had made his Christmas Day."

Anyone beat that for Putting On The Ritz?


PHOTO CAPTION:

[] MICHAEL De Cozar… now Chief Concierge at London's very swanky The Ritz Hotel, and good reason to remember his very first Christmas Day on duty at the hotel's Concierge Desk. (The Ritz Hotel)

[] TAKING the plunge – a guest at London's The Ritz Hotel asked for his bathtub to be filled with Brighton sea water, and the hotel of course obliged –  despite the need for a 200km, six-hour car trip. (The Ritz Hotel)

Hydro Majestic's global dining palette in the Blue Mountains

Saucy tales, exotic opulence and the odd celebrity demise. The Hydro Majestic Hotel in the Blue Mountains sits alongside the Hotel Ritz Paris, Raffles Singapore and Claridge’s London as legendary havens of mischief and luxury

With staff from around the world welcoming waves of international tourists in a distinctly Australian location, the Hydro Majestic also represents the modern face and cuisine of Australia – as it has for more than a century.

The status of the original Blue Mountains party palace as the grandest of the grand hotel in the region was restored when current owner Escarpment Group unveiled its $35 million refurbishment in October 2014.

Concierge, Patrick Verity, greets guests in the restored casino lobby

The spectacular Casino Lobby was stripped back to show off that stupendous dome prefabricated in Chicago and imported by original Hydro Majestic owner, department store doyenne Mark Foy.

The Wintergarden Restaurant where one takes high tea (traditional or Eastern) is bedecked in understated gold and white elegance with enormous windows giving a breathtaking view over the Megalong Valley.

There’s the Majestic Ballroom with its beautiful vaulted ceiling, the revamped Boiler House Café in the old pump house and the sophistication of black and chrome in the Belgravia accommodation lounge.

But the best way to appreciate the full magnificence of the Hydro Majestic, the building, the history and the gob-smackingly gorgeous location on the edge of the escarpment, is to stroll along the (in)famous Cat’s Alley hallway, cocktail in hand, and watch the sunset over the Megalong Valley. The golden tendrils seep down the blood red walls, lighting up the peacock feathers and richly furbished lounges, and bring the original artworks of blood sports to life.

Foy, was a visionary, an ambitious and remarkable one, creating the hotel on a mountain top against all odds. Soon the fortunate, the famous, the fabulous, even the infamous, flocked to the Hydro Majestic from around the globe.

With regular festivals and events including the Roaring 20s Festival in February, Escarpment Group has returned the flounce to the old girl’s skirt so the Hydro Majestic is once again the most flamboyant showgirl of Australia’s first tourist destination.

The latest event was a seven-course degustation featuring traditional dishes from global locations infused with local flavours served by staff from around the world, heralds a modern era of theatrical dining for Mark Foy’s ``Palace in the wilderness’’

Dishes such as Creole-style braised short rib, southern grits, collard greens and corn tamarillo salsa obviously originated from distant shores. However, the ingredients were sourced from a 100-mile radius around the hotel.

Rounding off the gastronomic event with lamingtons was the shared food link to Australia.

Wintergarden Restaurant

It could be said that the Hydro Majestic represents the modern face and cuisine of Australia – as it has for more than a century.

Escarpment Group general manager Ralf Bruegger said: ``The Hydro Majestic has always embraced cultural diversity, not because its first owner Mark Foy was politically correct but because he genuinely loved people of all races, their culture, art and food – just as we do today.

``In fact, what is seen as progressive, even outrageous today, has always been normal at the Hydro Majestic. I mean, what was normal for a man who liked to dress in his wife’s clothing and held cross-dressing parties for his friends?’’

With the means to satisfy his every whim, the well-travelled Foy had the famous hotel dome pre-fabricated in Chicago and shipped to Australia. Dr George Baur of the Shoeneck health spa in Switzerland was hired to devise and supervise a program of diets and weird and wonderful treatments. Turkish coffee at the Hydro Majestic was served by Turkish waiters, Chinese tea by Chinese waiters.

Ladies in "Cat's Alley" with Chinese waiter

Louie (``Charlie’’) Goh Mong was just one of many Chinese migrants who reverted to their traditional skills post-Bathurst gold rush era around the turn of the 20th century and worked as butlers, cooks, nannies, maids and produce suppliers to inns, guesthouses and manor houses across the Blue Mountains during that time.

Charlie worked as a cook at Foy’s Sydney home and managed the mayhem at the Hydro Majestic for 35 years.

Today, staff from 16 language groups work at the Hydro Majestic including English, French, Canadian, Russian, Chinese (all dialects), Portuguese, Vietnamese, Spanish, Italian, Indonesian, Thai and more. Mr Bruegger is German and head chef Mate Herceg has a Croatian background.

``People visit the Hydro Majestic from all over the world and we must understand and accommodate their cultural needs,’’ Mr Bruegger said. ``In an internationally renowned destination such as the Blue Mountains it is expected of us and certainly received by our guests in all other mature tourism regions of the world.’’

Go to hydromajestic.com.au or phone (02) 4782 6885 for bookings and more information about the Hydro Majestic Hotel.

Alaska Inside Passage Cruise with Princess

INSIDE PASSAGE WITH PRINCESS CRUISES

You might think ocean cruising consists solely of lazing about in a deckchair, a fruit cocktail in hand, doing little more than watch the water slosh about the ship’s swimming pool. But I have to report that cruising the Inside Passage, between Canada and Alaska, is non-stop action.

Crown Princess in Alaska's Glacier Bay (supplied) 

Whatever your choice of cabin, be it port or starboard, upper or lower deck, there’s an unwritten law of the sea which, simply put, says the most enthralling sights of the cruise inevitably occur when you are least ready for them. It means you spend little time actually relaxing in your cabin and a great deal of time executing the cabin-to-deck dash, only to catch a departing glimpse of what your more prescient fellow passengers will no doubt describe as the most singularly thrilling experience of their lives.

So it was with whales while cruising aboard the Crown Princess, one of a fleet of six graceful Princess Cruise Line ships that ply the Inside Passage between Vancouver and Seward during the warmer Alaskan months.

By September, on the last cruise of the season, it was autumn and the weather overcast. The sun was on holiday down south and daytime temperatures of around 9°C were considerably lowered by wind chill. The ship's pool was therefore deserted and deckchairs were strapped into neat stacks. Passengers working off a surfeit of breakfast made regular brisk circuits around the decks.

We had on board an effusively enthusiastic cruise naturalist called Brent. One of his many sizzling natural passions was the humpback whale. I was dreamily contemplating passing glaciers from the comfort of my cabin when the alarm sounded. "Whales, whales, three o'clock", came the urgent bellow over the ship's intercom. "Humpbacks, whooo boy!" yelled Brent from the bridge.

The slamming of cabin doors and the patter of feet told me I was not the only one caught offside. Grabbing my camera, I charged headlong for the uppermost deck as Brent's electric commentary urged me on to greater feats of nimbleness and speed than I'd imagined possible.

"Look at them go ... oh, look at that, a beautiful, double fluke re-entry!" he gabbled, like a demented Olympic diving judge. "Now a breach, wheee boy! And another breach, oh my gawd! Absolutely fantastic!"

I burst on deck, heaving and panting. Passengers were pressed four-deep along the starboard rail, seeming to lend the 70,000-ton liner a slight list. Brent's voice barked again. "More humpies, one o'clock!" I was leaping up and down like a Samburu warrior trying to see over the collected heads. "Fabulous. That's made my trip!" exclaimed one extremely short, bespectacled man pressed up fast against the rail.

"Nine o'clock, nine o'clock! A breach, a breach!" Brent was now beside himself. I was beside myself! That was my side of the ship! Had I stayed put I'd have had a balcony seat to myself.

We rushed to port, where I rucked and mauled my way to the rail. And thar she blew! A glistening leviathan hurled itself ecstatically from the frigid water off Point Adolphus, fins akimbo, its enormous barnacled body on display for a fraction of a second before crashing back into the green seas in a burst of spray.

Inside Passage cruising can be as exhilarating as it is energetic. During our seven day cruise I worked out regularly, rushing about the ship, propelled by an urgent voice describing significant but fleeting moments in this vast, preternatural landscape of mountains, snow and ice. Considering the avalanche of food that flowed day and night from the ship's kitchens this regular exercise was essential.

Daily consumption aboard ship included 1400 kg of meat, 380 kg of fish, 730kg of vegetables, 150kg of pasta, 1100 litres of coffee and more than 3000 delectable little pastries. This resulted in 39,000 dirty plates a day and nearly 13,000 dirty glasses. The 27 crew members on the continuous wash-up squad remained out of sight below decks, if not entirely out of mind.

In College Fjord we saw no less than seven glaciers, including Vassar, Harvard and Yale. The Captain carefully put the ship within 400 metres of one gigantic ice flow. We clung to the rails, peering from our wondrous vantage point into the deep, hypnotic blue of highly compressed ice, hoping to see the calving of an iceberg.

The rule on glacier calving is simple: once you hear the crack, the ice has already fallen! So never avert your eyes! I heard several sharp retorts but I saw little, perhaps caught offside again. But I did witness spectacular calving off Margerie Glacier as the ship probed deep into Tarr Inlet off Glacier Bay.

Alaska cruising is not for the faint-hearted. The most popular shore excursion of our trip was glacier-hopping by helicopter high above Juneau, a dramatic aerial plunge into a primeval realm of forbidding, craggy peaks and ice-bound valleys. More sedentary shore options included fishing trips, nature walks and cultural tours.

Ketchikan (supplied)

Another option was souvenir hari-kiri. The old salmon-fishing town of Ketchikan, the neat Alaskan capital of Juneau and frontier-flavoured Skagway each boasted unique attractions but shared a common blight, the excess of souvenir shops weighed down with a repetitive range of memorabilia. This, however, didn’t deter most of the passengers who seemed delighted to discover shopping nirvana at latitude 58°N.

Alaska has an exceptional "official state fossil", the woolly mammoth. Its frozen bones, found in the glacial ice fields, swiftly make their way through the hands of carvers and scrimshaw artists into outlets along the cruise ship corridor. They compete for attention with carved walrus tusks, polished polar bear teeth, crude jade carvings, Alaskan opal pendants and necklaces of "black diamond" haematite.

Other souvenirs include ulu knives, crystal and porcelain figurines, fluffy animal toys, tins of smoked salmon and an endless unfolding of slogan-rich T-shirts. The most intriguing indigenous artifact was undoubtedly those moose droppings, dipped in varnish and fashioned into earrings. Or how about moose poo swizzle sticks?

Escape from all this was found in the Naa Kahidi Theatre in Juneau where I watched enactments of the myths and stories of the Tlingit, Haida and Tshimshian people. The town’s lively Red Dog Saloon also provided refuge from souvenir overload, as did Skagway's Red Onion Saloon where cruise ship musicians joined local players in an afternoon jazz session.

Riding the rails above Skagway towards White Pass I had a Gordon Gecko moment, almost believing that greed might be good. The lust for gold certainly propelled people to insane heights of determination. One example is the staggering feat of engineering and hard labour that created the White Pass & Yukon Railway. The line was made by chiselling, hacking and tunnelling through solid rock. It crosses narrow canyons on spidery trestle bridges and overcomes formidable natural barriers on its steep haul up to Whitehorse and the old Yukon goldfields beyond.

The ride to Whitehorse and back to Skagway was a four-hour excursion of exceptional scenic beauty with the chance of spotting some wildlife, but only for quick sighted. A bear glimpsed lumbering up one side of the track disappeared within seconds into the surrounding bush.

More wildlife may be seen from the Midnight Sun Express which runs between Fairbanks and Anchorage via Denali National Park, hauling luxury railcars with panoramic views up top and stylish restaurant below. The trip can be a land tour add-on to a cruise.

Fairbanks was at its most beautiful, displaying an autumnal royal flush of luminous golden birch forests. The rich palette of summer's final shredding, a riot of amber and carmine, ochre and sienna, was reflected in the glassy smooth surface of the Chena River. A light powdering of snow called terminal dust, heralding the end of autumn, had settled on the mountains.

The M/V Discovery paddlesteamer churns along the Chena on a carefully prepared excursion that provides a whiff of life in the frozen north. At a model native Athabascan village two Eskimo college students, one Yup'ik, the other Inupiak, gave a delightfully frank, funny and informative commentary on the traditional lifestyle of their grandparents.

I ended my trip at the Anchorage Museum of History and Art where I was fortunate to see an exhibition of ancient Indian and Eskimo masks. It was a fascinating visual insight into local history and culture and a fitting finale to my Inside Passage adventure.

© Rob Woodburn

Struth! World's largest meat pie

Swiss precision sees meat pie record

FOUR Swiss chefs have found themselves on the front pages of their nation's newspapers, simply because they cooked a meat pie in the lead-up to Christmas.

And obviously not just any meat pie.

Because just like we'd do at home, their's had a pastry base filled with meat and other goodies (in this case beef and pork, bacon, garlic, onion and red wine, ) and on coming out of the oven sported a topping of crispy pastry all nicely folded and tucked to save any dribbling and spilling.

But any resemblance between ours and theirs ends-up there, for the Swiss job was a whopping 160cm long, 78cm wide and 11cm thick… and scaled-in at 86.75kg. (If you've not yet come to grips with metrics, that's 5ft 3ins long, 2ft 6ins wide and 4.3ins thick… and 191 pounds.)

All big enough to put the pie's makers, from the Swiss hotel management school Ecole Hoteliere de Lausanne, in the books of the World Record Academy for the world's largest-ever traditionally one-piece meat pie.

After a day to assemble and 40 hours to bake, the massive pie was put on public showing – and then cut up and given away to charities for the needy and homeless at Christmas.


PHOTO CAPTION:

[] ANYTHING but pie-eyed, these four Swiss chefs created the world's largest-ever traditionally one-piece meat pie, and after showing it off gave it away to the needy and homeless. (Hoteliere de Lausanne)