F&F Tour, Days 4-6 - Iluka

The mighty Clarence River.

Almost every year since 1994, we have - mostly in family groups - returned to the area of Sue's childhood. 

Sue was born in Maclean, when the family of six and nine years later seven, lived on 35 hectares of dairy farm on Woodford Island. I  was the same farm her father, John Gibbens, was sent to as a 14 year old. Raised by his grandmother in the Blue Mountains behind Sydney, his teenage years were starting to unravel into a skein of ragged wool which the local policeman was concerned might never be knitted into a suitable adult garment. So with the assistance of a Lawson shopkeeper with dairy farm "up north", John was relocated to the early morning starts and long days providing milk to an Australia on the escalation to another world war. At 19, he enlisted and was soon rewarded for his fitness, his accuracy with a rifle and he's penchant for thinking and and acting outside the square, with a spot in the newly formed Independent Companies ( a year or so later the Australian Commando Squadrons). He vowed to the pre-six o'clock swill as he left his last empty glass on the bar of the Brushgrove Hotel, to buy the Roberts Creek farm when he retuned.

He did, seven years later and after seeing service in New Caledonia, New Guinea, Borneo and the occupation forces in Japan. A few years back at Roberts Creek and a lovely young lass from Yorkshire opened a gate for him and his horse and soon enough accompanied him to St Jude's at Brushgrove on their wedding day. Sue has wonderful memories of milk moustaches from creamy milk fresh from the cow and climbing trees for solitude; and floods and snakes being chased from the watery loungeroom by her mother armed with a broom and a terrifying anger at these slithery Satans for threatening the safety of her children.

Later, when the farm no longer was the land of milk and honey, they moved to Yamba and lived, the seven of them, in a two room cottage opposite the then Yamba docks. Sue still values the experience of starting the fire for the chip heater but not the long drop dunny. On the farm they at least had a septic tank and a flushing loo! She recalls her brother Lance gorging himself on oysters from above the low tide mark when the dock was drained and her early teenage years carting her surfboard to Main beach and admiring the clubbies whose mid teen years fooled her into thinking manhood had arrived.

These are the rich memories all of those family get togethers since have invoked.

In order to meet the requirement of "new digs", we stayed across the mouth of the Clarence at Iluka. Its like Yamba only on a very dull afternoon ... when the shops are closed ... and its raining. Nice enough park with friendly staff but crowded and our spot shared a boundary with the park's neighbours who were noisy, unfriendly and gave the impression of not really being in touch with their circumstance or even, come to think on it, reality.

*****

Lunch at the Brushy.

On the way to Iluka, we stopped off to have a cuppa with one of Sue's oldest and dearest friends, Lynne, who has lived west of Grafton, on a farm, for most of her adult life. Their memories date back as far as primary school and devon sandwiches and tomato sauce when Lynne lived not far from Sue's favourite haunt, Main Beach, Yamba. They have a rich history which age, distance and time seem unable to separate. If we needed to be reminded of the import of this tour, a cuppa and a chat with Lynne provided the necessary underlining. 

Not done with diversions, we detoured to Brushgrove and lunch at the pub - the very same Sue's Dad had made the scene of his triumphant promises in 1941 - and a chance encounter with a local bloke, Barry Freeman, who remembered the family from the 1950's and 60's. He knew the farm and its subsequent history, halfway along what is Gibben's Lane.

*****

Climbing the stairs to the
Iluka Bluff lookout.

Regardless of the park's surroundings in Iluka, we had three pleasant enough nights there. On the first day, unable to ride the bikes, we drove to Iluka Bluff which lies to the north, about halfway to Woody Head. Its always a good view from the viewing platform and the associated cliffs which provide a backdrop to the rock platform below. Lots of birdies in the bushes and white-capped waves pushing on past on their blow from the southeast. We closed the day out with a walk along the Iluka Bay foreshore as the sun dropped into the sugarcane fires to the west. It happened to be the last day of a month long campaign of walking and raising money for the Black Dog Institute which my knees and various generous other supporters had helped me through. 180kms and $5,200 later, the sunset seemed a fitting reward.

Click here for photos of our stay.

On the second day, we traveled the long way back around to Yamba after initially planning to ride the pushbikes - via a ferry ride - to and around Yamba. A few niggles and un upset stomach changed our mind. Of course it was straight to Main Beach for the ailing mermaid to renew her gills in the  surf there. As always, I was content with a comfortable seat and a book in the shade, well above the sand.

Coffee, ice cream, hot chips - all the essentials, really, of a day in Yamba.

TOD Tour, Day 21 - Newee Creek

Sue on the front verandah
at Newee Creek

Some years ago now, after our Western Australia trip and two lovely days with Sue's Uncle Wal and Auntie Fay at Denmark in WA, we were tasked with the job of finding the farm Wal had spent time on in the late 1940's, at Newee Creek, NSW.

Newee Creek was an area of farmland whose landuse was almost exclusively dairy cows up until sub divisions broke up the old farming lots in the mid 1970's. This process has gone on and most of the land now is small holdings with nice houses for people with jobs in Nambucca Heads and Macksville.

Portions of it, especially in the north west of the area, were crown land which was converted to soldier settlements after the first world war.

In 1947, a young ex-commando who had stayed on as a soldier during with the occupation forces in Japan, by the name of John Gibbens, bought two blocks owned by Andrew Noble which spanned Irvines Road. The larger 100 acre block had a small house in the south eastern corner, on land which climbed from Wirrimbi Rd, up hill and down dale to Irvines Rd and the smaller 40 acre block beyond.

John came to the area to work in the meat works at Macksville in 1947, in the days before such places had clever French names. He bought a half finished house, completed the build and with it's sale and his army pay, which he spent nothing of in seven years, he bought the Newee Creek farm. His grandmother, Kate Knapman - who for reasons no longer known, called herself Margaret Stuart - joined him on the farm, as did his young half-brother Wal Gibbens. Wal, only a young lad, rightfully worshipped his soldier/hero brother but that would be tested over the next few years as farm duties kicked in. A strong believer in the need for education - something he would instil in his own children later - John also insisted that Wal attend high school in Macksville but that hard work was also a good teacher and made sure Wal's education was a full one. Every afternoon after coming home from school, Wal would be sent over the creek, up the hill to the top forty to bring down the cows for milking.

John and Margaret milked 80 odd cows each day, by hand, in the dairy near the house. They set a stern example.

The northwest corner of the hundred acre block. Seventy acres lie beyond the big copse trees, left of centre.

John sold the Newee Creek farm in 1950, in order to fulfil the promise he made when he left for the war ... made to the blokes at the Brushgrove Pub on Woodford Island in the lower Clarence River ... that he'd come back one day and buy Forrester's farm. He did and on that farm he had a house, ee i, ee i o ... and a wife and five children. The 4th of those, his daughter Sue, was with me today when we walked into the farmhouse at Newee Creek, now owned by Roslyn and John Field and and again when we stepped over things in the old dairy which is now Noel Robertson's garage.

There is something eerie but satisfying about walking through your own history. He father's footsteps had echoed on these floorboards; his sweaty smell had filled these rooms; his hands had twisted the wire around a post to hold a door shut. Caspers were everywhere.

We were able to correctly identify the boundaries of the old farm, despite subsequent subdivisions breaking it down into smaller holdings. Tree lines stand witness even when fence lines have been removed but in the main, enough of the fence lines were intact. Huge fruit trees dominated the areas near the buildings: giant mango trees and a chinese pear along the southern boundary. Despite additions and changes to the house, enough remains which is the same to follow the line of a roof or the alignment of a door back into a past beyond Sue.

The big mango tree near the dairy.

It dawned on us both, but for Wal and his stories, told to us with such pride and admiration, it would have stayed a part of her father's history which was an inaccurate minor entry in a third hand story passed down almost casually by her mother, in her final years. It did, after all, predate even her entry into John's life. That wouldn't happen until the 1950's and life further north along the coast and beside the Clarence.

Contact information was shared and pictures taken and stories swapped with the Fields and Noel. We even realised we had acquaintances in common, Noel having been a flight steward for many years with Qantas and having flown with and been entertained by Tamworth's Bill Gleeson. Noel is a writer now, living in the ideal setting for creativity and we exchanged publications: my poetry for his memoir. I may have got the better of that deal.

It was a warm, comforting day, when life seemed safe and memories richer.

Yamba 2014 - Days 8&9

St Judes Church, Brushgrove

For a break in the normal routine, Tuesday included a trip to Grafton.

After Sue had her obligatory visit to Main Beach, we made the 40 minute trip by car to the home of Jacaranda. Sue had shopping to do - presents for family and friends - and I caught up with Bill North. Bill and I met when he was playing for City United in Tamworth and this marked our second lunch since he returned from overseas and took up the position of Sports Editor at the Daily Examiner.

We spent time discussing the World Cup and cricket and the theatre and many other points in between and did so with the Clarence River as our backdrop at the Crown Hotel on the sad end of Prince Street.

Sue had lunch with her sister Rosemary, solving many of the world's major problems and several of the smaller ones as well. Some lunches out are like that.

Once we both had farewelled our lunch partners, Sue and I paid a return visit to the Grafton Regional Art Gallery. The special exhibition was artworks to do with horses: made topical by the proximity of the Grafton Cup. The other exhibition which caught our eye was a display of photographs of aboriginal people taken in the late 1800's. An attempt is being made to identify the people in the photographs and the public display is part of that process. Most interesting.

We finished our day in Grafton with a tea at the Purple Haze Cafe, who nomenclature was disappointingly originated in the purple flowers of the Jacaranda tree and not from a love of all things Hendrix. Had it been the latter, the pleasant ladies who served us would have been the most unassuming Fox Ladies of all time.

On the Pacific Highway for the return journey to Yamba, we detoured at Cowper and crossed the South Arm of the Clarence to Brushgrove. This is the southern most tip of Woodford Island and a just a few kilometres from Gibbens Lane and the site of the 86 hectare farm where Sue and family were raised. At Brushgrove, St Judes Church has been rebuilt, but the old church in which John Gibbens and Joy Thomas were married still stands. It a lovely story of courage and determination being finally bested by the economics of circumstance and even thought the farmhouse has migrated up the hill and the farm buildings are no more than memories and a few remaining pieces of rusty metal, standing there and retelling stories I know well, still enhances my wife's sense of place.

We drove back along the South Arm and crossed the McFarlan Bridge into Maclean and stayed by the river all the way to Yamba. A few beers at the Pacific Hotel, a dinner at home and then a rare DVD hire rounded out the day.

Today, it was beach again this morning for Sue and a game of beach cricket which I somehow managed to miss.

I spend the morning and some of the afternoon working on a presentation I am giving at Muswellbrook next week, on behalf of the Black Dog Institute. In between, we had lunch at Pippis Cafe.
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Sue was shopping again this afternoon, until the sun made for the horizon. We went for a walk along Pippi Beach - me all bare foot and splashing in the incoming tide and Sue with her joggers on and up in the soft sand. A Pacific Hotel finish before dinner and then off to watch the football with Joel and Jack.