Road to Hat Head

A car cruised along a winding road through back country New South Wales in-between the Pacific Highway and the ocean. Rain and twists kept the car from going the speed limit. Marco and Angelo feared the old bomb Nissan Pulsar wouldn’t handle any excess speed. The high beam only highlighted the rain on the windshield making the driver have to strain his vision past it, the wiper rubbers worn out and ineffective. The boys strummed guitar and sung improvised songs to pass the time.



Marco and Angelo were on a road trip down the NSW coast, pulling off the highway and surfing breaks that impulse took them to. They just left Southwest Rocks and were on their way to Crescent Head to stay at a friend’s place. They found time off university and wanted to make the most of it, so they took a friend’s car, threw boards in the back and took off.



They came to a small bridge that led them into a suburb. They saw a blue sign that read ‘Hat Head’ in white characters.



“Damn, we must have taken a wrong turn. We’ll have to cruise around and ask someone for directions,” said Angelo, patiently changing gears as the car protested loudly.



They cruised down the street looking for the town centre. All small Australian towns tend to look the same to someone just passing through. They all have a few houses in wide streets. The town centre has a few real estate agencies, a convenience store, a milk bar and an RSL, Bowls or Surf Club. They found the centre close to the beach and parked in the Bowls Club parking lot. They saw some kids playing in the rain so Marco called them over. They came running, jumping in puddles on the way.



“Hey, do you know where the surf is better? Hat Head or Crescent Head?” quizzed Angelo.



“Hat Head is!” said a boy in a Ben 10 shirt enthusiastically.



“My Dad says it’s the best here! He says he wouldn’t go to Crescent Head even if he could!”



“Hey, do you have to wear a hat in the line-up?” asked Marco teasingly.



“NO, you don’t silly!” the kid replied, shocked that someone could use the name of his home town in a joke.



“Anyway, have a good night, and make sure you put a hat on for the rain,” said Angelo as they locked the car and ran into the bowls club.



The inside was a large hall. Typical blue grey carpet lined the floor. There was a glass folding wall with the bowls green on the other side, barely lit up by overhead lights. A horde of old timers occupied the tables and ordered drinks at the bar. Thick Australian accented drawl filled the room. The boys were walking to the bar when a tall elderly man stumbled towards them. He was waving a beer around in his lanky arms and addressed them in drunk, Aussie slang.



“You boys lost or something?” he said.



“Yea, we were going to Crescent Head and we ended up here. How do you get back onto the road that takes you to Crescent?” asked Angelo.



“Crescent! That’s easy! Ye just go back along the road ye came down and you’ll get to the intersection. Left to Kempsey and right back to Southwest Rocks. Take the left to Kempsey you’ll see another turn off for Crescent,” he said.



“Hey thanks a lot mate,” they replied as they turned to leave.



“Hey hang on, why don’t you stay at my hotel? It’s pretty wet out there. It ain’t a bad fare either, only 60 bucks each!” said the old timer.



“Haha, sorry man. We’ve been sleeping in our car. We have to get going anyway,” said Angelo.



“Alright, suit yourselves. I’ll be in here for a little while more if ye need me. My names Bob by the way!” said Bob as he took Angelo’s hand in a vice like handshake.



The boys headed back to the car, dodging rain. The car started loudly and Angelo whipped it back onto the road. They headed back to the winding road; eager to get to the warm beds their friend had waiting for them.



The boys got to the intersection and took the left to Kempsey. A little further down the road they saw the Crescent Head turn off and took it. The dark road winded through the bush, illuminated by the car’s weak headlights. The moon and stars hid behind black clouds. The conversation became forced as the boys tried to preoccupy themselves and to think of something other than sleep. They finally reached the dull glow of suburbia in the distance. They crossed a small bridge and past a blue and white sign they expected to say ‘Crescent Head’. But it didn’t. It said ‘Hat Head’.



“What on earth! Are we seriously in Hat Head again!?” said Marco, scrambling out of his reclined position.



“No, we took the Crescent Head turn off, that can’t be,” said Angelo, frustrated from taking a 40 minute loop back to Hat Head.



“I bet Bob’s just trying to get us to stay at his hotel,” joked Marco.



They drove back to the Bowls Club to look for Bob and a clarification on directions. They parked it into the parking lot and ran back inside. The crowd had thinned out. No party animals in this gathering. Bob was there like he said at a table rabbling on about no good something or other to his friends.



“Hey Bob, we’re back,” said Angelo.



“Well it looks like we just can’t get rid o ya!” said Bob, a little drunker than he was before.



“We took the Crescent Head turn off and we ended up here again, did we miss something?” said Angelo.



“Well ye must have if ye ended up here again,” said Bob



“Hey, I’ll do you boys a favour. You can stay at my hotel for a better price,” Bob paused, trying to get his brain to process the words he wanted.



“Seventy bucks a night each,”



“Haha, nah we’re right,” said Angelo, bewildered at Bob’s bizarre counter offer.



They went and asked the bar man for new directions. He said the same thing as Bob. They asked more people in the club, same directions.



“Well it must have been us. Maybe there was another turn on the road to Crescent that led back here. And in the dark it looked like just another curve in the road,” said Marco.



“We did see the Crescent Head turn off.”



They got back into the car, Angelo frustrated at having to drive in the wet again for another hour because Marco couldn’t drive manual. They didn’t talk as Angelo drove them back out onto the road. His driving became a little more reckless as he tried to get them to Crescent as fast as possible. Finally they reached the turn off to Kempsey. The road was empty, so Angelo did a speedy turn towards Kempsey. Marco tensed in his seat, the car clanking in protest. Angelo slowed down as the came to the Crescent Head turn off.



“So we can both see that sign which definitely reads Crescent Head,” said Angelo, flashing the sign with the high beam.



They cruised along, the NSW bush looking so similar to everything they had passed. Finally they saw the dull glow of suburbia up ahead again. They crossed a small bridge and saw a blue sign with white writing. Hat Head.



“Christ,” said Angelo wearily.



“We’ll find out how to get out of here in the morning. Let’s just sleep near the beach. Maybe there’ll be waves.”



They parked the car, reclined the seats and fell asleep with hats on their heads and wrapped in sleeping bags for warmth.



The boys woke up with the sun. In the morning, cars heat up like ovens if you sleep in them. Thick condensation coated the windows like someone had sprayed water everywhere. The boys peered at the waves from the car park, sun in eyes. They saw fun waves in the shore break, barrelling off the take-off and then closing out after a small run. They got into their steamers, waxed their boards and paddled out.



After two hours of surfing they came in and walked around town. There isn’t a lot to see in Hat Head. They bought some bread, ham and juice at the convenience store. They sat on the gutter eating their food while watching the town wake up. A few cars drove by, someone walking their dog, a guy with a board heading to the beach.



A man ambled past them, muttering something to himself.



“Hey mate, how do you get out of here?” asked Marco.



The man snapped out of his trance and eye balled the boys. He was wearing old clothes that looked like they had been bought in an op shop. He had a long faced and his jaw jutted out to the side that he exacerbated by tilting his head. He had tired eyes that suggested he had known the tip of a needle many a time.



“How do you get to Crescent Head?” Marco repeated.



“Leave! Ha!” said the man with the lock jaw.



“Ye can’t leave Hat. It’s impossible. Believe me, I’ve tried.”



“You can’t leave. Why not?” said Angelo interested to hear the upcoming conspiracy theory.



“I can’t say what it is exactly, but it’s something beyond our control, something cosmic. See, some people come and they stay. And some people come and go, but don’t leave, people like you and me. We can go as many times as we want, but we will never leave. Believe me; they don’t call me Methadone Bruce for nothing.”



They starred at Bruce. They had never dealt with cosmic forces before, and they were pretty convinced they weren’t dealing with them now.



“Do you want some of this juice Brucey? It’s cosmic” asked Angelo.



He took a swig of the juice and nodded his head approvingly. He walked off to where he was going, swilling the juice and muttering.



With Bruce gone, the boys planned their next move.



“I hate to contradict Methadone, but I think the sign post was in the wrong spot. Let’s just drive straight past that Crescent Head turn off and onto Kempsey. If we reach Kempsey we know to turn back,” said Angelo.



They packed up their bread and ham and got back in the car. For the third time Angelo whipped the car out of the parking lot and headed back out of town. They passed the Kempsey/Southwest Rocks intersection and the Crescent Head turn off. Rejuvenated from sleep, surf and breakfast they felt optimistic they would reach Crescent Head. About 15 minutes later they came to a 50k/h sign. Optimism turned to dread and frustration. Once again they crossed the small bridge and passed the blue and white Hat Head sign. They cruised to the beach and parked the car. Methadone Bruce’s words rang in their minds, completely insane yet eerily correct. They got out and looked at the waves.



A car pulled up beside them. The window rolled down to reveal Bob from the Bowls Club.



“You boys still here. Weren’t you going to Crescent?” he said.



“Yea, but somehow we keep taking the wrong road and looping back to here,” said Angelo, feeling contempt for Bob.



“Well those roads are tricky. They’re definitely not sign posted well,” said Bob



“Hey, sorry for the way I acted last night, hiking up the price and all. You know what it’s like when you get on it. Look, to make it up, ye can stay on my couch tonight for free. I can’t believe you’re serious about sleeping in that thing,” said Bob, gesturing to their car.



“Thanks Bob, but we’re actually trying to get out of here today,” said Angelo.



Bob broke into laughter.



“Alright, but if you change your mind, this is my address,” Bob told them the address and wished them well. He pulled out and drove off.



Onshore wind bit through their jackets and made them cold. The beach looked depressing to be near.



“Let’s go back to Southwest Rocks. Then get on the Pacific Highway and loop around Kempsey the back way,” said Angelo, eager not to spend a night at Bob’s house.



“Aw, I wanted to stay at Bob’s house,” said Marco.



They got into the car and headed out of town a fourth time. The car filled the streets with excessive noise as they went through the main street and over the bridge. They turned left at the intersection and bee-lined for Southwest rocks. They zipped through familiar scrub, passing the occasional house on acreage. Yet surprise was not felt when once they reached the familiar bridge, only frustration. They slowed down to cross it and once again they were in Hat Head.



The midday sun sat high in the sky, bright and glorious.



“We have two options, stay at Bob’s house the night until we figure out how to get out of here. Or paddle,” said Marco.



“Bob’s house or paddle,” Angelo thought for a moment.



Then they drove the car to the beach, using the last of their fuel, and started putting everything they could fit into plastic bags. They put the plastic bags in backpacks and got into their steamers. With the remaining bread and ham and an old water bottle from the car they got into the ocean from the beach and started to paddle. They could see Bruce, with the empty carton of orange juice on his head, inspecting the abandoned car. The shore eventually went round a headland and Hat Head was finally behind them, dodging whatever cosmic force or incorrect sign post that was stopping them before.