Finding the cave
Spike's very close friend in Australia, Beverley Spiers,
found a cave near Woy Woy which, under years of dust and
grime, revealed Aboriginal rock paintings.
"I was out riding one day, and it started to rain
and I thought, now if I was an Aboriginal [person], what
would I do? I would find a cave and I would hide in it until
the rain stopped. I was sitting there while it was raining
so I got the water and washed it off. And it was a wonderful
scene, it was the longboat that first came into the Broken
Bay. So when Spike rung, I told him and he said, when I
come out, we’ll have to do this. So when I took him
down, he said 'this is so wonderful we’ve got to get
it saved'."
Many years after their discovery, Spike visited the cave
with a television crew and told them, "Inside this
cave 50 years ago, there was a rock shelf here and it was
covered in salt encrusted sand, and I... scraped the salt
sand away and there was a carving of a dingo. But then the
most extraordinary thing! I washed the sand away and came
across men in a rowing boat."
Aboriginal elder Jack Smith says, "That particular
cave shows how our ancestors lived, ate and slept, and also
performed and also did significant engravings on the rock
carvings which is up above the cave."
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Beverley Spiers today |
