"Man is not made for defeat," the writer Ernest Hemingway had his main character declare in his novel, The Old Man and the Sea.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
"A man can be destroyed but not defeated."
And so it is with the undefeated, indefatigable Bill Johnson, one of the Hunter's great old men of the sea.
After more than 70 years of working with Mother Nature in all her moods, fair and foul, Mr Johnson has declared a truce with Father Time.
At the age of 88, he is finally stepping ashore and retiring from a career on the water. If it floats or even submerges, chances are Bill Johnson has skippered or owned it, from barges and tugboats to survey vessels and mini-submarines.
Bill Johnson's career has been as expansive, as changeable, and as wonderfully dramatic as his watery workplace. The maritime world has been his passport to adventure. And that passport has many stamps in it, as he has done thousands of salvage, survey and towing jobs, each posing their own joys and challenges.
"They've all been memorable," said Mr Johnson. "It's not a matter of getting into trouble, it's how to get out of trouble."
Bill Johnson has voyaged far, looking for trouble on, and under, the water, and finding solutions. He has sailed on the seven seas, across harbours, and into nooks and crannies that are barely charted.
He has been at the helm of salvage operations around the globe and close to home, including retrieving the rudder from the Pasha Bulker just off Nobbys.
He has worked with navies and port authorities, helped keep mariners safe by installing navigational aids, including on Lake Macquarie, and worked with the Titanic wreck discoverer Robert Ballard, as he and a National Geographic crew searched the seabed around the Solomon Islands for sunken World War II ships.
And all the while, he has been dealing with whatever the elements have thrown at him, sometimes getting into trouble even deeper than the water he has been working on.
"I was quite sane before some of these jobs," Mr Johnson said, with a gentle smile. "With some of the jobs, you've got to be insane to do them."
Bill Johnson's insane love affair with a life at sea began when he was 15. He had grown up by a more placid waterway, on the banks of Dora Creek. He still lives in that Lake Macquarie community, with his survey vessel, Sea Rambler, berthed in the creek at the end of his backyard.
As a boy, he could have followed his mates, getting a job on the railways or perhaps at Morisset hospital. But young Bill looked over the horizon, to a job as a seaman. As his dad advised, "There's a bunk and three meals a day".
He sailed out of Newcastle harbour in 1947, as a deck boy on a ship named the Time.
"I started off as a deck boy, the lowest form of marine life, and I didn't get much further," he joked.
Seventy-three years on, Bill Johnson would be cruising out of the same harbour on his final voyage before retiring. The same harbour where he had done so much work, on so many projects, through the years, helping keep it navigable and safe.
This final job involved taking care of a new 24-metre commercial fishing boat, the Mira S, which had been built on home soil, at Kooragang, for the Skoljarev family, from Port Stephens.
The Mira S, worth about $4 million, was launched into the Hunter River on Thursday, and the following day, the vessel's first journey on open seas was to be guided by the man on his valedictory voyage.
Bill Johnson was to skipper his tug, Betts Bay, towing the Mira S from Kooragang to what would be its home port of Nelson Bay.
"I think that's pretty cool," said John Skoljarev, as he helped ready the boat for the tow. "He's a living legend."
On board the Betts Bay were two long-time employees of Bill Johnson, Alf Jones and Owen Griffiths.
"He's one of the best," said Mr Griffiths, who first worked with Bill Johnson in the 1970s. "He knows so many people, and he's been doing it for so long."
"To me, it's a little bit strange, to be on the last journey we do," Mr Jones said.
Alf Jones had begun working with Bill Johnson's marine salvage company when he was 21. He is now 65.
They've been through a lot together, including that search for the Pasha Bulker's rudder in mammoth seas: "I said to Bill, 'We must be the only crazy buggers out here'."
To Alf Jones, Bill Johnson is not just his skipper; he is his second father.
"It's teamwork," he said of his relationship with Bill Johnson. "If you don't work as a team, it's not going to work. And I'm lucky, I trust Bill with my life.
"When you feel you've got someone who's very capable, and you know what they're all about, you trust them. You don't have any hesitation. You just do the job. It's always been like that."
With his boss retiring, Alf Jones has decided to do the same.
He has had a rough trot lately. After taking a cruise holiday in March on that now notorious voyage of the Ruby Princess, Mr Jones was diagnosed with COVID-19 and spent about a month in hospital, including 12 days on a ventilator. So he is ready to take it a little easier.
"We can't keep going on forever," Mr Jones said. "But we've worked well as a team. And I don't think I could ever work with anyone else, because when you've worked with the best, you can't get any better."
Bill Johnson has also confronted adversity in recent months. Earlier this year, his wife of almost 70 years and mate in life and business, Viney, died. And the long hours spent on vessels, and the measure of the years at sea, prompted him towards retirement.
"The mind is willing, but the body is buggered," he said.
Still, there was one more voyage.
As the Betts Bay nudged the Mira S down the river, the usual ebb and flow of harbour life stopped to celebrate Bill Johnson.
A pilot boat and two Svitzer tugs, providing a water salute, accompanied the Betts Bay to Nobbys. Over the VHF radio flowed a torrent of praise from maritime workers in the port, as they paid tribute to Bill Johnson and wished him well for his final voyage.
With tears in his eyes, Johnson said on the radio, "I'm overwhelmed. Thanks everyone. That send-off was something."
But the journey was just beginning. After manoeuvring the Mira S into position in the harbour to be towed, the Betts Bay chugged out to sea and up the coast on the 48-kilometre journey to Port Stephens.
Even Mother Nature was blowing sweet farewell kisses to Bill, with a fresh south-westerly wind and a gentle swell.
But as we traced Stockton Beach, Bill Johnson recalled conditions were frequently not this kind during jobs.
"It always tests you, you never know what you're going to get," he said. While he never feared dying at sea, at times he wondered if the waves would claim him.
"I once said to a religious bloke, 'There's no atheists who go to sea'," said Mr Johnson, not religious himself. "You pray sometimes."
After a sweep past Tomaree Headland and into Port Stephens, closer to the Yacaaba Head side, Mr Johnson looked astern at the Mira S bobbing along and muttered, "I don't want to rush her."
Did he mean that for the boat's sake, or he didn't want this journey to end?
The skipper smiled and replied, "Bit of both."
As Hemingway wrote in The Old Man and the Sea, "It is better to be lucky. But I would rather be exact. Then when luck comes you are ready."
Those words came to life as the Betts Bay carefully lined up the Mira S at the entrance to the marina at Nelson Bay. It looked like Bill Johnson was threading the eye of a needle with a very expensive new boat, as the owners watched from the shore. Bill Johnson may have hoped for luck, but he relied on exactness. And experience. The Mira S safely slid through the entrance and nuzzled into the berth.
Job done. An era ended.
"Congratulations, young man!," said an elated Ivan Skoljarev, as he climbed into the tug's wheelhouse to shake Bill Johnson's hand.
Bill Johnson has been preparing for this moment. He has been cleaning out his yard, but there are some items he can't part with, such as the SCUBA tank that once belonged to diving pioneer Jacques Cousteau. And his vessels, including the Betts Bay, will be auctioned.
But for now, the little tug had one more job to do, as it chugged out of Port Stephens, its stern to the setting sun and its bow facing the sea. It was carrying its owner back home.
In a beautiful setting like that, some words from The Old Man and the Sea can come drifting back: "Now is no time to think of what you do not have. Think of what you can do with that there is."
Or, as Bill Johnson said, after he had held the wheel and looked ahead at the slowly darkening water, "I'm just lucky, enjoying life."
