Lightning Ridge is home to one of the artists that did one of the
"Utes in the Paddock" back in Forbes.
John Murray did the ute with the Galahs representing the young fellows
that typically drive utes on farms. We
looked at his gallery as his style of painting depicts the outback and he has a
wonderful way of painting emus, cockatoos and other outback scenes. I cheekily took some photos of his paintings
which were displayed in the bowling club.
He is not politically correct as he did a painting of Tony Abbott in his
"budgie smuggler" swimming trunks as well as one of an emu with Julia
Gillard's head and hair style. Once we
got to know his style of painting, we recognized his work for miles around.
The weather in Lightning Ridge turned bleak and rain was pending so we
packed up and headed for Queensland. We
crossed the border from NSW at a little town called Hebel where John Murray has
painted emus looking through windows that he had painted on the walls of the
old pub. After a look around Hebel we traveled onto St George.
We had heard about a caravan park called Kapunda Fishing Park which is
right on the Balonne river and just north of the town. We originally booked a powered site for 2
nights which were OK if you needed the convenience of power, but when we had a
walk around the park we discovered the non powered camping sites which are
right beside the river. Talk about
"absolute" river frontage, we parked the caravan not more than 3
metres from the river and were able to sit in the shade of our awning with the
fishing rods in. This site was so
relaxing we ended up staying a week. The
biggest downfall was having to use straight river water for showering and
washing up etc, but overall it was a fantastic week. Unfortunately the fish count wasn't good with
3 carp, one undersized eel tailed catfish and 1 undersized silver perch.
We met some wonderful fellow campers while we were there including Greg
and Noelene who had many stories to share of their travels around the country.
Greg put us onto 2 really good Apps which are well worth sharing. Every camper travelling Australia should have
Wiki Camps, it is only a couple of
dollars but is a wealth of information on caravan and camping spots around the
country. It also comes with excellent
maps to help find these places.
Greg and Noelene are keen bird watchers and they had an app called The Michael Morcombe & David Stewart eGuide
to Australian Birds. This one is
more expensive but is a fantastic tool for identifying birds. It even has sound effects of the bird
calls. It is interesting to see the
reaction of the birds in the close proximity when you play their call.
St George is at the centre of the cotton growing industry in south west
Queensland with up to 70,000 hectares of cotton grown within the Balonne shire
when conditions allow. Just to the east
of St George is a 12,000 hectare irrigation development where cotton is grown
by various farmers. The paddocks are
huge with the distinctive furrows ploughed all in the same direction so the
water runs through the paddock when they irrigate. They have also installed huge above ground
water storage "dams" they call turkeys nests. These are filled from the channels during the
wet season and the water used for irrigation during the growing season which is
October to March in this area.
There is also a cotton gin where local cotton is processed. It is easy to pick the cotton growing areas
as the sides of the roads are "littered" with cotton which seems to
blow off the trucks carrying the bales to the gin. Seems like a waste to me and I think their
method of transport needs to be reviewed to stop this waste. Where there is good water, there are cotton
plants growing along the side of the road.
At this time of the year they look like a dead bush about 1 metre high
that somebody sprinkled a bag of cotton balls over.
The harvested cotton comes from the farm in a
round bale wrapped in yellow plastic around the outside but not on the
edges. This is where the loose cotton
blows off from during transport.
We gathered information on cotton growing and I have scanned it for
those who might be interested to find out more about cotton growing. We found it very fascinating.
About 44 kilometres south east of St George is the rambling historic
Nindigully Pub nestled on the Moonie River.
This pub was established in 1864 and was the Cobb & Co. Coach change
over station from the late 1800's to the early 1900's. It is believed to hold the longest continual
liquor licence in Queensland. It still
runs as a pub but is more of an iconic attraction these days. There is a free camp on the river only about
100 metres from the pub so it is very popular with the campers.
Their signature dish is the "Road train Burger" which is a
5.5 kilogram hamburger in a huge bread roll.
Of course it is served with chips and it costs $60.00. There is a note on the menu which says it
feeds up to 6. The bread roll is in the
shape of the map of Queensland. We didn't
tackle it!!`
Cunnamulla sounded interesting so we took some time out to have a clean
up after the bush camping at St George.
This caravan park is on the banks of the Warrego River but the river is
not as easily accessible, so with fishing off the agenda, we set about having a
look around the town.
The centre of attraction is the statue of the Cunnamulla Fella.
A fellow called Stan Coster wrote the words for the song 'Cunnamulla
Fella' when he was 'ringing' in the Cunnamulla district around the 1950's. Slim
Dusty later recorded the song and it has more recently been recorded by Lee
Kernaghan. The Cunnamulla Fella is the larrikin in all Australians. In the 1950
and 60's, Cunnamulla was enjoying prosperity and growth due to a strong wool
industry. Friday and Saturday nights saw the young ringers and shearers race to
town for dancin', lovin' and fightin'. These Young blokes worked hard and
tomorrow was a long way off.
Artist Mike Nicholas worked in Cunnamulla as a policeman in the 1960's
and these young men inspired his pen and ink drawing of the Cunnamulla Fella.
He recalls seeing boys as young as 14 years old sitting on their swags outside
the pubs waiting for the 'cocky' (grazier) or the mail truck to pick them up. The statue of the Cunnamulla Fella is the work of sculptor Archie St.
Claire. The details of Archie's work gives life to the Cunnamulla Fella as he
gazes across the town. His expression captures a quiet moment in his day.
This is the original Slim Dusty version of the Cunnamulla Fella song
The visitors centre in Cunnamulla is possibly one of the best we have
ever seen. They have a wonderful
collection of memorabilia from all around the district. There is a 3 stand sheering plant built into
the centre along with a lot of other old farm equipment. There is also old communications equipment
and newspaper clippings showing the history of the area.
The centre also runs a very informative half hour video on the formation
of the Great Artesian Basin. It explains how the basin was formed and how the
aboriginal people used it for 20,000 years as a food and water source. It also explains how white man has used it
and almost destroyed it by overuse and waste of water, mainly as a result
of uncapped bores which just kept
pouring water down open channels where 95% of the water was lost due to seepage
and evaporation.
New pipelines replacing the open channels and capping the open bores is
now starting to restore the artesian basin back to it's original water
pressure.
There is a "time tunnel" which takes visitors back 100
million years to see how the basin was formed.
It also has a story of a local grazing family that discovered the bones
of 2 dinosaurs on their property near Eromanga, northwest of Cunnamulla, in
2005. These are the largest bones of any
dinosaur discovered in Australia. It is
estimated that these bones are 95 million years old. From the bones discovered, it is estimated
that these dinosaurs were around 26 metres long. The upper leg bone is 1.5 metres long and
weighs 100 kilograms so it certainly was a big animal. Hmmm, do they realise how long ago 95 million
years is? Hard to imagine anything still
being found that are that old.
Charleville is another 195 kilometres further north east and this town
has a lot of history as well. Cobb and
Co ended up building all their stage coaches in Charleville as the climate was
perfect for drying the timber out before the stage coach was built. In the years before they built their coaches
in Charleville, the timber wheels and axles used to crack after they had been
up in this country for a while. Moving
the factory to here stopped all these problems.
Unfortunately the factory burnt down so there is nothing left to see
accept the managers residence.
The Visitor Information Centre sell a CD which is a self guided tour of
the town. It takes you around the points
of interest and gives a bit of their history.
We were surprised how many of the old buildings were destroyed by fire
in the 1920's. One of the pubs was burnt
down twice in 20 years.
The current Commonwealth Bank was built of concrete in 1926 and is
still used as a bank to this day.
There is a Cosmos centre near the airport and a lot of stargazing is
done around the area.
We stayed at the
Evening Star caravan park which is 8 kilometres out of town. It is fantastic for looking at the solar
system at night as the sky is so clear and there is next to no background
light.
 |
| About 300 Brolgas live on this property when the dam is full |
We visited "Woolabra" station about 40 kilometres north and
did the "Brolgas and Bustards" tour.
Kevin who has owned this property since 1980, picked us up from his road
gate and took us around his station for 3 hours. We were lucky enough to be the only ones on
the tour so we got to ask a lot of questions and learn a bit about station life
in outback Queensland.
 |
| Bustards are also known as "Bush Turkeys" |
Kevin said he ran a very successful sheep station producing wool up
until the bottom fell out of the wool prices in the mid 80's and then the 100
year flood which occurred in 1990. We
had heard a bit about the 1990 flood on the town tour that we took, but didn't
realise just how big it was. Kevin and
his family lived in a "Queenslander" style home built on stilts about
9 foot off the ground. During the 1990
flood, they had water 10" deep in the top story of their home for a week
and they were completely surrounded by water for 10 weeks. Even after the water receded, they still
couldn't get off the property for quite some weeks as the creeks were still
full. They were very glad when a
helicopter dropped them some food supply after the 10 weeks as they were down
to half a tin of golden syrup and 7 weetbix.
One of the heart breaks of the flood was the 15,000 sheep that they
lost, including some 500 stud rams which they had just sold. The rams were in a
holding yard near the house waiting for their new owners to have them picked
up. The flood water rose within 1 hour
of when they first noticed it coming and they didn't have time to shift
stock. Most of the rams got washed in
under the house and drowned by the flood water.
Kevin said that when the water receded and they could get the dead rams
out, they were packed in nose to rump and very tightly by the pressure of the
water. Imagine 500 dead rams rotting
under the house that you were trying to live in and nothing you could do about
it for 10 weeks.
After the flood came the drought which just about ruined them. In 1994 they were given a government directive to shoot 4,000 sheep as there was
nothing for them to eat. Kevin said that
the bank wanted to foreclose on them but he came up with an irrigation scheme
and convinced the bank to let him try it before foreclosing.
Now, I have had a few visions myself and seen many other men with a
vision, but how do you irrigate 2,000 acres of bush in outback Queensland when
there is no river. This man certainly
had a vision. Kevin new that when it
rained to the east of his property there was heaps of water as was proven in
the 1990 flood, all he had to do was capture it.
 |
| The dam is dry at the moment but just needs 3" of rain to fill it |
He took us and showed us his "dam".
It covers an area of 650 acres to 9 foot deep. It holds 7,000 million litres of water and
only needs 3" of rain in it's catchment area to fill it to overflowing.
He simply got on his D9 bulldozer and pushed up a wall 9 foot high,
about 50 feet wide at the bottom and 1.5 miles long in the gully where the
water ran through.
With the water storage problem solved, he cleared the mulga and
coolabah trees from a 690 acre paddock, installed about 4 kilometres of
14" water pipe, bought a 580 metre
long travelling irrigator for $280,000 and sewed a certain type of beans for
the Indian market.
When he wants to irrigate he simply gravity fills the billabong that
runs through his property from the dam and starts the diesel driven pumps to
supply water to the irrigator. Each
irrigator uses 70 litres per second or 252,000 litres per hour and they set the
irrigator to water the whole 690 acres in 24 hours.
As times were tough and the bank was constantly on his back, they were
extremely happy when the bean crop took off and things finally started to look good. As they were in the middle of a drought, this
was the only green paddock for thousands of square miles around the area and it
didn't take long for the kangaroos to find it. They virtually destroyed the
690 acre crop in a week. They had roo
shooters come out and they shot over 1,000 roos in 3 nights, but they still
couldn't save the crop. He said the
hardest part was having to go to tell the bank that they had lost the
crop. Not to be defeated, they then put
a 7 wire electric fence around the paddock and sewed it with lucerne which
finally turned out to be a huge success.
They get 8 cuts of lucerne a year off that paddock which worth over 1
million dollars. They cut the lucerne at
night in a V shape behind the irrigator as it is too hot to work during the
day.
During the season they found they were too busy to keep the fuel up to
the diesel pumps so their simple answer to this was to have the power company
bring 3 phase power over 40 kilometres from Charleville. I hate to imagine what the bank manager said
about that.
They are now setting up their 5th travelling irrigator on the 5th 690
acre paddock to grow lucerne.
I take my hat off to him for the
true grit and determination to get this project up and running.
Now that there is water on the property, bird life is abundant. Brolgas and Bustards have been seen there by
the hundred along with sea eagles and a myriad of other birds.
A lot of the natural land is covered with mulga and coolabah
trees. The mulga trees can be pushed
over in a drought and they become good fodder for the sheep and cattle. Unfortunately they can only live on it for 9
months before it kills them.
Kevin said the saviour of the mulga is the buffel grass which the
animals eat with the mulga. This keeps
them going 4 months longer in a drought.
Buffel grass is an introduced species which came to Australia with the
Afghan Camel Drivers. They used to pack
their saddles with buffel grass seeds as it was soft to sit on. When the saddles tore, the seeds escaped and
took root around the camel trails, especially along the north west coast of
Australia. There are various opinions
about the value of buffel grass as a fodder, but Kevin is still spreading it on
his properties to keep his cattle alive during drought conditions.
As the wool industry declined, Kevin has been changing his sheep over
to Dorper's which are a meat strain of sheep that shed most of their own
wool. The workload is therefore a lot
less as they can be shorn with just 3 strokes of the comb. They run the rams with the ewes all the time
to give them a constant stream of income from sale of fat lambs.
Feral goats are another source of income for station owners in the
outback. Once again Kevin has tried to
go one better. He now has 250 kilometres
of electric fencing around his property to keep the goats in and the roos
out. He has introduced male Boar Goats
with the feral goats and now producing good quality goats for the market in Charleville. These goats are mainly sold to America.
It's hard to believe how quickly things change out here. This area was flooded again in 2011 which
took out a lot of fences and roads, but now everywhere you go out here, they
are all talking about drought again. One
farmer told me that they have only had 30 mils of rain out here since the flood
of 2011. The country is starting to look
very dry. Most farmers haven't joined
the sheep or cattle for fear there won't be any feed or water. There goes next years income.
The Evening Star Caravan Park has a husband and wife team who have
lived and worked all their lives around this area. Len plays a guitar and sings country songs while she cooks
the evening meal in the camp ovens. Camp
oven lamb roast, spuds, pumpkin cauliflower in white sauce, baby carrots,
beans and peas with gravy then hot damper with
lashings of jam and cream for sweets for $15.00 per head around the camp fire,
who could resist that? Ymmm!!
About half way between Charleville and Longreach is the small town of
Blackall which is famous for it's wool industry history.
Blackall was home to a shearer named Jack Howe who holds the record for
blade shearing 321 sheep in 7 hours and 40 minutes. This record for blade shearing was set at
"Alice Downs" station on October 10 1892 and has never been broken to
this day. Within a few weeks, Jack set a new machine sheering record at
"Barcaldine Downs" station of 237 sheep shorn in 8 hours. Jack retired from shearing 1900 at the age of
39 and went into the hotel business owning 2 hotels in Blackall at different
times. In 1914, Jack ran a Ford car
agency from the Universal Hotel selling many T Model fords into the Blackall
area.
Blackall is also famous for having the only operating STEAM DRIVEN wool
scouring plant which incorporates a shearing shed in Australia. This is an
awesome piece of history that every visitor coming through this area should
take the time to go and see. Unfortunately
the plant stopped operation in 1978 after 70 years when the wool industry went
into decline and the plant was abandoned.
17,000 volunteer man hours were put into restoring the old wool scour
over a 12 year period and the plant became operational again as a tourist
attraction in 2002
The plant is steam engine driven and even though the old steam boilers
are completely burnt out, the plant still operates with its original single
cylinder 45 horse power engine using steam from a diesel fired steam
generator.
 |
| Mill Bros 45 HP steam engine |
This engine which was built in 1904, is one of only 2 Mill Brothers
steam engines known to be left in the world.
The other one is used on an historic bridge in London to open and close
a gate. The London engine has been
converted to run on compressed air, so the Blackall engine is THE ONLY MILL
BROTHERS STEAM ENGINE IN THE WORLD known to be running on steam as it was
originally designed.
 |
| 20 stand shearing shed attached to the woolscour |
The guided tour is absolutely fascinating and visitors can follow the wool
process from the 20 stand elevated sheering shed, through the 3 stage scouring
process, the rinsing process, the drying process and the pressing process where
the wool is bailed and ready for export.
I loved it and for once Judy didn't have to listen to me whinge about
the old steam engines rusting away.
 |
| Woolscour machinery is fully operational |
Unfortunately, the woolscour is facing hard times again and there has
been talk of it closing again. This
would be an absolute disgrace on the face of the local council if this was
allowed to happen after the huge effort that has been put in by volunteers to
get it fully operational and try to fund it to keep it open. Come on Blackall Tambo Regional Council, get
your act together and fund this as it is not only an absolute piece of history
but also one of the best tourist attractions your shire could have.
Blackall is also famous for the saying "Beyond The Black Stump"
as well as "This Side Of The Black Stump" as this is where the Black
Stump is located. The Black Stump was
used for surveying purposes and permanently marks the Astor Station which was
established in 1887. Surveyors placed their transit on the stump for latitude and
longitude observations as a stump was used rather than a set of legs to give
more stability to the large transit that they were using.
At the time any country to the west of
Blackall was considered to be "beyond the Black Stump" and therefore
country to the east of Blackall was considered to be "this side of the
Black Stump".
When staying in Blackall, it is advisable to leave the caravan hot
water service turned off. The town water
supply comes from the Great Artesian Basin and the cold tap runs between 58o
C and 62oC so to have a shower you use the cold water tap and then
feed in cold water from the hot water storage to cool the cold water down to a
usable temperature.
Our travels continued on to "the other side of the black stump"
and we arrived at Longreach where all of a sudden we find ourselves 2015
kilometres from Geelong. This is as far
as we will be travelling north west on this trip as we need to be back in
Melbourne by the end of October.
Here we are in the middle of August and the whole week that we have
been here it has been over 32 degrees.
Longreach has a lot of wonderful attractions and events that outline the history on outback Queensland. We
decided to do the Kinnon and Co experience as it offers a Cobb and Co style
stage coach ride at full gallop.
The day started at 9.00 am with damper covered with lashings of jam and
cream, all washed down with a big pot of tea or coffee. We were given a quick briefing on the dangers
of stage coach travel and had a chance to have a look around the coaches before
boarding. I was glad to see that the wheels were all fitted with hydraulic disk
brakes behind the old wooden chocks that used to rub on the wheels for brakes
back in the early days.
The stage coach drawn by a team of 4 horses, took us down the main
street and out onto the town common along the old road that was the original
south entry into Longreach that the stage coaches used to take. We soon saw how coach travel used to be as
the dust and smell of sweating horses filled the coach.
True to their word, they took the horses up
to full gallop on the dusty road around the common for about 200 metres. At a top speed of 48 kilometres per hour, I
was glad we didn't get the seats outside on top of the coach and that modern
day coaches have air bag suspension.
The coach driver gave an excellent commentary on how Cobb and Co used
to run their coaches. Their drivers were
only permitted to bring their horses to a gallop if there was danger of a storm
hitting which would keep them from reaching their destination on time, and then
only for 500 yards at a time before bringing the horses back to a normal pace
for 10 minutes to let them cool down.
From the drivers commentary we could tell that Cobb and Co. really
looked after their horses and passengers.
Perhaps that is why they were so successful in Australia for so many
years.
Cobb and Co. were also the first passenger company in the world to
introduce a customer travel pack. This
pack consisted of some very tightly wound fibre about the diameter of a 10 cent
piece and about 12 mm thick. When this
little pack was soaked in water for a few seconds, it opened out into a piece of
cotton material which passengers used to cover their noses to stop the
dust. It could also be used to wipe the
sweat from your brow and was also very handy if you had to go to the toilet at
one of the bush stops. We all thought
that Kentucky Fried Chicken were the first to introduce moistened soft
towels in the late 60's. Qantas also say
that they were first to introduce passenger travel packs, but Cobb and Co were
doing it well before commercial air travel.
On arrival back at the Kinnon and Co courtyard, we were treated to a screening of the outback movie called
"Smiley Gets A Gun". This
movie has relevance as it was made at Muttaburra which is a small town about
110 kilometres east of Longreach.
Following the movie, Kinnon and Co put on an old fashioned "Tent
Show" which told the story in a rather comedic style about Captain
Starlight who is a bit of a folk hero around here. Short story is that he stole 1,200 head of
cattle from a station in this area and drove them all the way to Adelaide.
The fact that he was a cattle thief doesn't detract from the story, but
the fact that he had the skills to drive those cattle all the way from
Longreach to almost Adelaide through some of Australia's biggest outback is
what made him into a hero.
This experience also offers a cruise down the Thompson River at sunset
on a paddle wheeler. We were picked up
in the evening by coach (with air suspension) and taken out to the river on the
edge of town.
We traveled about half an
hour downstream and then back upstream
again to see the sunset in the west.
As night fell we gathered around the campfire and were treated to a
hearty beef stew followed by apricot danish with cream and custard. Oh, that reminds me, we will need to do an
extra couple of laps on the push bikes in the morning. A bush poet told some wonderful outback poems
with only some interruptions from a stockman riding a rooster drawn carriage.
After dinner we moved to their open air theater on the river bank to
watch the sound and light show which once again told the Captain Starlight
story in spectacular fashion.
We have heard the Captain Starlight story told on 3 different occasions
now, and all have a slightly different lean on the story. Apparently, it depends a lot on whose
ancestors you hear the story from.
For more on the Captain Starlight Story click here
Kinnon and Co is a "mum and dad" run outfit which include the
whole family. They have had to diversify
from their farming enterprises to keep the family a float during tough farming
conditions.
They told us that 1.4 million head of cattle have passed through
Longreach since last Christmas either by rail or road train, as farmers from all over
central and far north Queensland as well as the Northern Territory off load
cattle to save feeding them during the current drought.
They are absolutely passionate about outback Queensland and also the
Australian way of life.
The Stockmans Hall of Fame is the iconic attraction of Longreach. The museum is set in this wonderful purpose
built building which covers 3 different levels.
This part of this attraction left us a little bit cold as a lot of the
displays weren't working as designed, but
folk who have ancestors associated with outback stockman and properties
would find it fascinating to research some of their history.
The building also houses outback artwork done by John Morrison. John followed the track that Captain
Starlight took with his stolen cattle and did a series of oil paintings along
the route. These painting were then
animated and used in the sound and light show that we saw on the river.
The saving grace of the Hall of Fame visit was the live show and dinner
that they put on in the afternoon and evening.
Lachie Cosser from Yackandandah in Victoria, along with his wife and 3
daughters do a half hour night show at the Cattlemen's Bar and Grill and also a
1 hour day show at the Outback Centre.
The evening show is in a larger arena so the wife and 3 daughters aged
9, 14 and 15 do an excellent riding display with the horses while Lachie does
some clever acts with his horse and a
lovely old bull.
The day show had some similar acts but also included his dogs, some
piglets and sheep. Both shows were very
entertaining.
Longreach is also home to the Qantas Founders Museum which isn't
terribly hard to find as there is a complete 747 jet parked there, almost right
on the edge of the highway. We didn't
visit this museum as our trip to the USA earlier this year just about cured us
of aeroplanes. I couldn't help snapping
off a couple of pics as it is not everyday you can get quite so close to a 747.
Judy has roast chicken on for dinner this evening so we might go and make the most of the spa here at the Longreach Tourist Park while we wait for it to cook.
The next part of our travels will take us east from "beyond the black stump" with various stops between here and Toowoomba and then starting to head south down the east coast.
