Botany Bay

When the First Fleet arrived in Australia they had followed a map left to them by Captain Cook. So they steered for Botany Bay, wisely by-passing Tasmania and Victoria.

The first vessel of the fleet arrived there on 18 February, 1788. There is no tribute, no marker, no memorial spot at Kurnell to suggest that the First Fleet might also have visited the landing spot where Cook’s crew came to shore. There’s plenty of historical acknowledgement to Cook's visit, but nothing about the First Fleet at Kurnell.

Instead the monument to the first white immigrants is way over on the shallow side of the bay, in the suburb of Brighton. I can’t imagine them even considering pitching tents there.

Kurnell is a poor place to want to build a new country, but Brighton is worse. But that’s where the grand monument to the arrival of the First Fleet sits on the shore.

What the Captains of the First Fleet vessels might have found at Brighton probably looked bad for chances of success in their new world mission. But further around in Botany Bay, there’s water deep enough for ships, where Sydney’s industrial harbour now operates.

Perhaps they thought the French were already there, and didn’t chance further exploration in Botany Bay. The French certainly arrived in Botany Bay a few days later, hard on the heels of the British First Fleet . Hence we have the suburb of La Perouse on Botany Bay to remind us of their early presence in 1788.

The monument to the First Fleet, at Brighton today, is peeling and torn, a good meeting place but no one sitting around the model ship on the day I visited could tell me why it was there.