“Young Men and the Sea”

Stroll the boardwalk of any fishing hamlet and it's hard not to reflect on past times: boats arriving with salty fishermen, rusty hooks and fish scales drying in the sun. Canvas drumming in the wind, bending to the heavy air of southern chill; wet, cold salt on a sun-carved face.

Along the Moyne River waterfront, among the black bluestone of the riverbanks, Port Fairy hides a true story of the sea. Faded plaques around Griffith Island hint at the story. "Haldane's Landing", a wooden structure like a flash-card into the past. In the town itself, a lone fibro shed.

The riverside was once the domain of the unfortunate class of townsfolk. Not so today. The waterfront luxury dwellings are a far cry from the humble weatherboard fisherman's cottages of a past era.