We leave a rain-sodden Brisbane heading south to Tasmania along an old droving and fossicker route no doubt oft' used by my great-grandfather, WJB, in the 1880s and '90s, as he led flocks of sheep to the animal markets in the south. On occasions, fat cattle, too. He would push the animals at a pace of about 10 miles a day, most likely. Yet now we can drive twenty times that distance in any one day. So easy for us; so inconceivable for him.
We pass charming examples of pioneer and homesteader cottages that my great-grandfather, too, might have passed, but, most nights, he would have had to settle for his swag roll and a warm fire at best, overseeing the animals with which he was charged.
I keep wondering if small groups of traditional landowners roaming these parts might have looked down on him from the hills either side of his droving route? Might they have been permanent clans of this region, or, like us, occasional travellers, passing through? Might some of them have helped him take his animals to market? Or was that not a common happening yet?
On we drive to Bingara. Here, there are streets of completely untouted, but exceptionally fine examples of Art Deco country architecture. The merchants of the early 1900's must have delighted in creating these buildings. On one corner stands a milk bar, with rich polished wooden shelves, smart tiled floor, and lights and decor straight out of a 1930s blockbuster movie. Beside it is a theatre of the same era needing only a few cobwebs dusted to bring Garbo back to life. Across the road a drapery store is adorned with angular shards of coloured Art Deco glass. It is all quite beautiful.
I keep wondering if Ebenezer, his young brother who ended up fossicking in the West Australian goldfields, slow panned in these very hills, addicted even then. Maybe, he was even in this next tiny town of Barraba, where, when the gold finally ran out, copper and diamonds were brought up from the deep, making Barraba one of the most famous diamond centres in the world at that time.
In its prime Barraba must have been one of the smartest towns around. A hundred years later it really only needs a quick feather duster and a fresh dab of paint to see it buzzing again. And tourists don't need much of an excuse to drop their modern day swags these days. So why not encourage them to come this route?
Swagmen most likely shared my great-grandfather's evening campfires. And bushrangers who roamed these parts might have ridden in under cover of darkness, and been tempted by the boiling billy to dismount.
Certainly, ten years earlier, Captain Thunderbolt held up a mail coach in the tiny town of Wallabadah where today stands an interesting new park, thick with caravaners and motor homers having their morning tea at its picnic tables, then breaking for a walk through this newly created space: a park and garden that honours all those who sailed aboard the Aussie First Fleet.
The park displays comprehensive tablets and bulletin boards carved with information about the convicts, captains and crews from each and every first fleet ship, including those who died enroute. This is reputed to be the best collection on the First Fleeters in any one place in Australia right now.
A wonderful idea proposed by Ray Collins, who as an adventurous 14yr old stowed away on a ship destined for Columbia. When he arrived home his dad no doubt gave him a good walloping, worrying that this plucky son with wild ideas would amount to nothing.
But it was likely that very stowaway trip that seeded Ray's notion for such a park, and once his idea was was fully formed he offered it around to many councils, thinking it might improve their chances of capturing a slice of the tourist trade, but only one, Wallabadah, had the foresight to offer space and assistance for his project.
Simple ideas like this bring tourists, who stay awhile, breathe some animation into a space, and drop a few dollars into the drained coffers of these old communities whose colonial means of survival no longer exist.
One thousand five hundred and twenty names have been hand-carved by Ray Collins into stone tablets set into individual gardens, commemorating each of the eleven ships. Ray contributed more than just a fine idea, and I am betting his dad would be so proud of him.
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