A very rare book indeed: one copy for sale here costs US$83.79!!!
You all know about my fascination with Tom Neale and his book "An Island To Oneself" which I found years ago in a musty second-hand shop. Today, at Vinnies in Ulladulla, I picked up a copy of "Together Alone" which I had never heard of.
It's the sort of book that deserves to stand next to "An Island to Oneself" - in fact, as Ron Falconer writes, "Originally we had left France with the intention of sailing directly to an island called Suvarov in the Pacific Ocean, an atoll where a hermit, Tom Neale, had lived for several years. I'd met Tom and also visited Suvarov." (page 35) - and to be read by kerosene light in cosy "Melbourne" while dreaming of 'escaping to a life in paradise'.
It's the true story of a modern-day Swiss Family Robinson, Scottish adventurer Ron Falconer and his French wife Anne and their two adorable little children, Alexandre and Anais, who make the ultimate seachange for a new life on a desert island, tiny Caroline Island, part of the island nation of Kiribati in the South Pacific.
They quickly discover that life in paradise isn't easy. Shark-infested waters, crafty rats, giant crabs and flesh-eating ants - it's sink or swim for Ron and Anne, as they struggle to live off the land and raise their children without the things most of us take for granted.
They build their own beautiful little house. Ron brings the floorboards with him on his boat and salvages the roof from a shipwreck, while Anne weaves the shutters, Polynesian style, from coconut leaves. Ron also builds an outside kitchen, a chicken coup, a well, a solar shower (ultimately voted too labour-intensive by his savvy companions) and even a wind-powered flour grinder (until a conventional one proves to be a lot less trouble). While Anne fishes every morning for the evening meal Ron works on one of his many projects or tends his vege garden with his willing and able assistants, Alexandre and Anais, who are just four and two when they arrive on the island.
Visitors come and go - a group of scientists, old sea-faring friends, and a Kiribati businessman and his men - but all the while the family take care to tread lightly in their island paradise, which in return fulfils their simple needs. Finally, though, modern-day realities intervene, when the Kiribati businessman succeeds in gaining control of the island, with plans to fish the waters and eventually build a resort. Ron and Anne are asked to leave after four years, in 1991, and their paradise is lost.
In August 1997, to promote events to mark the arrival of the year 2000,
Caroline Island was renamed Millennium Island by the Kiribati government
"Together Alone" is an insightful, fascinating, sometimes philosophical, and ultimately uplifting story of how one man's dream to live a solitary existence in paradise becomes very much an extraordinary family affair.
(Of course, I picked up several other books - as I always do; to say nothing of five seasons of "NCIS" - but that's a story for another day.)
P.S. And here is a post from 2014 from the author on his facebook page: Usually the first question I am asked is, “So where do you come from?” “The North of Scotland,” I reply. “So how did you arrive here?” is the predictable second question. “Well,” I begin, at the age of 37 I had my own business doing architectural drawings, had modernized a small cottage by the sea, owned a Jaguar car and a caravan, all paid for, so I built a small sail boat and sailed away. Sailing around the world I discovered Polynesia and loved it. I sailed back home then sailed back to Polynesia again, this time to stay. I cruised around the islands for many years then found a beautiful uninhabited island. With my new French wife and two small children, 2 and 4 years old, plus a dog, cat, 2 parrots and 5 hens we went and lived there. We stayed 4 years on the island, built a sleeping house and kitchen, planted a garden, made a fish trap and generally lived off the sea and nature. It was such an interesting story I put it all down on paper and Random House published the book, “Together Alone”. Returning to the real life after 17 years of wandering I couldn't think of going back to a 9-to-5 routine so I started playing music around the restaurants and hotels of Moorea. [Update added in 2020:] Eventually met a New Zealand lady, sold the home-built house on Moorea and went to New Zealand. I was refused residency because of the Caroline story and was evicted - click here. Moved on to France, bought a beautiful old Dutch barge. Now we live together on the historic Canal du Midi.
P.P.S. Via his daughter Karriann's facebook page, I've just now tracked down Ron's current facebook page: click here. It seems to confirm he's still a-barging on the Canal du Midi in the south of France.
