Jetty Tour Day 4 - Wilcannia

Ring Neck Parrot

As I have previously said (May 2017), Wilcannia is a town I find confronting. Not in the sense that I feel scared - although there are places and times of the day I would avoid, like most towns - but in the sense that I find it hard to imagine a place where the difference between Australia's non-indigenous population and its indigenous population is more pronounced.

This is blatantly obvious in the infrastructure of the town, where splendid examples of the white colonial past, which took everything from the culture that was insitu, are still standing in the form of huge limestone buildings. Magnificent as they are - the courthouse, the police station, the post office and several others - they are an in-your-face reminder that in the 1860's, white fellas arrived and took over the place. Meanwhile, much of the other buildings in the main street are ramshackle dwellings or the remains of shops and businesses long since gone and beaten up and beaten down by locals. Everywhere, decay and disadvantage stands beside everlasting privilege. 

The cafe we visited last time is no more. "Miss Barrett has gone to Tasmania" we were told. Next door, an old shack with damaged corrugated iron roof, was having solar panels fitted!

We tried the road house for a cuppa but that was as limited and as expensive as it was unfriendly. We retreated back to our campsite.

A drive around the property revealed what we already knew from looking at what used to be the billabong in front of the campsite. The larger billabong was cracked mud with a fresh layer of green that some sheep were enjoying. In 2017, they would have be covered by water. One small puddle still battled the sun for survival. Not that it stopped the Red Tailed Black Cockatoos. A mob flashed past as we drove along. The red sand dunes seemed to have denser tracks and even in low range there was some  tyre slippage. The Darling itself sort of sat there, way down the bank, with all of the fallen trees exposed like piles of old bones (Sue's description).

They need rain out here.

Today's photos

The afternoon was spent chatting with new chums as they arrived and other relaxations. Sue read a book while I spent an hour updating our financial records. In the late afternoon, I enjoyed a few beers while sitting in my campchair with my camera in my lap, snapping the odd little birdie. I had been hearing a Whistling Kite for two days but hadn't been able to capture it, until late in the day, just as the last orange light was leaving, I caught it high up in a tree about 200 hundred metres away.

A lovely place Warrawong, despite the lack of water in the billabong, there are plenty of birds to marvel at, tracks to explore and peace and quiet. 

Broken Hill tomorrow.

AAA Tour - Day 17 - Broken Hill to Cobar

A long day in the saddle today, on our way back to Tamworth.

Lining up for fuel at Wilcannia

We reluctantly decided to bypass Warrawong, at Wilcannia, in favour of a long drive on the first of three days driving. This will also give us the advantage of staying the night in Gulargambone. The caravan park is one of several pieces of infrastructure which has been taken over by a collective formed by locals in order to keep their town alive. We are told that the welcome at the park is warm and the activities provided as a bonus to accommodation fees, need to be experienced. In 1978, Sue did her first prac teaching assignment at Gulargambone Central but remembers more about the pool table at the pub. I remember receiving a call from her two college mates suggesting I should come out for the weekend as she was chatting up locals at the pool table. There's more to this story but another time.

The 460kms to Cobar passed without much in the way of events worth a mention. Perhaps the most notable was the line up for fuel at Wilcannia. There is one petrol station and a fuel depot. The depot has a range of fuels, where as the petrol station has unleaded 91 & 98 and diesel ... when the pumps for 98 and diesel aren't broken or out of gas. We joined a queue of five and more piled up behind us. With the distances to travel out here, hoping you'll make it isn't an option.

During the afternoon, Sue had her first drive of the tour and her first with this van. She doesn't like driving at the best of times, so it sort of worked out that I am usually the one behind the wheel but its not realistic for her not to practice the skills needed when towing. The time may come when I am injured or sick and that's not the time to be learning how. She had a reasonably uneventful run apart from emus who wandered a little close to the edge of the road and a nerve-wracking few minutes with a B-double hard on her tail. She was fine and will hopefully have a few more stints at the wheel in the next few days.

Its no reflection on her that I hate sitting in the passenger seat. Because I have done so much driving - nearing 2 million kms - I find it hard to be comfortable when someone else is in control.

Drive through site tonight with no frills and van staying hitched for a quick getaway in the morning.

AAA Tour - Day 11 - Pondering Problems

Intermediate Egret

We have fallen into the relaxed style on the road we have always wanted to find. Unfortunately, things like washing clothes still have to happen and even more unfortunately, it’s my job, so half hour after sunrise, with the frost still crackling under my feet, I was off to the laundry. Luckily I was early, as there was only one machine available!

Chores out of the way and Sue finally awake, we returned to town looking to double our experience yesterday at Miss Barrett’s Café but it was not to be, as it was closed in order for staff to attend a funeral. This meant we took an extended drive around Wilcannia and I must admit, it made the conflict I was feeling yesterday even more pronounced.

There are so many problems to be overcome here.

In the main street, former businesses lie broken and deserted, their windows long ago smashed despite the iron bars that were intended as protection. Corrugated iron has replaced many of them but where visual passage is possible, the walls and roofs are often caving in, with piles of bricks where customers once would have been. Yet over the road, sandstone buildings built by white fellas 140 years ago are still in pristine condition and occupied by the council, Australia Post, the police, the courts.

Driving around town, thoroughly decent country houses stand beside hovels. Everywhere, the contradiction.

Royal Spoonbill

It got me wondering, how do young people aspire to break the cycle when there is so much decay still standing. Education perhaps? The local paper skewered that idea: last week only 72% of primary aged children enrolled at the central school turned up but it was streets ahead of the 48% of secondary students. How do you run education programs with attendance like that.

I’m not pointing the finger at the aboriginal community or Wilcannia or the residual white community. I don’t know what the answer is. It’s clear, people are trying but negative media isn’t going to help. I read today that the BBC has apologised for the biased presentation it aired: apologised and placed the production company who supplied it under scrutiny for several other projects it was set to supply.

However, it’s not going to be fixed by ignoring the elephant in the room either.

I’ll be leaving Wilcannia tomorrow and I’ll be a little better informed but still with no idea what
might repair the damage. There is hope. There is resilience. It’s just that it is up against it.

Click to view today's photos

In the afternoon we went on another driving tour around the property and more lovely birdies.

Campfire circle again this evening with a meal of brazed steak and vegetables made by our host Gordon and shared among the punters. Lots of sharing about places and roads travelled. We left when it got around to bragging.

AAA Tour - Day 10 - Walking Around Town

The original bridge

All of the morning was spent in the town of Wilcannia, after a cool night.

Wilcannia is a much maligned place. Even the BBC caned it in a recent documentary anchored by British actor and TV personality Reggie Yates. According to Bill Elliot, who we spoke with at Miss Barrett's Cafe, a passionate former property owner and now local business man, they chose to leave positive interviews and events they filmed on the cutting room floor when they edited the final to air program.

Thomas Mitchell passed through the area in 1835 and Sturt in 1844 but it was 1863 before the site for the town site was commissioned by JC Moore and the town was gazetted in 1866. White settlement had begun sixteen years early. Aboriginal Australians had been here for thousands of years of course. Local sheep stations soon needed a way to transport their huge bales of wool to market and paddle steamers solves that problem in such spectacular fashion that Wilcannia became the third busiest port in NSW.

Trade became so big that public and private businesses built the huge sandstone buildings which still stand today.

We walked the streets and examined the the prominent sandstone buildings dating back to the 1880's which seem so out of kilter with other abandoned shells which are almost side by side along the main street. Its complex. Most of the businesses have security mesh screens on what were windows and doors. There is no glass to be broken. The Club Hotel, a big dominant hotel on the corner of the main intersection, has no windows. They were boarded up long ago. A park on one side of the main river crossing is run down and broken and further along the river, another area down the bank, was covered in discarded beer cans and broken glass.

A statement of intent from local
Aboriginal women

In between, three large colourful boards beside the original heritage listed centre lifting bridge, define very clear, affirmative statement about how indigenous members of the community want to lead their youth to a better future. The photos and names are displayed. They are making a clear public statement of intent and taking personal responsibility. It was an inspiring action.

The people we spoke to were positive, such as an aboriginal women who asked Sue to visit the board by the bridge and the park opposite the hospital. Parts of the town speak of it but other parts maintain the stereotype you take there with you. It was disturbing. It was perplexing.

We drove out to the hospital. Built in 1879, the original building is still very much in use and has been continuously since it opened. Across the road, is a rough park, called Reconciliation Park, the most dominate feature of which was ten painted panels by indigenous artists. Beautiful artwork. We would have loved to have some explanatory notes but it was enough to appreciate the panels for how they looked.

Interesting morning.

During the afternoon, I sat in the camp kitchen and uploaded photos from the past few days. OnceSue joined me, the next hour or so was such a delight as we watched the birds come to the billabong and feed. Spoonbills, egrets, ibis, restless flycatchers, whistling kites, black-fronted dotterills, a pelican, a pied butcher bird, little corellas, herons. little black cormorants, galahs, magpies, mud larks and lots lots more. Brilliant, brilliant afternoon. Hopefully the photos will reflect that.

Click to see today's photos

Campfire circle again tonight talking with folks from Foster-Tuncurry, Penrith and the Clare Valley.

This is such a great place to camp.

AAA Tour - Day 8 - Cobar to Wilcannia

Back on the road today, along the Barrier Highway to Wilcannia. It was mostly straight road driving but for two thirds of it, we were up and down over gentle rises of between ten and twenty metres in rolling hills.

Morning tea was at a road side rest area called Lilyvale, 90 odd kms west of Cobar. Located on both sides of the road, it has a fully bitumen and wide surface, roofed tables and chairs and a long drop toilet - and all of it pretty new. We opened the lid and had a cuppa.

The following ten kms had an interesting array of roadside trees. First there was a bottle tree, then a shoe tree, an undies tree, a bra tree and several others. Odd but in a 110km/hr zone and bad road edges, I wasn't prepared to stop to more closely investigate.

Click to view today's photos

We arrived at our destination, Warrawong on the Darling and backed the van into our spot on the edge of the a huge billbong, which was once the Darling River. The venue is a fully fledged caravan park on a working farm about three kms from Wilcannia. Grass sites, brand new, state of the art amenities, power, water, camp fire and cheese and biscuits at 5:00pm each night and then there is the view. Birdies, lots of them. The camp kitchen doubles as bird hide. We'll be here for the next three days just chillin' (literally ... 15C daytime and OC at night. Air conditioner and electric blanket will manage those issues.