Jetty Tour Day 6 - Art Galleries & Coffee

In 2017, we spent five days in Broken Hill and pretty much gave the highlights package a good run, so this trip, a full day in town was really all we needed to punch all the buttons.

Parking at the western end of the main drag, Argent St, the walk of several blocks to the other end reveals what a busy and so very occupied place Broken Hill is. There aren't many country cities who don't have multiple empty shop fronts staring blankly out in condemnation of disengagement along their main streets and yet in the four most busy city blocks, we saw one. Its a city of all sorts and that's what you meet on the footpaths. One concerned older aboriginal woman asked me "excuse me sir. Aren't you the gentleman who slipped and fell on the street here yesterday?" She took some convincing that I wasn't.

We started out morning with what turned out to be a search for our favourite BH cafe, The Silly Goat. It was trickier than we might have expected because they have moved. Google would have solved the problem quickly but its nice to use a bit of ingenuity to problem solve occasionally ... and then ask Google! Once found, we reveled in great coffee and a range of sweats that were free of all of the things we can't have but full of indulgence anyway. A couple of octogenarian locals struck up a conversation - yes I know, hard to believe it wasn't us initiating - and told us about their lives lived exclusively in Broken Hill. Sweet old couple who finished each other's sentences. For us, its one of the reasons we travel - to meet people, not finish each other's sentences.

Our secondary objective was across the road: the Broken Hill Regional Art Gallery, with its temporary exhibitions and a collection valued at $10 million. Downstairs were the entries in the Maari Ma Indigenous Art Awards, a competition open to all indigenous artists of the western plains. There was also a fascinating and at times disturbing exhibition by Cathy Farry of small illustrated books on the topic of "Shame". People were asked the same four questions and their responses dictated how Farry illustrated or made the books, many of which are called tunnel books.

Upstairs was Annette Minchin's series of works, the best of which was Cry Me A River, a series of impressions of faces on a multitude of materials which depicts the many people who are reliant on rivers and the many faces of a river.

Of course, part of the magnificent collection is displayed in the main hall upstairs and in a short circuit you can see works by Lloyd Rees, Ken Done, Arthur Streeton, Frederick McCubbin, Jack Absalom, Pro Hart ... the list really does go on. A wonderful gallery who doing the most incredible things to support and promote indigenous artists, with a strong emphasis on youth.

Walking back up Argent St, we stopped at the facade of the old town hall. Slated to demolished in the early 1970's, agitation caused a compromise and a narrow section of the front building which contains the staircase, was saved and is now occupied by West Darling Arts. A collective which supports artists from west of the Darling River, their displays were most impressive. We met one of the artists, Shane Vink, who was vacuuming ahead of an opening tonight. We took part in a most interesting discussion about Wilcannia.

Here's a thing: Broken Hill has more art galleries than pubs. I'm pretty certain that doesn't count places that used to be pubs but still.

The rest of the town hall was removed. Its a car park. Go figure.

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We had lunch, did some shopping - Sue shopping, me sitting in a cafe writing words into some degree of sense - and then returned back out to our digs fifteen kms out of town. While Sue read and rested for a while, I went to the bar with my laptop and finished re-writes of the first act of the next play. Red dust, rocks, a wide verandah, laptop, Iron Jack and me. That will do me for a good way to finish the day.

Dinner in the camp kitchen tonight and finishing off the fruit before the border. We are skipping town as the St Patricks Day races get into full swing. Sounds like a wild turn out.

AAA Tour - Day 14 - Flying Doctors & Minerals

For nearly 90 years, the inspired desire of John Flynn to provide a "mantle of safety" to Australians in remote areas, has been flying doctors, dentists and nursing specialists to them to protect and save. These days, that service has extended beyond the emergency call for help and includes the provision of an expansive system of clinics run in community centres and the use of motor vehicles.

This all takes money, some of which is provided by State and Federal governments - wages, insurance and running costs. However, replacement equipment has to be met by fund raising and this includes new aircraft. The most common aircraft in the fleet, the Beechcraft King Air, costs $10 million to be fully kitted out and under the usual servicing and replacement schedule for these aircraft, that means three need to be replaced each year.

Somehow they do it or perhaps, somehow we do it, for it is average Australians who do the heavy lifting in fund raising for the RFDS.

This all became apparent during our tour of the RFDS base at the Broken Hill airport. Our guide, Larry, took us through the operational procedures of the service and explained the changes from radio to telephone communications thanks to satellite.

Very, very impressive people.

We returned to the cafe we tried yesterday, The Silly Goat, giving it a chance to redeem its noisy impact on us yesterday. It was a lot quieter today. The coffee was just as good and we also had a fabulous gluten-free, dairy-free lunch.

After lunch we tried to visit West Darling Arts but it was closed. We did visit the Silver City Art Centre and Mint and wished it had been closed. It's the home of the "The Big Picture", a big concave scene of the outback which is 100m long and 12m high, painted by Peter Anderson over the course of two years and using nine tonnes of paint. I guess when you use that much, you know longer measure it in litres. His brother has built the scene in front of it to make it more realistic: hence the plastic kangaroos. The rest of the "gallery" is an exercise in tacky. Elsewhere in Broken Hill, visitors will know what it is that art does in response to its landscape and the integrity of art's interpretation of life.

From this low point, we went to the Albert Kersten Mining and Minerals Museum, also known as the Geocentre. Formerly a Bond store where items were stored awaiting tax being paid on them, it was purchased by the local Council specifically for the museum. It has two very important pieces on display: a 42kg silver nugget and a small tree modeled in silver and originally owned by the man who discovered silver in Broken Hill, Charles Rasp. The geological development of the Line of Load - the large deposit that lies under Broken Hill - is explained well in a short video and there are lots of minerals and crystals on display. In a separate gallery, an exhibition of the artwork of local school children on the theme of recycling and reusing materials was refreshing.

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I particularly liked a large video display highlighting individual streets in Broken Hill - mostly named after ores and minerals - and what each of them are.

We finished out the day with communal nibblies and drinks back at the caravan park - an event organised by the park hosts each afternoon. Its a good chance to catch up on things to do and places to stay. I'm perfecting small talk. Its hard.