Macquarie Island and Cape York: How to visit Australia’s wild edges

Zodiacs from our expedition ship, Heritage Adventurer, have dropped us ashore to explore this remote wildlife sanctuary, a critical breeding ground for thousands of seals and millions of seabirds and penguins. Access is by expedition cruise only, and fewer than 2000 travellers a year make it here.

Getting away from civilisation doesn’t mean serenity. In a dune rookery, 40,000 royal penguins squabble and honk. On the beach, king penguins sound off like party horns.

To add to the drama, my doe-eyed seal has challenged another male who’s vying to be king of the harem.

A prone six-metre male is one thing. A roaring six-metre male reared on his hind flippers, spine arched to almost vertical, proboscis fully inflated is quite another. I’m intimidated, and I’m not even in the fight.

Macquarie Island is one of six subantarctic island groups – the others, The Snares, Bounty, Antipodes, Auckland and Campbell, are managed by New Zealand – and the only one with a permanent human presence: a rotating crew of up to 40 expeditioners at the research station.

The rules are strict for visitors. Before leaving the ship, hiking boots are scrubbed, backpacks vacuumed, and gloves and hats “plucked” to remove loose fibres. Biosecurity is tedious, but no one wants to be a human wheelbarrow offloading nasties – soil, seeds and pathogens – where they would wreak havoc.

We explore the rocky shoreline and wander the boardwalks that wind through tussocky grasslands. Above, brown skuas ride the thermals looking to pluck a stray penguin chick from a crèche or swoop on an unattended egg.

In the afternoon, Heritage Adventurer sails south to Lusitania Bay, where more than 100,000 king penguins pack a kilometre of beach – a scene that perhaps prompted Antarctic explorer Sir Douglas Mawson to declare, “This little island is one of the wonder spots of the world.”

It’s emotional, too. The birds surround rusted digesters that once processed hunted seals and penguins. My daughter, Evie, asks why these eyesores are still here. “To remind us,” I answer, “of what we did wrong”.

Albatrosses soar in silver skies and orcas porpoise through darkening waters; 50 shades of grey, black and white as we sail the Southern Ocean, bound for the next subantarctic isle.

Almost 5000km north, Cape York Peninsula is a palette of blues and greens. Winter here exists in name only, with temperatures rarely below 20C.

I’m with Intrepid Travel and onboard Betsy the Beast, our group’s nickname for the hulking overland 4WD truck that will take us from Cairns to Pajinka, or The Tip, about 1200km and 10 days away.

The world’s oldest tropical rainforest, the Daintree, opens the roadshow. It’s a forest so impressive Sir David Attenborough called it “the most extraordinary place on Earth”.

At water level, it’s the scariest place. This is saltwater croc country, and on a Daintree River cruise we meet Hook, a 4m, 450kg male.

With eyes just above water, he regards us with the weary contempt of an apex predator that knows it’s been the most dangerous thing in Australian waters for four million years.

I’m trembling and breathless again, wishing our boat was bigger.

Mangrove forests line the banks, the rainforest canopy carrying the burden of vines, creepers and massive epiphytes hitching a free ride. Filling the gaps of this living canvas are giant palms, ferns and the pink, white and yellow of native hibiscus flowers.

It’s an unbelievable collage – an artwork a kindergarten teacher would applaud for its originality.

A green tree snake curled around an overhanging branch looks unreal. Above it, high in the foliage, Papuan frogmouths sit out the day until it’s time for the evening hunt.

What we don’t see is the world’s most dangerous bird, the flightless cassowary, which stands 2m tall and has dagger-like claws that can easily kill you. It is one of the few creatures that makes crocodiles look good.

At Cape Tribulation, the Great Barrier Reef and Daintree meet in a heritage-listed collision that happens nowhere else on Earth.

As tempting as the ocean is, however, Kulki Beach is a no-swim zone – not only because of the presence of “salties”, but also potentially deadly box jellyfish.

Betsy does beautifully on the corrugations, creek crossings and rocky climbs of the 37km Bloomfield Track – a sketch in the dry season, often impassable in the wet, and a definite no-go if you don’t know how to wrangle a 4WD.

At the end of the line, we celebrate her hard work with drinks and dinner at Rossville’s legendary Lion’s Den Hotel, a 150-year-old pub with walls and ceilings covered in messages from generations of travellers.

Further north, our expedition takes in Cooktown, the tiny town of Laura, the one-million-hectare cattle station Fairview, and Iron Range National Park, home to Australia’s largest lowland rainforest and the continent’s biggest snake, the amethystine python.

Ready for photos, there’s one curled around a drainpipe at the ranger’s hut.

I want to yell “yee-haw” in Weipa, almost eight hours north of Cooktown. Set on the western shore of the Gulf of Carpentaria, this is a wild town where everything is huge. It’s the barramundi capital of Queensland, home to monster crocs and the world’s largest bauxite mine, and a sunset on Front Beach that’s bigger than Texas.

After a croc-free swim at Fruit Bat Falls in the Apudthama National Park and a ferry crossing over the Jardine River to Bamaga, Betsy the Beast is fuelled up for the final dirt track trek to Pajinka.

It’s the roughest road so far, which makes our arrival at Queensland’s northern tip a huge celebration. We made it. But the Torres Strait islands are in sight, tempting us to travel just a little further. I’m trembling and breathless again, just thinking about it.

Macquarie Island is included on the Galapagos of the Southern Ocean cruise operated by Heritage Expeditions.

Intrepid Travel offers two 10-day overland trips on the Cape York Peninsula.