In the foreground of ALL VISITOR'S ASHORE is a set of bizarre characters, all of whom seem bent on escaping from New Zealand into a larger world. The 1951 waterfront lockout is on, the harbour is full of cargo vessels, but the passenger ships continue to sail. One by one or two by two the characters in the novel depart, leaving Curl Skidmore, the would-be poet and latterday professor (who is looking back on these events as an older man) alone on Takapuna Beach.