Travel to Barrow Island

The flights to Barrow depart at the Perth domestic airport, but at a different terminal than all the others. As best I could tell at 5am, the terminal I needed was not connected by bus or footpath and a car or taxi was necessary to get there. The airline was Cobham National Jet, a charter company that caters to government and industry. They seemed to be the only operator for this small terminal.

The security process was fairly normal with the exception of a rigorous quarantine check. Quarantine doesn’t refer to a segregated area for sick people or travelers, but it is instead a check for materials that can contaminate Barrow Island. Since Barrow is classified as a nature reserve, measures need to be taken to not introduce non-native plants, insects, animals, etc to the island. This process involves scrubbing all dirt and debris from shoes, checking clothing and pockets for seeds or dirt, and screening for any food or plant material before passing through security. I had to do some serious scrubbing of my sandals because of some imbedded sand. I think for future travels to the island, I’ll just leave running shoes and sandals there.

The terminal seemed to fill in as the time passed. We weren’t waiting long when they began boarding. I’m not sure what model of plane we took, but it was a 4 engine jet with 20 rows of 5 seats. The interior was worn and I would guess the plane was 15 years old from the dated styling. Two flight attendants were on board and made it seem like a regular flight with their safety speech at the beginning and drink service during the flight. The plane was two thirds full and I had a window seat with no one next to me.

The flight was 2 hours long heading north across the West Australian outback. As we left Perth, the land quickly turned a barren red with small odd shrubs here and there. From an aerial view, you could see that a 4x4 was necessary to navigate this land, but it didn’t seem like you’d see much on the drive. The island is 30 km off the coast and we had already begun our decent before crossing water.

The small airport at Barrow (BWB – it actually has a name) has one runway and waiting room. We de-boarded down steps directly to the runway and picked up our bag from a cart. The morning sun felt nice with the cool ocean breeze while I looked around and took my first impression of the island. I couldn’t see much from where we were, but this would be my home for the next month