Qld Outback Tour - Pubs & Poetry

Done - my five hotel pub crawl
comes to an end

I have a confession to make. I love beer from the tap a great deal. Really ... a lot ... and I love the characters you find in pubs.

For the past four years, it has been banned, along with most of the things I loved to consume and sometimes over indulged in. Recently, those wonderful researchers at Monash University suggested that I could return to the frothy stuff and breast the bar with a beer glass and not a long-shanked wine glass. For goodness sake, those things were never filled much past half full and then there was the stereotype of the poet and the glass of red.

I missed sitting on bar stools and shooting the breeze with bar staff. So many stories were passing me by for the benefit only of my digestive system. It never quite seemed justifiable.

So, late this morning, having noticed yesterday that Barcaldine has five hotels in a few hundred metres along its main street - the last throws of the Capricorn Highway - Sue and I set out on a pub crawl to visit each.

Starting at the Union Hotel, at the eastern end, would prove to be a mistake, as it transpired they had the best tucker so would have made a good place to finish. Regardless, the publican pulled up a stool with us and explained his family heritage in Barcaldine. Born here, he left "for the big smoke" and became a banker, before returning to purchase the Union from his father (one of two pubs in town papa owned). The pub is on the market now but he was philosophical about life in Barky and was glad he came back.

The Railway Hotel sits across the road from the railway station - like der - and also the Tree of Knowledge Memorial. Here, we were joined by a regular patron and it must be said, entertained by an Irish/Scottish barmaid. She was quite a character, although her "mongrel accent" - her term - took some getting used to and I was only on my second beer. She shared lots of ideas of things to see and do around Barky and expressed a great love for the people in the town. She's now in her fifth year in Australia and battling to secure permanent residency. As we left, I asked her for a business card so I might complete a Trip Advisor entry. There were none so she tossed me a beer stubby cooler. "Use that."

The Artesian Hotel was my third beer and by far our least pleasant. Well, it wasn't unpleasant but it was a battered old pub, with old stained and in places torn carpet and electrical cords hanging from holes in the ceiling and a loud speaker system. Rough as guts seemed an appropriate conclusion. It is apparently the loudest and most boisterous establishment on Friday and Saturday nights, invaded as it is with all the younger drinkers. Decor is apparently unimportant. It wasn't unpleasant in terms of feeling uncomfortable, although having the large breasts of Samantha Fox threatening to break free of their slender restraints in the poster above my head was a little intimidating.

The Shakespeare Hotel was easily the most impressive, with a big airy bar reached after an imposing entrance hall with a huge wooden staircase leading upstairs to accommodation. Heather, the owner, met us with a big smile and a hearty welcome, as did her sister, who sat at the bar, knitting. Again, we were the only customers. The sisters were originally from Beverly Hills in Sydney but had lived at Cronulla "for ages", so we had some common heritage. I thought I noticed something hairy about their feet, even though they weren't of the Shire. They had loads to share about their lives and then Heather's sister took us up those magnificent stairs to look at the first floor. The rooms were very old world but clean and tidy and the pride that the place was held in was obvious. The Shakespeare is on a corner block and has a huge verandah around two sides in the style of most country hotels. This was my favourite port of call.

The last beer was had in The Commercial Hotel. Bidjara man, Gerry Fogarty, is the probably first indigenous publican in the central west of Queensland and certainly the first in Barcaldine. Nice tidy little pub and the one with the longest opening hours. As a result, he gets the well oiled of the other pubs when they shut. I asked him this was a problem he said it could be a pain at times, especially the young blokes. Sue asked him how he dealt with it. "The young blokes know what I expect. That's pretty much enough." Hmm. He wasn't a big bloke and didn't employ security. Impressive.

That was it and boy was it worth doing. With the exception of the Artesian, it was a really interesting way to spend a few hours getting to know folks and their town. Pubs have great stories but they don't have to always be from long ago. For the cost of five beers, we got a great education about Barcaldine and in a much more interesting and less rehearsed manner than a tourist information officer.

We had lunch at Ridgge Didge Cafe. The food was nice but the service was ... distant. I suspect the
lass who served us hadn't completed her training in customer relations. After discussing several options for my meal, she gave me less in the way of recommendation and more a list of negative options. "No" was a word she had mastered. After settling on a gluten-free option - sorry, the only gluten-free option - I retired, defeated to my table, only to be informed five minutes later it wasn't available. I should add, I got a steak by compensation. Oh well, I enjoyed my Coke. Sue, by comparison loved her all day breakfast and an excellent cup of coffee.

Click to see today's photos

We slipped back to the Australian Workers Heritage Centre to finish off what we missed yesterday and then back to camp at the Barcaldine Tourist Park and another campfire tea and damper. This afternoon, I was invited by the owner Jeff, to read a few poems, which seemed to go over well. Its a really friendly, clean park with lots of grass and drive through sites. Jeff and Lyn are only new to town and they've already made this into a great stop for those rolling up the wallaby track.

Queensland Outback Tour - Blackall to Barcaldine

Blackall to Barcaldine - 108km, Fuel 10.0L/100km

Australian Heritage Workers Centre

I'm not going to rave about fuel consumption again but a new record low again today ... just sayin.

To say we were pleased to leave Blackall Caravan Park would be to understate the obvious. Despite the rave reviews it had in several places, it was a dud for us. Sue had a warm shower this morning ... well, mostly warm but spiced with cold. Having left at or earliest convenience - Sue had to be served breakfast for Mother's Day - we sought out a cafe since we had time on our hands and a short distance to drive. By some perverse sense of fate, we went to the place where the wedding reception had been the previous night but having waited for five or six minutes to be attended to and received three "I'll be with you in a minute mate", the last with "you can see we are busy" as an addendum, I left.

It was Sunday and everything else was shut except the petrol station. Here, I encountered my only friendly face in 24 hours and his was a young man born in Pakistan.

The 100k sign couldn't come quick enough.

It was a short and uneventful trip to Barcaldine, accompaned by Melanie Safka, Sue's Mother's Day choice of music.

After booking in and setting up, we went to the Australian Heritage Workers Centre, a place we had visited in 1995 with my parents and the kids. I snapped a shot which replicated the family shot we took then. It's still an excellent museum which tells several different stories well but the most dominant is the plight of shearers in the late 19th century and the Shearers Strike of 1891 over conditions and pay. It happened after several rowdy meetings under a Ghost Gum outside of the Barcaldine Railway Station and a street procession. Barcaldine was only in its infancy as a town but the railway bought shearers to town, from where they could be taken out to the big stations at shearing time. 13 of the shearers we arrested, tried and sent to St Helena Island Prison. Most served two and a half years.

The tree became the symbol of the workers and was dubbed the Tree of Knowledge. It was under this tree that the organisation which was to become the Australian Labor Party was formed, making it bby far the oldest political party in Australia. We saw the tree in 1995, with much of its trunk cemented to keep it standing but in 2006, an unknown person poisoned the tree and killed it. The local council had already transplanted part of the tree and it now grows strongly at the Workers Heritage Centre. There are so many excellent displays and information to absorb. Included in the grounds is the huge tent used as part of the Bicentennial Australian Tour of tents and trucks which toured Australia, defining Australia until 1988 through state of the art displays.

We'll be returning to complete the exhibits in the morning as it was too much for one sitting.

The amazing Tree of Knowledge
Memorial

Down in town where the Capricorn Highway ends and the Lansborough Highway takes a right angled left hand bend and continues to Longreach, we visited the Tree Of Knowledge site. In place of the old tree, the trunk and branches have been synthetically petrified, left leafless and bare and have been encased in a giant wooden cube of slats whose base is several metres off the ground, allowing ingress by pedestrians. Inside, varying lengths of timber hang from the high glass ceiling, bumping gentle together in any breeze. In the evenings, when properly lit, the outside of the cube creates the illusion of the shape of the former tree.

It is an amazing piece of sculpture, well and truly one of the most captivating I have seen, even if only viewed from an engineering perspective. Of course, to only see its technical achievement, as such, is to completely miss the point and blind yourself to the poignancy and beauty of the installation. We walked around and under it for a long time.

Click to see today's photos

Back at the campsite at Barcaldine Tourist Park, our host Jeff had prepared a damper and billy tea cooked over coals and most of the guests sat in a sharing circle and told tales of where they had been which devolved into morning meaningful thoughts on life in general. The group then broke up and folks continued chatting in smaller groups. It was a bonza hour or so.

Charleville - Augathella - Tamba - Blackall - Barcaldine - Longreach

Charleville - Augathella - Tambo - Barcaldine - Longreach 516(1901) kms

We had to make a late start this morning owing to my reluctance to adhere to an old adage of my father's - when you replace one part, replace the lot. In particular, whenever you repack the hubs of a trailer, replace the split pins. I discovered considerable movement in the wheel bearing on one side of the trailer yesterday in Morven and had to tighten the castellated nut by a sixth of a turn. Having not replaced the split pins when I repacked the hub with grease before the trip, I shouldn't have been surprised when an old pin fractured. Therefore, we waited for a supplier to open this morning in Charleville so I could make this minor yet vital repair - new pins in both sides and we finally hit the road at 9:00am but not before we returned to town and purchased a new camp stove. The old one - still in our trailer after 32 years service - had too many broken worn out bits to make it worth repairing.

Our morning had the perfect pre-dawn start with a phalanx of kookaburras waking us in song - what a glorious sound it was! If I needed only one excuse to be here, this was it. The other feature of the caravan park was our first sighting of a mob of Grey Nomads. Interesting species. They flock into great herds for safety and the benefit of always talking to someone who is like them. Special gathering times are at dusk, when they wander campsites, have drinks and swap tales of profitable feeding grounds and in the morning when they break off into groups of two and three in order to prepare for their day, often preening their feathers and equipment to make sure it is ready.

Sue had talked up Augathella as a source of bush art, including sculptures and murals, so we naturally turned in with keen anticipation, despite being behind schedule. The artists must have been on holiday or hiding behind a tree.

On to Tambo for lunch by the Tambo Lake and despite an exaggeration - this is a small dam at best - we had a lovely hour with geese and ducks and Willy Wagtails.

At Barcaldine, where I stopped and did some computer banking in order to assist Sam with medical supplies. Whilst I was occupied, Sue was off to buy coffees. We have discovered that things are a little different out here in the outback (we officially passed into the outback today). No decaf, no lattes, no soy. Out here, they make song and dance about selling Nescafe instant!

The last 100km to Longreach helped make the decision to stay an extra night and have a rest from driving (1600kms in three days). We booked into the Gunadoo Caravan Park, which is the biggest we have stayed in. 260 powered sites and an endless panorama of caravans and Winnebagos. We set up quickly and disappeared into the outdoor spa even quicker. Sue cooked tea on the new stove - thumbs up - and then we caught the remains of Brooks & Magee, a country act playing at the park. A few red wines made them sound better than they were. Lots of Johnny Cash, a bit of Slim and two great country classics, "The Gambler" and "Harper Valley PTA". I am ashamed to admit I sang along and knew most of the words.

Stockman's Hall of Fame and the QANTAS base tour tomorrow. This is so much fun!

AUC 1995 - Barcaldine

Longreach (Qld): 11th to 13th July.
Emerald, Alpha, Barcaldlne (Capricorn Highway) 418 kms

Our morning started earlier than normal, with a walk down to the lake and a view of the sunrise. The bird life was plentiful and the morning sounds alone were worth recording. The pack up was smooth and we were on the road by 8:50, with Sue having her first spell behind the wheel for the trip.

Morning tea was taken on the summit of the Drummond Range at the site of the official opening of the sealed road surface over the ranges. This was as recent as 1984 and was performed by Sir Joh himself, more than amply assisted by the Minister for Everything, Russ Hinze.

Following another roadside lunch, this time just outside Barcaldine, we traveled the short distance into the town and photographed the Tree of Knowledge, famous for it's role as the rallying point for the shearers involved in the Shearer's Strike of 1891. It was this meeting which was responsible for the formation of the Australian Labor Party. The tree has seen better days, and was recently attended to by a tree surgeon. Radical surgery was necessary to save the tree and parts of it were encased in wire and cement to strengthen and support it.

The other point of interest was the Workers Heritage Centre, which was opened in 1991 and contained displays and tributes to unions and working men and women over the last century. There is a railway display which includes a rail carriage and station, with voice descriptions and recreations of past days. Other displays have been mounted by the Police and Education Departments and various unions. A highlight is the theatre used for the travelling Australian Bicentennial Exhibition in 1988. The large tent structure was purchased for $45 000 by the group running the Heritage Centre and has become a permanent fixture on the grounds. It shows a variety of slide presentations, including "Celebration of Australia" - a combination of slide and video footage which drew on the people and places which give Australia its unique nature. The tent - or marquee - has a square rigged girder standing vertically in its centre. This supports the weight of the polyplastic roof and walls and they are pulled into position by a motor at the base of the central column. Three pantechnicon bodies provide the operating rooms for the theatre. The original anchors for the central column were the prime movers, but these have been replaced by permanent cement anchors.

Having visited the Bicentennial Exhibition when it was in Armidale, it brought back warm memories of what was on show and the way it stirred my patriotism.

A refurbished one teacher school was another of the excellent buildings which were part of the complex. In this building, there were examples of desks, ink wells, wall charts and work that was typically part of the daily routine in schools 100 years ago. Excellent audio presentations, including reminiscences of ex-pupils and teachers, classroom dialogue and historical perspectives, also added to the character of this building.

The last building we visited was formerly the Barcaldine Primary School - an elevated weatherboard
building so typical of the schools in Queensland. This now houses a tribute to various unions and both State and Federal Labor parties, but as time was running short, we were not able to fully utilise these excellent displays to enhance our knowledge beyond cursory glances.

The final 100 or so kilometres to Longreach passed uneventfully and we arrived to the confusion that is the Gundaroo Caravan Park. Our first encounter was trying to sort out the sites we had rung ahead to confirm from Barcaldine an hour earlier. This was one of the only parks which had not responded to my enquiries - on two separate occasions - as to bookings etc, so it came as no surprise they would have forgotten us in the space of one hour!

After some discussion, the space cadet who doubles as the male owner deferred to Mrs Cadet and two sites were found. Ours was right behind the office residence and closely resembled their backyard. The sites were so small, I inadvertently assembled the tent across two of them - not hard to do as the second of the two sites was not marked! It further transpired they had booked a site for us in response to my mail booking request six month earlier and we were now double booked. The owner assured me they seldom reply to booking requests. It was easier, he said, to book the sites and wait for people to turn up. Of course, when I had rung from Barcaldine, this system didn't allow him to recognise he had a booking!

An ongoing element of discussion during our stay was to be the lack of hot water and many were the
conversations ranging from laughter to anger that were to be had with park patrons on the subject. We ultimately eliminated the problem by preparing solar showers each day and hanging them in the shower stalls in the place of the conventional supply.

We were in the back blocks now!