Dodging massive crocodiles and death adders is part of daily life for Kimberley local Don MacLeod, but he says that pales in comparison to battling a 300km/h cyclone.
Mr MacLeod hit headlines this week for saving a stranded Kiwi kayaker from an isolated island where he was menaced by a massive crocodile for two weeks, too terrified to paddle back to the mainland.
The rescue is one of many by the retired grandfather, who “went feral” and set up camp near the Drysdale River in a remote part of Western Australia’s Kimberley 11 years ago.
Mr MacLeod speaks with great love for the countless native animals he shares his home with – including the deadly ones.
But it was Cyclone Ingrid, which crossed the coast near Kalumburu in mid-March 2005 – not jumbo man-eaters – that has proved his most frightening experience so far.
When he received a call warning him that 300km/h winds were on their way, he grabbed a mattress and a tarpaulin, and squeezed himself into a tight crack in a big rock.
And he didn’t forget a bottle of whisky and a tin of bully beef to see him through the night.
“It was open at the top so you could see all the clouds were racing by, the wind got up and by 9pm, it was just absolutely roaring,” Mr MacLeod, who is nearly 70, told AAP.
“It’s just like a jet taking off.
“You couldn’t hear any thunder – there was lightning – but it was just the sound of the trees getting smashed. Just one big homogenous roar.”
When daylight broke and the winds had died down, he emerged from his makeshift shelter and faced utter devastation.
“You really didn’t know where you were for an instant.
“And for five or six days after, everything started to smell like cold tea.
“All the animals came out of the swamp because the oxygen was getting depleted – I came out of a billabong covered in these big leeches.”
Because the bees and tattered butterflies had nothing to feed off, Mr MacLeod threw out jars of jam from what was left in his shack.
Mangrove birds didn’t have the shade they needed, so he put up a tarpaulin, “which had a two inch fringe on it just from being whipped by the wind”.
The tremendous sound of the cyclone left him with ringing ears for three days afterwards, he says.
“I kept going down to the phone but the phone (line) had blown off the roof.”
He managed to re-attach it to advise the State Emergency Service that he was okay, but they came to check on him anyway.
“I hadn’t smoked for 20 years but I accepted a smoke off the pilot. Just a rolly to settle my nerves.”
But the whole experience was strangely exhilarating, he admits.
“If you’ve ever got a hiding from your mother or been in a fight or something – and after it’s all over, a couple of days later, you think `that was alright – I wouldn’t mind doing it again’.
“It was like `I survived this – the excitement!”
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