Quokkas a moving experience

ROTTNEST Island is a special place for me and my annual sojourn always gives me a chance to write something different for this column.

I had a week on the island last month, the first time in many years that did not include any crossover with school holidays.

That provided a different perspective on the type of visitor who heads to the island: it seemed there were a lot more families with pre-school children, and overseas tourists were also more prominent.

That mix of visitors, which ensures the island is bustling if not full, even outside the peak of that mid-term break, is pertinent to something I noticed: how the Rottnest Island Authority tries to manage the visiting hoards.

It also helps that I have been going to the island annually for the better part of two decades, so I might be more conscious than others of some of the incremental changes over that period.

Part of that goes to people management on the island, over which the level of overt control has waxed and waned during that time.

Take, for instance, the island’s interior. Given Rotto has 25 kilometres of coastline – including some the most spectacular beaches and bays in the country – the undulating heath and partially forested middle is somewhat more forgettable.

As a kid, though, I remember the interior of the island – save one road running up the middle – was out of bounds.

While many of my friends would ignore that kind of thing and, say, climb over the gates of the tunnels and explore them, long before they were restored and the snake-friendly habitat was sanitised, I was more of a stickler for the rules.

In any case, bikes were not good at handling sandy tracks back then.

These days, the inner island has been opened up, with several walking tracks criss-crossing it: an excellent addition about which I have previously written. They are augmented by plenty of service tracks which, being signposted, also seem to encourage walking.

Oddly, though, given the cycle-friendly approach encouraged by Rottnest’s management, it seems bikes are not welcome. While I understand the erosive impact of cycling on the thin vegetation and sandy soils of the island, it does seem a little behind the times given the modern penchant for mountain biking.

Perhaps a special mountain biking trail is needed. I’ll drop that in the suggestion box.

Speaking of welcoming bikes, over the years I have seen the RIA try all manner of things to manage the flow of traffic along the route past the general store and bakery, which is the main settlement’s second most important thoroughfare (The most important route is the one from the jetty to the pub.)

Not so long ago, barricades were erected that prevented even the walking of a bicycle through the piazza area which, despite its role as a destination for food and shopping, was also the most obvious way to get to many island attractions such as The Basin.

It was like blocking the main street of a small town without building a bypass.

Thankfully the authorities noticed this was a bad idea and removed them. Nowadays there are just signs that politely ask people to dismount and walk their bike through the congested area. And most people do.

However, I am not one to suggest that signs always work.

Take the feeding of quokkas, for instance. From the time a tourist gets onto a ferry to the moment they get their first quokka selfie, they are bombarded with messages, announcements and signs telling them not to feed these usually delightful creatures.

That clearly doesn’t work.

Despite the timidity of the quokkas, it seems all those star-studded closeups with Roger Federer et al have prompted tourists to try to outdo the influencers by getting pics for their Insta accounts. It seems the most obvious way for an amateur quokka wrangler to do that is to use food as an enticement.

As a result, the quokkas around the settlement are overfed and acting like any human might on a diet of junk food. It is quite feral, including nasty fights that make the seagulls look tame.

One solution could be to relocate the quokka population to the west end once a week. Only those strong or determined enough will make it all the way back to ‘civilisation’ and maybe the tourists will have eaten the junk food before they find them.