Gordon Barlow

Cripes, Bruce!! You've got yourself a bobby-dazzler, there.

She would put me to shame, I'm sure of that. I took after my mother in being a book-worm, which is not exactly the kind of kid a man wants, in the bush. When there were sheep to be dealt with, I would usually be hard to find, behind the house reading a book. Until my brother came along: at age four he was more useful than I was at age seven.

I've written relatively few reminiscences from my childhood days. "Inside the rabbit-proof fence" was as much about the dingo fence as the rabbits), and "The last surviving player" told of bush horsemanship, both fictional and factual. (Banjo Paterson wrote a wonderful poem about the Geebung Polo Club, which every spouse of a bushie ought to read! Are you up for it, Ozzie?)

Kim67

I grew up both in the Pilbara and Perth. I spent lots of time on family and friends' properties and mine sites. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of the bush. Sleeping wherever your parents lay your swag (except when you're in a flood way and it rains and your swag floats down the river). Bathing in the river once a year when the rain comes. Smelling those first rains coming and running outside to dance in it and watch the red dust fly as the first drops hit the dry earth. Laying in the cool huts constructed of chicken wire and spinafex with drip pipe running through it, turn on the hose and let the breeze blow through, I would lay for hours reading a readers digest that I'd nicked from the thunder box with a peg on my nose. Eating dinner by kerosene lamp when the generators are turned off as soon as dinner is cooked and then dancing to old vinyls on a battery operated record player. Sleeping every night on a cyclone bed under the stars with your grandfather laying beside you telling you tall tails until you fall asleep.

ozzieeagle

Great picture you paint there, I've not heard the expression Cyclone bed before, so I'm guessing that could be a WA parochial term ? Wifes never mentioned Kerosene lamps either, so maybe they exclusively used candles.

Are you a handier woman than the average because of your bush upbringing as well Kim ?

There was a fantastic movie about life for women in the bush in the 50's last year, tounge in cheek but if gives you a bit of a flavour.


God I love Aussie movies, they are so bright and positive.... This one and Death in Brunswick kind of epitomise what I love about them.

ozzieeagle

Yes definitely..... I've actually had a few drinks in a pub called the Geebung Polo club here in Melbourne.

So it would be good to read the origin.

Amazulu

Great story

Australia owes a debt of gratitude to the people who opened up the Pilbara and therefore drove our wealth and prosperity to such a level that we are now the 5th richest country in the world

And I mean all the people - those at the top with the money and vision and those that actually toiled and built

Kim67

I think maybe cyclone bed comes from the fact they're a metal frame with cyclone fencing wire wrapped around them. I wouldn't say I was handy, but I'm certainly more patient than my kids growing up in the cyber age - we would never have gone to mum and said "I'm bored" even when there was only a few rocks and a bit of mulga scrub to play with lol.

I really want to see that movie. Might have to get hold of it this weekend and watch it. I love all the classic Australian movies.

Kim67

The old original WA miners were a crazy bunch that's for sure, but a whole lot of fun.

ozzieeagle

Add this one to the list, not in the same league as the other two I mentioned, but fun all the same. Of real interest to me as It's set in the town where my about to be SiL hails from, Warrnambool at the end of the Great Ocean Rd and basically a true story.

Apparently his parents went crazy when they were prepping for the movie as the trained the dogs that were used for the film at the back of their property and they were barking at all hours.



I dont think Warrnambool quite counts as Bush in relation to this thread...but it's still a fair way away from anywhere.

Dorothy

That's a great story Kim. I can almost see it in my mind.

Gordon Barlow

Oh yes, I well remember the kero lamps - Tilly brand, were they? Our rich neighbours had a 240-volt generator, so they could have lights blazing all the time - when it was on. When it was off, nothing. We only had 110-volt batteries, which Dad ran for an hour a night. That provided enough light for long enough to do our homework etc. The strict rule was no more than three overhead lights on at a time, and none in an empty room. Even today, I still go around the house switching lights off that my city-bred wife leaves on.

That general upbringing is very useful whenever we have a hurricane here and we lose power and water for a couple of weeks!

Gordon Barlow

Here's the original poem, Ozzie: THE GEEBUNG POLO CLUB by Banjo Paterson (1864 - 1941) by the man who wrote "The Man from Snowy River".

The polo matches that were held as part of the annual gymkhanas in my home community of Hannaford, on the Downs, were a far cry from the intensity of the match Paterson describes. They were also a far cry from the polo played at Windsor Great Park, which is the poshest place I've ever watched the game.

jad n rich

We lived and still own a acerage in QLD that is definately bush. Acres of it, as untouched as it was 100 years ago, we have old pictures that confirm its exactly the same as then. Not that remote either, one hour from brisbane, minutes to major centres, beach and mountains.

My kids had the experience of a lifetime and they know it. Totally private, you can hear sometimes, but never see any other neighbors. We had pythons in the roof, one son would say he kept hearing thumping in the roof at night, though he was just scared then found a huge python happily up there, skins were shed over 6 years, still no idea how he got in but placid snake.

Several types of possums, annoying at times, one had white markings, quite odd looking, never seen that type elsewhere. Would often spot owls at night, one terrified as thought someone was watching us over the fence. Hundreds of bird types from tiny 5 cm red and yellow birds, to giant rare red and black cockatoos and wild woodland birds, and bushturkeys building giant nests, they are like a giant compost heap.

Had turtles, large metre+ long goannas, the claws on those things! echidnas, like a hedghog, hilarious walk on them they wobble only saw babies once, so tiny. So many wallabies, each summer a couple would get the increasingly huge pouch, then pink legs and would poke out and about a month later, mini wallaby would be with mum.

Black and brown snakes were kept down by the resident python, we knew of 2, one on the roof and one with a territory down the back. In the mad summer storms 30 m trees would occasionally come down, waking everyone, luckly none near the house. The fallen trees would be chopped and burnt in winter. Huge log burner. We used to have kids parties every year, camping out in the forest, and of course kids from the big new estates would end up terrified and end up back in the house

At night you could lie in bed and see endless sky and stars, sky as clear as the desert in winter, yet hear the beach if it the surf was rough. If there was an eclipse or something perfect view from the bed. One night a giant light ball flashed across the sky, no idea what it was, like a giant ball with light coming off it. Greenish, fast but big. Every night you really felt like you were in the middle of nowhere. Still amazes me every time I go back.

I think we were so lucky, got to experience something so uniquely australian, if there was a dream place to live in aus that would be it.

Gordon Barlow

One extraordinary aspect of life in the bush - though not everywhere, of course - is the distance between places. I went to school with a boy*** from a neighbouring farm who in later life sank into the cesspit of Federal politics and represented the Division of Maranoa in southern Queensland. You can find a map of it on Wikipedia, where the area of the electorate is given as slightly bigger than the area of Texas. Bigger, too, than the combined area of the British Isles. The voters numbered less than 100,000, and during every election campaign he aimed to be seen by every one of them.
*** He, I and his twin sister, made up the biggest class in our primary school of a dozen or so pupils. We all went off to boarding school at age 11 or12.

Here on my Caribbean island (Grand Cayman) we have 18 MPs, representing 18,000 voters, and some of them grumble that their electorates are too big to handle!

Kim67

Some old photos of the WA bush from my family album. The first is us playing in the Murchison outside of Newman after school one day in the 70's, second is two of my siblings and three cousins with the family pet in Marble Bar in the 60's, third is my grandfather at a Pilbara Station in the 80's, my grandma and my dad in the 20's, my dad and brother at a mine in Nullagine in the 80's.

Kim67

And a couple more.

My Gran and Great Gran with my dad and his aunts picking wildflowers in Wiluna in the late 20's. My parents and brother on holidays in the big smoke (Perth in the 1950's), My Gran and Great Gran with a pet galah in Wiluna in the 20's, my sister and our friends at the Capricorn Roadhouse out of Newman in the 70's, my grandfathers family - typical Australian bush family, taken after WW! when my great grandfather came home - the youngest child in the photo became a prisoner of war in WWII and Neville Shute wrote A Town Like Alice about his experience in Changi.