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Take a trip to Longreach, Queensland to sample the true Aussie Outback
Mike Larder
Longreach, the central Queensland capital lies cradled in a long
reach of the meandering Thomson River in the vast prairie land that is
central western Queensland. Every thing about this outback oasis is big:
Big skies, big trucks, big properties, big steaks, big welcomes and big
distances. “Just down the road” can mean a journey of two or three
hundred kilometers. “Don’t worry mate, just keep going …you’ll get there
eventually.”
 Outback
folk are famous for being a real friendly bunch.
Outback people in their quiet and dignified way welcome visitors to
their territory with genuine warmth. They seem pleased and sometimes
curious as to why people would actually want to travel so far to
experience a brief taste of their isolated and sometimes cruelly harsh
way of life. But they are very pleased to offer an insight into their
lives anyway and are unfailingly hospitable.
Just as the scale of the Central West is awesome, so the pace of life is
gentle. Make haste slowly, it will still be there tomorrow. Time is
gauged by the seasons, the cattle sales, or when the next truckload of
supplies will arrive at an outlying station or when to finally pack up
your kids and send them off to boarding school in ‘the big smoke’. Or
when the pub opens, or the droughts, or the stock market.
Take a close look into the face of a Western Queenslander and you will
see distance in their eyes. An open-faced friendliness and sincerity
that is rapidly becoming lost forever in the mayhem of modern day city
living. But you also notice that they will keep an eye over your
shoulder, maybe scanning the distance for a telltale wisp of cloud that
could produce sweet rain to replenish famished waterholes or a dust
storm that could wreak havoc to barns, sheds and precious livestock.
They will speak in a slow, polite and considered way. Wander down any
outback town’s main street and more often than not people will offer a
greeting with a smile attached. “Gudday, how’re you going, mate?” (Hello
how are you friend). “Not too bad, yourself?” (Quite well thank you).
Outback life moves at a measured economical pace. You can’t rush about
in 45 C heat. Difficult for urban dwellers to contemplate who live by
the urgency of the clock and timetable, the immediacy of the computer
and the demands of a jumpy boss watching his back and his profit
margins.
There are several modern day methods of reaching Longreach, Queensland’s
historical heartland. The journey that once took three lonely,
exhausting and often tragic months by horse team and wagon or days by
Cobb and Co., takes a couple of hours comfortably ensconced in a flying
armchair. A heck of a sight quicker than it took the original settlers.
Go by car from Brisbane and the journey will take 14 hours. A coach will
do the same job and someone else does the driving but in the eighteen
hours it takes to get there you could fly half way around the world.
Either way you get to see a lot of country, wildlife, road kills, wheat
silos and telegraph poles.
The ‘Spirit of the Outback’, Queensland Rail’s comfortable, if slow,
train takes even longer. The journey lasts a full twenty-four hours
being tugged north by smooth electric loco to Rockhampton and then veer
left, swapping quiet electric engines at Emerald for a couple of
rumbling diesels, and then onto the original heat twisted rails to
Longreach arriving at sunset.
It’s fun sitting back in air-conditioned comfort in a comfy chair
sipping a cool drink and watching sweating backpacking push-bikers zip
past the panoramic windows only to be caught again on inclines. The
Spirit is not known for its haste but certainly for its undulating
relaxation.
The question often arises from the uninitiated. “But what the heck do
you do out there?”
The simple answer is plenty. Just don’t rush it. This is heritage
country where the Australian character was and still is forged. Corny as
it may sound to some, this is still the land of the ‘fair go’ and of
fiercely guarded independence. Of mate ship and camaraderie born out of
necessity. If you don’t look after each other, no one else will.
It’s a vast place where egalitarianism comes as the norm. Front up to
any bar and soon you could be yarning with a sweat soaked, dust
encrusted millionaire grazier who runs a property the size of Ireland.
Or a wiry, blue singleted, equally sweat soaked shearer escaping the
furnace-like heat of the shearing shed. Or Sister Anne Maree the flying
nun, or a knight of the realm, or a politician. Or even a local bunch of
teachers dressed in drag, skylarking at the end of the school term.
Outback people do not suffer fools gladly, or at all, but befriend them
and you’ll have friends for life. Like the legendary encounter at The
Commercial between a city bred loudmouth and a cattleman who after a
noisy and physical altercation decided that, in the best traditions of
the bush, to settle their disagreement ‘round the back of the pub’. The
bout was long and hard fought with neither pugilist left standing.
Both were carted off to the Longreach Base Hospital for extensive
repairs. The very next morning at opening time both were found settled,
albeit bandaged and bruised, at the Commercial Hotel’s bar enjoying a
heart starter and comparing each other’s X-rays, the very best of mates.
The local walloper turned a (metaphorical) blind eye to the event and
The Beak wasn’t troubled on Monday morning. An altogether satisfactory
outcome.
At the Commercial Hotel while sipping one of publican Roly Goodings’
freezing cold beers or munching through a massive steak that overlaps
the plate and the mushroom sauce dribbles down your chin, you might bump
into the ebullient Smithy and his wife Sue. Big Smithy and Little Sue
run Outback Aussie Tours. A big broad-shouldered bloke, Smithy knows
just about everything there is to know and see in the bush. And tells
terrible jokes.
Or you might find yourself minding the pub’s bottle-shop assisted by the
chief constable of Longreach on a day off and Rolly needed a hand.
Rangy Bill Wilkinson might amble in. Bill will take you out to his once
abandoned station. With a typical bushman’s economy with words, the
softly spoken drover will tell you that, “When I moved in the goats
moved out.” He was a boundary rider for years on a huge station nearby.
He now runs horseback trips into Captain Starlight country.
Captain Starlight, aka Harry Redford, was a legendary cattle duffer who
was finally knabbed by the wallopers but escaped the gallows. The jury,
impressed with Harry’s novel, if not downright illegal, method of
opening up new livestock routes, albeit with the aid of other peoples’
cattle, declared him “Not guilty Your Honour”. He walked free and into
legend. Another classic example of Australian bush justice in operation.
Then there’s Tom Lockie, a been there done that countryman whose
knowledge of bush lore, verse and country yarns is out of all proportion
to his diminutive stature. Lockie runs Artesian Country Tours. He’s a
one-man operation who works out of historic Barcaldine an hour ‘down the
track’ from Longreach. He will take you to see Aboriginal Rock art and
the eerie massacre caves where once a tribe of Aborigines was summarily
slaughtered for allegedly spearing a white man.
These grizzly reminders of a less than savoury past are hidden in a huge
crater to the north of ‘Barcy’. He will take his privileged travellers
into parts of Queensland that very few white people have ever seen.
Unlike Smithy, he tells hilarious jokes, tall (and short) stories and is
a talented exponent of the didgeridoo that is longer than he is.
There is a saying amongst the locals of Longreach. They say that once
you’ve crossed the Thomson River you’ll always return. Return to a place
on this earth where you can sit around a campfire, peering up to the
infinity of the heavens and listen to the deafening sound of silence.
You don’t get to do that very often these days. Go enjoy it while you
can.
The Australian Outback offers the visitor
some truly stunning vistas.
Get away from the hustle and bustle into a
vast, tranquil wilderness.
City administrators and media escape to the North
Visiting Pra Nakhon Kiri National Park (Kao
Wang).
At the beautiful Praram Ratchaniwet (Ban
Puen Palace).
Pramote Channgam
It was altogether some jaunt when public relation officers from
the Pattaya Information Office and the Pattaya Mass Media Club went
touring together, all in the interest of promoting better public
relations and information exchange.
 Fun
and games.
For three busy days the recreational tour took 150 people to travel in
Petchaburi Province and to stay at the Tonnampet Resort and Travel.
The first stop was at the well-known Chanpha Restaurant for a good meal.
Then the tour went to Pra Nakhon Kiri National Park (Kao Wang) to see
the King Rama IV palace with its beautiful scenery. Praram Ratchaniwet
(Ban Puen Palace), King Rama V’s palace located on the bank of the
Petchaburi River was next.
Dinner was at the resort where amusing recreational activities were
organized.
Niran Wattanasartsathorn, chief advisor to Pattaya’s mayor, Deputy Mayor
Ronakit Ekasingh, and Deputy Mayor Verawat Khakhay were on hand and fun
was had by all.
The tour group took to water on the second day, paddling rubber rafts
for some 10 kilometers down the Petch River. A “walk rally” later tired
out the travelers even more so. But more recreational activities awaited
at the resort for those with energy and bonhomie left.
The last day saw the tour at the Kang Krachan National Park where tree
seedlings were planted to help regenerate forest. The group continued to
Don Hoilord in Samut Songkram and visited a mangrove forest, followed by
a trip to the Ampawa floating market before eventually returning home.
Planting seedlings at Kang Krachan National
Park.
Rafting down the Petch River.
Everyone jump!
Ampawa floating market.
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