“That’s not a boat, we’ve got one!” a shout went up.

Quickly the binoculars went round the car and we all saw that the little boat was actually a whale. Its great wide head pushed through the water followed by its even greater back, just like a small Quintrex Bar Crusher*, leaving the rather small wake (for a boat).

We looked around for a closer vantage point and picked out a small cliff road across the other side of the beach. No sooner had we belted up, than belted down the hill winding out through the houses to a little parking bay overlooking the happy whale some 300m out from shore.

Now down at a much closer view point my suspicions were confirmed beyond a doubt. Long periods spent cruising at the surface, slow lazy progress, a massive broad head like a bonnet and a distinct lack of aerobatics for the moment proved we were looking at a Southern Right Whale. Way, way back when whaling was a thriving industry these were the whales to harpoon for they hardly needed hunting, they were easy targets and floated after being shot due to their high blubber content, making them the ‘right’ whales to hunt. Scarlett thought this an entirely mean thing and she’s right. As a result of all this activity the Right Whales were sent all too quickly to the brink of extinction. Fortunately, due to the ban on commercial whaling, they were spared and although they’ll probably never recover to their former numbers there could well be enough left to remain part of our world.

Certainly they were not extinct here, not now though; we were experiencing something very rare indeed. I couldn’t believe my eyes and my kids thought me a little daft to be so excited about this particular sighting. They’ll know one day what all the years of supporting the Sea Shepherds was all about, if they don’t already.

As the whale lazed around at the surface our binoculars brought us even closer and the distinctive downturned mouth line could be seen by all of us, Scarlett and Lottie were particularly enchanted and Scarlett couldn’t take her eyes off it. At this range almost immediately we then saw the next even bigger revelation. Alongside this gargantuan black creature swam another lighter grey form, considerably smaller but similar in shape. How old I have no idea but mother and calf looked the perfect picture of nature’s creation. How rare must that be? Mother and calf? Fantastic!

A huge wide spray of mist from mum’s exhalation, followed by a smaller puff from bub, marked their places out in the sea. Soon they disappeared from the surface and a fluke followed a flipper as they dived together. Seconds later a huge broad head rose from the sea as the mother stood up for a look around in a perfect spy-hop. The callosities and barnacles forming her unique pale yellow markings around the head and chin could clearly be seen and a few seconds later down she went. Had she seen us? Did she know how much we loved her, how much we care that their world is kept safe?

Soon we were seeing tail flukes clearly and unlike the humpbacks, these were completely black underneath and much broader. They sometimes seem to signify the end of a sighting as the whale sounds to feed or explore the depths but this was an exception as both mother and baby continued to play. They treated us to some flipper slapping and even the little one poked its head up for a nosey. Nobody wanted to leave but the whales had moved slightly round the headland and were just out of our sightline for now.

Watching these animals always leaves a huge impression of power, grace, beauty and intelligence on me; indelible images etched across my mind forever and I think it could be doing the same for my children (and their children?). What a wonderful thought that is…

*Quintrex make aluminium sports boats and a Bar Crusher is a 5-6 metre long fishing sports boat suitable for offshore use and crossing coastal bars

The Saturday before was spent jobbing around the place as usual, drivers were charged and helpers engaged to unpack the coop. Expecting to find some basic instructions we searched through piece after piece of treated wood, mesh, roof parts, door parts, ramps and more mesh to find a single A5 sheet and a bag of screws and bolts. On the sheet were four exploded view diagrams, hastily sketched, blown up, copied a thousand times in Beijing and probably faxed around the world losing any detail they might have contained.

Initially seeming like a TV challenge show we soon had the main parts together but the trusty battery driver was knackered after just a few screws (sounds like me) and as I refuse to wear out any more of my body driving screws in the old fashioned way, a trip to the famous hardware superstore was called for. An early Father’s day present in the form of a much improved, faster charging driver capable of endless screws ( ah, if only… twenty years ago maybe…) was procured.

As soon as we got back on the job the Coop De Ville was finished in minutes and after pegging out a few metres of chicken wire just to keep the birds in one big corner, ‘Chooksville’ was ready for guests.

Next day amid much excitement the Tribe disembarked at the Farm Shop with Lottie leading the way to order up some hens. A brief family debate followed and we settled on five of the best laying Isa Browns. Imagine the kids’ horror and dismay ten minutes later when the farm hand stood in the doorway with five tied up hens hanging from both hands looking for all the world as though they’d been on the receiving end of a shooting party and their 12 bores!

“Are they dead?” exclaimed the kids in unison.

Relieved that it was only to calm them down and not have a feather flying, claw thrashing menagerie to drive home in we laid them gently in open trays in the back of the car. Minutes later they were untied and set free to roam the range chez Heatley, clucking and scratching as happy as could be.

They’ve settled in pretty well but as expected there are already requests to modify their humble abode with extra doors and more cosy downstairs accommodation. Sounds just like what I have to do to the big house. Best of all they’re straight into the lay popping out an egg a day, even delighting us with the first double-yolker.

We think they must be quite content little hens; the kids go in, tend to their water and food, collect any eggs and pet and coo with each of the named ladies. They decided to name each one after various family members – Grandma’s are popular – and there’s one Scarlett’s called Julia, not realising that’s the PM’s name. Must check Julia’s quota of eggs being laid; they’re bound to be fewer than the rest or subject to huge tax bills. Don’t think they’ve had it so good actually.

Minutes tick by.

Bounced and battered on the badly repaired springy seats. Will they catch the killer in the latest thriller? Novel if they do. Folded newspapers. More printed guff about NSW state politicians being in a state, a depressing state. No money here, get the taxpayers to pay, again. Cut this, scrap that. NRL on the front pages for the wrong reasons. Again. Bin Laden’s dead, William’s married. I’m still bored with all this. A machine says “doors closing”. Rush of schoolkids, swearing, pushing, shoving; just games. Shirts hanging out, holidaymaker sized bags. Lunchboxes of salad and sarnies. Neatly pressed uniforms for the bank, ties, coats, brollies, more bags.

More minutes tick by.

Shoes never polished, I hate that. Shirts not ironed properly, that I hate more, wear a T instead, scruff bag. Dirty windows, graffiti scored into the glass or burned on with a lighter, bubblegum always on the seats. Feet on the seats, fines apply. No wonder they’re cheap. 60 bucks for 700 kilometres in a week if you like. Without air con, except on chilly winter mornings. Stifling in the summer, travel with a drink they say. Water they mean, not ice cold goldies. Cobwebs in the corners of the windows. Cockroaches race along the floor disappear down the cracks. Seat wars, stuffy air, spread out a little more, keep out the intruder. Ring tones, patchy reception, stupid conversations. No reception, tunnels under Sydney. More pages please Wilbur. Too much perfume, not enough deodorant, stifling people smells. Have to get out, get off the loser cruiser.

Too much time gone. Forever gone.

Both of us were so eager to get it all over and done that all twenty questions were buzzed through in about 3 minutes flat, with all answers clicked correct. We’ve received confirmation from the Department Of Immigration that we’ve been approved and all they have to do now is interview our 17 year old daughter – I suppose 17 is considered too young to sit a test(!) and too old to be allowed in sans questions – to make sure she fits the bill and at least understands what she’s letting herself in for. After all, it’s a good age to be causing a fair bit of mayhem anyway. All a lot of expensive bureaucratic bulldust in my opinion but these are precisely the reasons for becoming a citizen; I’m fed up being treated by a visitor by the System at least.

Our toast was justified anyway and the bottle had to go sometime! The final piece is the swearing in part where we all appear before the dignitaries in power and pledge our oath to Australia and its people. I’m looking forward to that bit because I think it really will change the way I feel about being here and after all I’m not a citizen of anywhere else except Britain. I won’t have any trouble with the swearing part but I might keep my fingers crossed behind my back!

Meantime we soldier on and if anyone’s been keeping up with earlier pieces of our journey where we’ve shifted through 1st to 4th gear you’ll realise why we’re now slipping into 5th. Along the way we’ve ticked off quite a few boxes, although that’s never been the intention or reason for coming here, just the way things have happened.

We’ve bought and sold a few cars, first on the list. We’ve also bought, renovated and sold our first house, buying another with the proceeds, although it never really works out how you plan it. Done the boat owner thing, got licensed, experienced NSW’s waterways and some of its idiotic patrons, sold that. And we’re ‘been there – done that’ campers having narrowly survived multiple injuries from pieces of camper trailer trying to maim me and acute exhaustion from the effort involved in putting up a tent the size of a small village church. Although I’m not sewing any badges onto my cub scouts hat yet. Still haven’t seen the Outback, slept under the stars, chewed on red dust, driven across the Nullabor or been the only humans for thousands of miles around in any one spot. Still to come on that I think.

The sporting boxes have been well ticked though, especially by our kids getting into soccer, tennis, surf life saving, with others of us kayaking, fishing, diving and a brief dabble at watersporting while we had the boat. Again, I’m not done yet on those counts as I’ve still been nowhere near the Barrier Reef or the Coral Sea in flippers and goggles, plus my fishing exploits have so far amounted to nothing more than lots of tangled lines, plenty of swearing and scary looking prawns frozen in packets that stare out of the freezer every time I go for ice cream. And they’re not ones I’ve caught!

We’ve both moved well through the Australian workplace from coordinator to regional manager and designer planner to project manager, as well as our eldest children being able to get and hold down regular part-time jobs themselves. An opportunity they may not have come across as easily elsewhere. In fact I know that’s true because the eldest is stuck in a dead-end place where getting jobs is like finding hen’s teeth. But that will change I’m sure.

Through circumstance not choice I’ve sampled the Australian healthcare services, doctors and hospitals and although pricey due to the non-existence of Blighty’s unique NHS, they’ve fixed me up well enough after severing a tendon in a finger and snapping an Achilles. They’re also chock full of top quality doctors and nurses from – of all places the UK.

But as with everywhere else in this modern world time, days and months move at hyper fast speeds, with just a couple of hours spent in front of the telly seeming to suddenly be the passing of an entire week. Monday morning crashes into our lives almost every day and that “oh no! it’s tomorrow already” feeling is all too familiar. Surely time can’t really be moving so fast? Faster than a second at a time? It must be how and what you fill it with. Deadlines, agendas, timetables, schedules, run rates, fixtures, meetings and appointments all seem to join each other end to end, sucking us along into the machine. Getting off or even slowing down for just a few moments feels like the impossible task, the 99th push-up that just can’t be done. Or the 9th push-up in my case…

In a little less than five years I feel I have achieved an awful lot, from arriving here on the strength of a six month contract with my beautiful family trustingly following on behind, to securing our permanent residency, to finally becoming citizens. Settling the Tribe into schools and throwing ourselves headlong into Sydney’s hustling, bustling metropolitan lifestyle. And that’s the double-edged sword because the hustle and bustle is another word for rat-race, hum-drum and it doesn’t’ matter which way you mash it, rat-race is what we’ve been trying to get away from…

So, it’s for that reason that I feel 5th gear isn’t top gear. As with many modern (German) automobiles that have six and seven and even eight speeds I feel we’ll be shifting again.

Two years before now the heat wave of 1976 had been slowly roasting the British public and this weekend wasn’t much different on a stifling overcast Sunday in July. I can remember the survival techniques that we kids developed at home, taking cold water from the open hose pipe, seeing how much you could drink by putting your mouth right over the end and swallowing as fast as you could, or snatching it from each other to use for water fights. Surprised we never drowned! My Mum had one of those sets of plastic moulds that you could use to make your own cordial flavoured ice-lollies. A tree of plastic sticks with rocket shaped moulds that you filled with your favourite sugar-loaded drink and then popped in the freezer. Scorched grass, concrete-hard earth, popping tarmac bubbles on the way to school, all signs of a hot summer.

I didn’t know any of the names of the bends and corners at the track back then, relying solely on Dad’s knowledge of the track. He’d been a visitor a few times more than I had, often times with my Uncle on one of his shore visits from raising hell around the world in the Merchant Navy. I relish the tale of Uncle’s test drive in a Mark 1 Lotus Cortina, the hot-rod of the day, thrashing the car to within an inch of it’s twin-cam life and turning the salesman ashen faced and more than a little hot under the collar. He didn’t buy it either preferring the low slung chick magnet he had in the form of a Triumph Spitfire. If only huh?

Anyway, back at Brands and with Dad knowing all the best places to see the cars we trudged round the place forever. It set me in good stead many years later when a mate and I would drive up on Sundays to watch the club races or the rallycross or anything else that involved a good healthy waste of petrol and a slog through the mud.

Dad had brought his treasured 35mm Kodak camera for the Grand Prix and my efforts at early photography were well rewarded, although I could kick myself these days for cutting off poor Jody Scheckter’s head in the paddock and completely missing our own fighting hero James Hunt. At one point he was probably stood right in front of me, Dad knew some people in the pits, Dad knew everyone come to think of it. That’s right we were in the paddock standing next to the roped off pit garages that would now be the sole domain of freeby invite-only sports personalities, fly-by-night rappers and unknown filthy rich people. But not this day, Dad had managed to get tickets for us. My photos are good though and I still have the programme from the day. Another special is the memory of standing next to a pale blue Ford GT40 with the number plate “GT40” and peering through the plexiglass side windows with hand cupped to shade the sunlight away. It was parked in the dusty, dirty gravel paddock next to the trailers and trucks and it was a proper, 60’s GT40, not a striped up Ford GT or a kit and although it was special back then, it was no more guarded than the Ford Granada tow car parked next to it. Who owns it now? Would it be sitting in a paddock car park for young teenagers to marvel at these days?

The memory of that wooden bridge has been re-visited for me on a few occasions, most notably at Le Mans when we’ve peeked through the steel plates of the famous Dunlop Bridge and Spa Francorchamps in Belgium has a bridge over the track too, with holes. It’s funny how time plays tricks on the memory; I wish I could remember more from that day. We probably drove there in my Dad’s MKII Ford Cortina, a 1600GT, red of course, he loved his Cortinas and had one of every Mark from the MKI (which started life badge as a Consul) through to the signal red MKIV that I passed my driving test in. All of them were red. All were at least GT’s and to me at least, all were ultra cool. Isn’t everybody’s Dad’s car cool?

Later in life he would confess that he always wanted an “E”, which was the Executive model, with metallic paint, varnished wood and a bit more chrome. But I’m glad he stayed a GT man; the MKII had black matte Lotus look-alike stripes that he painted on, but the MKIII had the coolest thing of all with a black matte bonnet, bolt-on go faster bits and at one stage in its life side-pipes. These monstrous side exiting exhaust pipe contraptions were from the US hot rod world made famous by the AC Cobra. Now, Dad’s old Cortina was never gonna be in the same league as a Cobra but he was determined to have a go. Ask my Mum about the multi-storey car park debacle, scraping its way up and down every ramp and the noise it made was horrendous. Side pipes; neither one of Dad’s coolest, nor long-lasting customising tricks. But the matte black bonnet was the best.

It wouldn’t have been far from home for the track was local to us and we got to drive up ‘Death Hill’, which was the A20 trunk road past the circuit named then after the loony motorcyclists who would race up and down it from Johnson’s Café while the records played on the jukebox. It was renamed Gorse Hill to appease the politically correct but little did they realise it killed off a big part of Kent’s tourist industry, so you won’t find it now but it was all mythical to me then. Back then we were also in the time of the famous John Player Special brand. Colin Chapman had done another deal with another cigarette giant (red and white liveried cars from the Gold Leaf days were his first) and painted his cars in those unmistakable black and gold colours, even pin-striping them to turn out very ‘special” racing cars indeed. Never mind that technically they were streets in front of everything else, for we were now also into ‘ground-effect’ cars, so named after Chapman’s love of flying and everything aerodynamic and winged, these black and gold missiles looked like world champions just sitting on the grid. Skirts were in for racing cars and the buzz-word was aerodynamics.

Not long after this particular race a very clever engineer designer by the name of Gordon Murray devised an almost worthy opponent of the Lotus 79. He worked for a team called Brabham, managed by a little guy called Ecclestone (who went to school with my Dad (told you he knew some people)), it was the Brabham BT46 and it was dubbed the fan car. Not because everyone loved it but because it had a stonking great air fan that ran at the back of the car and literally sucked its rear end to the track. Murray had spied the Lotus cars at other races and could only see the skirts as visible evidence that something was different about them; this led him to believe that Chapman had some sort of device on the car that pulled it to the track. So advanced was Chapman’s genius at that time that the equally brilliant Murray just couldn’t work out the full details of ground effect. Who would ever have thought to make the underside of a racing car shaped like a plane wing in reverse, knowing that as it travelled forward the air pressure in the space would drop and the lift would actually be transformed into more of a suck, dragging the Lotus closer to the ground? The side skirts were needed to maintain this pocket of low pressure under the car. Colin Chapman; not just a flamboyant character in gold Dunhill sunglasses and trend-setting race wear but a true engineering genius.

I know we both couldn’t wait to see Andretti and Peterson’s Lotus’s (should that be Lotii?). With their paint colours, few sponsor stickers and little Union flag designs on the nose they just looked fantastic. And they were also the days when you bragged about being a constructor by putting your crowns across the rear wing. I think these cars had five; the patriotic Brits loved Chapman and his cars.

As the day wore on and the early saloon car races went by we would have had some lunch, most likely some sarnies that Mum made up for us and we definitely had Coca-Cola from cans with the old style ring pulls. You pulled up the ring and ripped off the whole triangular tab from the top of the can. Then, you placed the end of the tab that was now bent into a curve, in one of the little slots on the ring. Drawing back the ring against the spring of the tab you could fire it off at the nearest target. Probably into the dust along with the other 100,000 people reportedly there that day.

The big race was no disappointment, but the thousands and thousands of people did mean it was almost an overwhelming sensation of trudging round finding places to just see the track, let alone prime spots to view the cars. The red and white McLarens were popular because our own James Hunt was driving one that in ’77 had a number one on the nose. Now however his luck was running out and he retired on lap 7 after one of his infamous shunts. Although I can’t remember these things that actually happened on the day I now know that Carlos Reutemann won from my interest in F1 these days. I’m also pretty sure that as soon as the Lotus cars were out with engine and electric gremlins Dad and I stayed for as long as we could before we beat a hasty retreat for the hills to avoid the traffic chaos at the day’s end.

I only have my photo’s and the program from the day as real souvenirs but the memories in my head remain the best, the sound of the 12 cylinders in the Alfa and the Double Four Valve hidden under that sleek black bodywork ring around in my head from back then, just as the V10 Renault did at Goodwood when they started Alonso’s car in the pits and even better the music of sports-cars at Le Mans screaming round La Sarthe for a day and a night each year in June.

Happy days, happy times and I wouldn’t have any of those memories if it were not for my Dad. Our trip to Brands for my first ever Formula One experience probably didn’t start my passion for cars, Dad had done that a long time before but it most definitely went a long way to cementing a very special relationship with the world on four wheels.

I warned them,

“if you guys don’t stick in at school and keep up all your good work, you could end up with the job of filling all these little sugar packets you know”

Lottie looked at me, slightly puzzled, kind of enquiring, sort of ‘you sure?’, Scarlett merely assessed what I’d said, carefully weighing up, and Ted, well Ted, he came back, quick as a flash of light,

“Don’t be silly Dad, it’s a machine that does that…”

Seems the heady mix of school and cable TV is working then.

Steve and Claire got the nod to kit up first and headed for the cage. Now the excitement had taken over any other emotions and for self-confessed shark nut Steve I knew he was in for a treat. He tried out a drysuit first time round in the 14C water but soon found that there wasn’t enough depth in the cage to squeeze the excess air out leaving him a bit buoyant. We had a visiting shark at around 3 metres long and Coenie lured him in for a good look as video cameras whirred and shutters clicked. The view from the flying bridge was actually far better than that at deck level for we could see right down into the water thus partly eliminating the reflective glare. After a few passes another shark came in for a look and soon even we could tell the difference between the different males and females passing by. The various shades of colour, the fin shapes and distinguishing marks from scuffles and bumps identified each individual. Folded claspers at the anal fin giving away the males as they often glide onto their sides for a look up at the boat.

Sure enough Coenie had sussed out a nosey one, a 3 and a bit metre male although size is hard to estimate and it’s not really the length of a great white shark that makes it a big one but more the girth of its body. Some may be three metres long and two metres across from pectoral fin tip to tip. Their bellies and mid torsos can be so massive that they are easily as huge as a cart horse.

In he came, rolling over onto his side, eye looking up at us, slowed to a stop, nose poking above the surface, Coenie reached out and pursed his fingers around the pointy tip whereupon the shark stopped dead, its mouth opened and the jaw dropped down, those famous triangular razor sharp teeth immortalised in so many images gleamed at us, eyes rolled back, Coenie still tweaking the sensors in the tip of the nose as the shark dropped away into the water. The first of the expletives were uttered and we all looked at each other, jaws gaping and aghast. Whether it was the first time or the umpteenth time of seeing one the reaction is always the same.

Apparently the tip of a great white’s nose is very soft, like nubuck leather but whether I’d actually want to find out for myself is questionable. Perhaps the action of touching all these sensory receptors somehow short-circuits the shark’s motor system as they really do stop dead in their tracks when touched on the nose in this way, some talk of going into a tonic state. From inside the cage these encounters were just as jaw-dropping.

On the surface there was a very stiff breeze that whipped at us constantly. This place can be beautifully peaceful or savagely fierce; today this is being kind to us. The water was cold, fourteen degrees Celsius and as I dropped into the cage the cold water filled my rented wetsuit sending shivers through all my bones and I had to sink below the surface in blind anticipation to mask the cold. I wedged my feet under the ring running around the bottom of the cage. Instinctively I sucked hard to shrug away the shock of the cold and the surface fed demand valve delivered life gas as reality unfolded and the dream began to play. Now I looked into the misty visibility and scanned for a great white shark. You don’t really know what shapes to look for but from countless film footage and documentaries sharp pointed fins, or torpedo shaped bodies run through your picture book mind. As if to keep you on the edge they cruise just out of sight and it’s only when you aren’t looking that they appear. Right there in front of my eyes was a great white shark! Slowly he slid past the bars of the cage, my regulator hissing and bubbling away. In real life they are even more awe-inspiring than any book, photograph or film can ever even start to make them.

I guarantee it will simply take your breath away.

They are unquestionably magnificent creatures, apex predators, curious even inquisitive, certainly intelligent and most definitely gracious. Effortlessly they glide past sometimes very close to the cage and the sunlight penetrating the surface helps you pick out all those documentary details for yourself. The steeply raked fin shapes, angular and cutting, the pointed snout armed with its array of sensitive pits peppering the nose surface like tiny absent whiskers. You can marvel at the dynamic bodylines and flattened tail keels, the tail fin itself is an enormous near symmetrical blade carved seemingly from some exotic metal. There is the classic great white shark grin with the jaws held just apart to allow a healthy flow of oxygenated water out through the gathered gill slits. With every pass you notice more and all too soon the time comes to swap with one of the other guys on top.

Clambering up to the surface there are no thoughts of whether you’ll be attacked getting out, just pure elation at having shared a very small piece of ocean with the world’s favourite bad guy.

From the surface we noticed around a dozen different sharks passed by the boat during the day, some stayed, some carried on to who knows where. Some of them were curious and we were treated to spectacular passes with their heads held clear of the water and black eyes inspecting us. When you get this close to a great white shark’s head the traditional description of cold black eyes cannot be justified, as there are shapes within the dark disc, image recorders as data is being processed and sometimes an individual will glide almost to a stop just looking at us. It affected me profusely for I felt something more than just looking at a shark. I was actually being checked out, my image recording somewhere in that shark’s senses, somewhere within its brain. When they swam away I wondered how long the question lingered with them. ‘What was that creature up there on the boat all about then?’

Back down in the buffeting, cold cage and the thrill is back, it’s not comfortable on a day like this and filming and camera work is a nightmare but then a male shark swims in from the left to take the bait. From somewhere way off his sensor system has picked up on the slick of oil and tuna scent, two of their heads chained to a float. At three and a half metres long he sweeps up from below and clamps his jaws onto the tuna. His head begins to slash from side to side, firmly but not frenzied. Eyes are rolled back out of harm’s way. The great blade of a tail powers him upwards and the slashing becomes more determined.

He begins to move round towards the cage, I am mesmerised. The shark uses its head to work away at the stubborn bait and then turns towards us. The maw begins to chomp down on the tuna, still slashing sideways. So close is he now that all the muscles in the throat and neck are easy to see in detail, flexing and bulging, the outline of the massive jawbone is clear to see. The black eye is shielded white. With the brilliant white underside glaring at us, it’s easy to see the origin of his name. The action of his jaws clamping shut flushes gallons of water through the tapered gill slits, he is still chomping and slashing at the tuna in an effort to release the heads from the float. Although concentrating on freeing the bait his on-board senses tell him exactly where his body is in the water. He comes about heading straight for the cage with his massive left-hand pectoral fin planing the huge torpedo body. Carving his head from side to side all the time his great tail powering as he then spins and comes right at the cage. Instinctively we push to the rearmost boundary of the small wire sanctuary for the round cage has no corners, the fin passes in front of our eyes, close enough for its black tip to brush against the bars. Then the tail sweeps past the double spaced camera opening, its upper hooked lobe is before our very eyes, it is absolutely enormous, in a flash it is there, then gone as the shark wheels full circle and makes for the transom where he is being directed topside by the bait puller. Those up there could only see our Jacuzzi of bubbles from the howls of excitement screamed through the regulators. All they get is frothing white water as bucketfuls of ocean are thrown up by the white’s huge tail.

As the beating tail bites solid water and propels him forward, there is just enough time to see the lateral stabilising keels visible on each sweep, and then he is gone into the murk.

Jagged tooth had his prize for now.

I don’t think I can divulge what is on all the lists, suffice to say that those who need to know will know, but a funny thing happened when Ted, who is now 8, told me all about a particular Playstation game he’d seen. We don’t as yet have either a Playstation, X-Box nor a Wii (there’s a stupid name if ever there was one) instead we have trees in the garden, bikes, a large park outside, dolls, pushchairs, a tree-house and of course the beach just ten mniutes away. But Ted gets his virtual reality fix from his elder brother’s handed down PSP along with plenty of practice at friends’ houses.

So with his best descriptive head on he set about explaining that the game is centred around cars and you get to drive these cars really fast. Then, as if to qualify the game’s acceptable status, he stressed to us all – the girls are listening intently by now – that there was absolutely no swearing in any of the game. He laboured on this point a fair bit as he continued. Hmmm … that’s good thought I, we wouldn’t want any of that swearing round here in this house would we now? After some more details the awful realisation of which game it actually was dawned on me. It was Grand Theft Auto Chinatown. Now if ever there was something I was going to hate it’s a game about stealing cars.

So I gently explained that he could certainly put it on his list but I cannot have it in the house and I’m not sure the guy in the red and white suit would be too thrilled about it either. He was puzzled, but there’s no swearing in it, he reiterated the point strongly now. I went on that it wasn’t swearing that would be the problem with it, no, it was a game about stealing cars and that is just plain wrong. Games should be fun things to do, in the world of children at least. Stealing however is not a fun thing. If your mate whips away your sandwich at lunchtime and eats it as a joke, you’re not laughing because it sucks. But it’s still theft. On top of that stealing cars is especially dangerous, things go wrong, cars crash into stuff and people usually always get hurt or killed. So, I put it to him that how can something so stupid, dangerous and wrong be made into a game? He clicked on fast that Dad doesn’t like the GTA idea as a game one little bit and agreed with the point.

Incidentally, a similar conversation occurred about 10 years ago with his elder brother and he saw my point straight away when I asked how he’d feel if some loser stole and smashed up our Dax Rush sports car we had built. Point made. And Ted never knew that Alistair made sure that GTA wasn’t in the collection of games he handed down with the PSP…

Back to Ted and as he thought a little more about our conversation, satisfied with our agreement for now, I studied his look and those enquiring brown eyes and readied myself for the next barrage of defensive questioning. Instead he asked, deadly serious,

“Can I get a jet-pack then instead?’

Somewhat bemused I composed myself for a reply,

“Er… Yeah, ‘spose so, you mean a real one don’t you?’

“Yeah, one I can go up in…”

“Mate, I’d rather you had a jet-pack over Grand Theft Auto anyday!’

And now I’m sitting here thinking, what on earth have I said…?

Later that night, much later in fact, Lottie, the 5 year old, refused to go to bed without the contact from us she seems to crave so much and came through to try and watch TV. Lindsay had lined up the last half hour of a film she’d been watching earlier, ‘Bridget Jones: Edge of Reason’ and as I’ve seen it I took off to bed to read. I tried to coax Lottie along with me and get her to sit in her bed next door to our room after a cuddle, but it was no good. She’d managed to secure a spot on the sofa, cosily snuggled in at one end in the hope she wouldn’t be spotted so as to watch the end of the film and that’s where she was staying.

A short time later I returned to say my goodnights and see if I could get her to bed one more time. Wide-eyed and concentrating as if in a sweet shop Lottie didn’t bat an eyelid when I leant in for a goodnight kiss and before I could say a word she said,

“I’m only looking at the wall up there, not the TV screen OK?’

Who am I to argue with that? Later I found out that with some deft screen-skipping on the remote Lindsay was able to steer her through Bridget’s heart-wrenching love scenes to the end. And Lottie was happy to see Bridget again in her underwear in the part where the man buys her the book and kisses her in her undies…

Paying little attention I’m drawn to the other conversations and stories going on. Homework has been a bone of contention with all the kids of late. The younger ones can’t keep the concentration through to the early evening to sit and do some more work, after arriving home, unpacking, resisting the urge to go and play. The older one just doesn’t want to do homework full stop. I can understand all their sentiments but I sympathize more with the younger ones as when I actually look at the homework and see that it’s mostly just a photo-copied extension of what they did in class I can’t always support it. It would seem to have more value if it’s adding to the content of their work, like times tables, research, more facts dare I say interesting, like it should be when you’re at high school possibly sorting out a career path, but I digress. We’ve forgotten Ted’s homework this morning but he’s not particularly bothered, probably because he hasn’t actually done it so I agree to remind him tomorrow.

Scarlett breaks into song, it’s ‘Baa Baa Black Sheep’ today and after all her vocal acrobatics and newly discovered singing talent the last line is continually spoiled by her young siblings with reference to the little boy living, not down the lane as was intended, but down the drain as popular culture now has it. She’s not impressed and launches into a series of whines that I say would go very well with cheese.

The wipers flick-flick across the screen clearing away the thrown up spray and light shower of the morning.

There’s more talk of things off in the distance, like why are the Blue Mountains blue? I struggle for the easy answer that doesn’t involve a trick of the light and atmospheric conditions and blame it on the indigenous peoples of this land. It works and dawns on me that I might be right.

A short while previously we’d jumbled into the car, bags and booster seats, after searching out hats and shoes, smoothed out wrinkled socks and tied laces. Archie the dog snuck out the front door and ran to hide under the car in the vain hope of coming with us all, Ted was reminded again about his hat. He never wears it and Scarlett’s always telling him “you know what they say, ‘no hat, no play’”. He seems not to be bothered, and I even less so about it. His mind always seems to be preoccupied with far more important things.

He once sat down with me and asked a superb question.

“Dad, if we’re in Australia how come we’re not upside down?”
“Well we’re not are we, but maybe it just looks that way and it’s actually everyone else who are upside down?”
“But how do we know that?”
“We don’t”.
“Perhaps it’s gravity, Dad. That’s what keeps us all on the ground and so that’s why we’re not upside down then.”
“You could be right there kiddo”.

And I think back to his enquiring mind, he’s always asking good questions, but right now I needed them all in the car. Archie’s ordered back indoors and scowls at me with those eyes. Scarlett helps me fumble about with the seat belt holding Lottie into the booster seat, then shoves Ted aside with more raised voices. Zoe’s been ready a while and is standing on the veranda, staring on bewildered as if she was never like that.

We go on the old road sometimes, we prefer it in the hope of spotting some morning wildlife. Our road lane is coming to an abrupt end, marked out with dotted white lines and I suggest that if we could drive the car into the end of the ‘V’, holding our breath and squeezing our eyes tight shut we might escape school and work instead entering another world, perhaps where everything is made from sweets, lollies and candy. We could stop off and eat a tree. Scarlett’s eyes light up. Lottie’s convinced but we can’t get the car to fit into the last little bit of the ‘V’ and she tells us again that there’s a shark on the windscreen.

As we look to the front the flick-flick of the wipers has indeed left an unswept fin swimming across the bottom of the screen…