Taff Down Under 25

Ok, so it’s 9.00 at night, I’ve just clocked off work, and driven a few blocks down the road. From behind me comes the inevitable and unwelcome "nee naw, nee naw!" of a police car. Now you may find this hard to believe; but I was driving under the speed limit at the time, and so couldn’t believe it when they pulled me over. I got out of the car most indignantly, and strolled over to the cops. Not too belligerently of course, as they arm the buggers over here.

"I wasn’t speeding officer, I’m quite sure of that!" I knew my rego (tax) was up to date as, if you remember, last month I got pulled for not having any.

"No sir," says the cop, "But do you know you have no number plates on your car?"

I looked. "Fuck me pink, I don’t do I?"

Some bugger had pinched me plates, the bastard! They may have used them to fake another car's identity, or just ripped them off out of spite, but some bugger had my plates. I apologised, and to be fair the cop took it all in good humour. He was very polite and gave me a slip to say the matter was in hand, and a number to dial to report the theft. He did ask, rather dimly if you ask me; "Did you not notice they were gone sir?

" Well it’s not an obvious thing to check really, Officer," I said, "petrol, oil, washer bottle, all filled? Lights working? Number plates still in position?"

He liked that.

So the next day after queuing for hours I got a new set of plates, and so far no buggers nicked them.

Oh, thanks for all the e-mails and letters asking after the health of the cat, following my last e-mail. Fucking typical that; I fall from a great height (ok, five foot or so) onto rocks, sprain my ankle, get cut and bleeding, drag myself five kilometers through hazardous terrain, dehydrated and battered, not a frigging murmur. The cat goes to the vet, and every bugger I know is anxiously sending "get well soon" greetings, and inquiring after his health. You tossers.

 

I started wearing the hearing aids, just in case you were wondering. They make life, louder, basically. It’s nice to retreat into a quiet world at will, and I often go without them. Wearing them is like walking round with someone’s thumbs in your ears, so not that pleasant. However people have been a lot less pissed off with me since getting them, so not all bad.

The last fortnight have been Bethy’s school holidays, some parents really know how to piss you off don’t they? Sorry about the rather odd mixed sentence there, but that was immediately leapt to mind.

I had a day off in the week, so I was looking after Bethy. She asked if we could go to the climbing wall. Yes, it was her that asked not me that insisted. She asked if she could bring a mate; "No problem babes, who do you want to bring?"

She mulled over the options and settled on Allene, who was the only mate available that day. Ok, so she rings Allene up. I get put on the phone to Allene’s dad. We’d planned to go to the wall for the morning, come back for lunch, and then they could play in the house or the garden for the rest of the day.

"Allene’s booked into a program until 12.30, can we bring her around after that?" No problem, save me feeding her I thought; "Sure; you collect her from the program, and bring her round here at 1.30, after she’s had lunch."

Ok, the next day at 12:50 Allene rings and says she’s on her way around. Eh? Ok, have it your own way, so she gets to our place, and we shoot off to the wall. Bethy, as per norm, shoots up everything in sight, she’s a brilliant climber. Allene mopes around, occasionally getting three-foot off the ground, and making it bloody obvious that she’d rather be elsewhere.

One point I was belaying Bethy up a hard route, and on the route next to me was a father and son. The son, about 12 years old, was being belayed up a very tricky overhang. "That’s it, just sling your leg up and pull yourself over, it’s easy!" shouts the father. He looked like an advert for coronary heart disease and brewers droop. He was so fat he wasn’t wearing a climbing harness, just a belt. Anyway, Bethy gets to the top, and I lower her off. I stroll over to the son, who’s on the deck, looking absolutely knackered; "like this mate," I say to him with a wink. So I solo up to the overhang, and, hanging off a couple of jugs, I talk him through the technique for getting over it. (There’s a hidden hold just over the lip.) I then jump back down onto the crash mats. "It’s lot easier to teach by example, mate." I say to father with a big cheesy grin.

Ok, I’m a show off and a complete pain in the arse. I know I am, you don’t need to remind me.

Oh, while I’m boasting, my latest short story, "Flying to live," has won me $100.00 !

Anyway, it’s mid afternoon by now, and Bethy says: "Can we go home now Taff? Allene hasn’t eaten today yet, and she’s very hungry." Oh dear, someone forgot something didn’t they?

So at 5.00 p.m. they are due to collect her, and promptly at 5.40 they turn up.

 

The next week, Bethy is having a holiday sleep over. She’s invited Ginger Steph, and wants Allene to come. Lee Anne phones Allene’s dad; he gives his ok. A couple of hours later, Allene’s mum phones up, "Can she stay at your place tomorrow night? I’ve asked her Gran to have her tonight." Lee Anne tells her that we’re off for a four-day break as of the following day, and that’s just not possible. Mum then gets shirty at us for being inconvenient. Fucked if we’re bothering asking her again then.

Oh, just to add insult to injury, yesterday Bethy went to Allene’s 10th birthday party at the local ice rink. On the invite in big letters; "We will not be providing lunch, please make sure your child eats before coming."

We decided to have our winter holiday somewhere different, for a change. We always go down the coast, and while it’s fun staying at the place we do (more on this later) we were due a new venue. So we decided to head inland.

6.00 a.m. Thursday morning we set off. Driving out of Canberra was wonderful; a low mist hugged the hills and turned the dawn landscape into a picturesque almost semi-mythical scene. The sun rose out of a gray filled valley directly behind us, it made me come over all something or other, as one does… We drove, and drove, and drove, and drove…I saw my first wild emus grazing by the side of the road, hard to believe these huge birds exist in the wild. In fact Lee Anne had to work hard to convince me that they weren’t farm birds.

Then we encountered one of the things I’d been longing to see, The Hay Plain.

I love a sunburnt country

A land of sweeping plains

Of ragged mountain ranges

Of droughts and flooding rains

I love her far horizons

I love her jewel sea

Her beauty and her terror

The wide brown land for me

Words will not be able to express how totally bloody gobsmaking this was for me, but I’ll bore you in an attempt to try in any case.

It’s flat, very flat.

There are a few trees, but nothing more. Then every so often you’ll pass miles and miles of fruit orchards, hundreds and thousands of orange, apple trees or grapevines in regimented rows. I took some shots to illustrate it, and they are so long on perspective that the road in them warps. The only way I can describe it is for you to imagine the widest sea view you can, with the ocean stretching to the horizon on three sides of you. Now turn the sea to brown earth, and dot an occasional gum tree on it. That big.

At one point I stood on the roof of the car taking shots of the view, when I saw a huge truck, one that I’d overtaken half an hour earlier, coming down the road. As the roads here are dead straight, arrow straight, for many, many, miles, I thought having the truck in the picture would give a sense of scale. I took the picture, and it worked well I think. However I forgot that the huge frigging truck heading towards me would be doing 120-130 kph. The wind off it as it passed had me doing my best Fred Astaire routine on the car roof. Lee Anne was not best pleased.

We eventually got to Hay, a place that describes itself as the "Gateway to Everywhere." Although, "a small agricultural town in the middle of the great sod all," would be more accurate.

We had a break there, and I bought a couple of books. One of these was How Green was My Valley, by Richard Llewellyn. Bethy read it over the weekend. She didn’t get her hands on the other one I bought, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, but I’m sure she’d have enjoyed it. Yes Bethy, at nine years old, is devouring classic literature. She insisted that we played the six tape set of Bill Bryson reading his book; A walk in the woods, which I had got from the library for the boring parts of the journey. My kind of kid!

Our Car cricket rules are developing nicely too…

A person is nominated to be "in".

for every car that passes in the opposite direction they score 1 run

unless:

It’s a blue car: scores 4 runs.

It’s a red truck: scores 6 runs.

It’s a car or truck towing something; scores 2 runs.

It’s a white car: [size=16px]OUT!

Unless:

It’s a white car followed by a blue car: dropped catch not out.

It’s a white car followed by a second white car: Leg bye; not out, one run.

It’s a white car followed by three blue cars: the best shot in the world ever. (Bethy’s rule.)

Total up each persons score until they are out, then the next person is in.

Reaching a town or city boundary means the end of play.

We drove on some more, then a lot more. We passed signs that said "Fruit-Fly Exclusion Zone!", though how they train the flies to read them I don’t know.

The Fruit Fly Exclusion Zone (FFEZ) encloses valuable horticultural areas of New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia, into which it is illegal to carry fresh fruit without a permit. There is a risk that the fruit may contain hidden fruit fly eggs or maggots. The majority of fruit fly outbreaks are associated with travellers bringing infested fruit into the Fruit Fly Exclusion Zone. It is vital to keep the FFEZ 'fruit fly free'. The value of horticultural products within the FFEZ is estimated at $500 million per year. Fruit fly outbreaks cost Australian fruit growers up to $100 million each year in lost income and eradication.

We eventually got to our destination, Swan Hill.We found our digs and settled in.

We had a nice room, well we had a nice room after Lee Anne went and complained about the first one we were given, so that’s all well and good. We took a look around town and spotted a place to eat. Then we went back to the hotel, had a bit of exercise at the gym, I had a good sauna, and the girls went in the pool and spa bath.

This was my first sauna in Oz; I used to have one every day after a workout when I lived in Sennen, boy I’d forgotten how relaxing they are. They also get all the blackheads out of my hooter, so no worries eh?

We strolled into town, had a look at the "Big Murray Cod", it’s one of Oz’s "big things". Seeing the "Big Murray Cod" brings my total of "Big Things" seen to two.

 

We found a bottle shop, where I bought a load of local wines. Well you have to really, don’t you?

Ok, I have to.

We then hit the cafe, and were served by a friendly young woman. We’d chosen this place to eat, as it was the only place we’d spotted with anything, and I mean anything at all, vege to eat on the menu. Also the owner was sat in the window as we had passed earlier, and he had given us such a sad look that I couldn’t not eat there. (Ok, I’m a soft touch.)

The wine that we had brought was opened, and was superb, I was soon well into the bottle. Then Bethy’s meal arrived. She’d ordered seafood paella, no probs there. It came with fried octopus. A whole one. I nearly threw my pizza up watching her eat it….

Lee Anne gave a reasonable tip to the girl who had served us, as the grub had been good, and she’d been very sweet and obliging. She looked stunned and was obviously dead chuffed. Tipping is not a big thing here in Oz.

We took a leisurely stroll about town and made our way home. Even though it was the middle of winter it was still warm enough to make strolling about pleasant.

Ok, the next morning we went to the Pioneer Settlement, a "living museum" or some such rot.

I’d been dreading this to be honest, as I’ve had some pretty bloody dire experiences at such places.

Mind you, not as dire as my good mate Alan Harness, who took his lads to visit a collection of WW II armed vehicles in Barnstable, near where they live. The owner, obviously a useless, pedantic, git, had covered the vehicle handles, steps, and other bits, in grease to stop kids climbing on them. I mean to say, they’re armed vehicles for fuck’s sake, they should be able to stand up to kids shoes?

Anyway, I needn’t have worried, as this place was fantastic. It cost an arm and a leg to get in, but was worth every cent of it. We started off with a paddle steamer trip up the Murray. I saw a spoonbill on the bank, but couldn’t get my camera out in time, bugger! All the way up the river and back crimson swallows buzzed us, getting insects disturbed by the paddles of the boat.

Then we had a ride in a horse and trap, followed by a ride around the whole place in a 1921 Dodge convertible. The old guy who drove us around, a volunteer as are most of the staff there, was called Maurice. He was a mine of information, and had Bethy entranced. I’m sure she learned more Ozzie history off him on that journey than she would do in a month of school.

We went to the cafe there, and were served by the same girl who had served us the previous night at the other cafe. Obviously she was after another big tip.

The bit that got me though, and clearly made me remember I wasn’t in the UK any more, was that all the shops had the fittings, and bits and bobs of whichever trade they represented. But here you could pick them up, examine them, try them on, and play with them even. You could play the harmonium in the music shop, feel the cloth and handle the irons in the drapers, handle the type set in the printers, handle the tooth pliers in the barbers. I was even tempted to ask if I could use the metal lathe in the garage, as it was exactly the same as one I learned on when I did my apprenticeship!

The shops were all original buildings too, knocked down, transported to the site, and rebuilt in the original manner. All the volunteers there were in period costume, and were only too glad to give you a run down on how things worked, and what they were.

We hired period costume for ourselves, and got our photos taken with our own camera, they charged us all of five bucks for this. That’s another thing, the admission price was all-inclusive, but even where they were trying to flog you stuff, it was reasonably priced, but more importantly discretely done. If it had been "in your face" it would have ruined the whole thing.

I could have stayed there a week, but eventually Lee Anne dragged me kicking and screaming out of there. At the level crossing outside, which even though it was in the heart of town, had no gates or barriers, we watched a train go by. It had four locos pulling it, and I swear it was at least a kilometer long. Bethy said, "I’ve seen longer."

We played table tennis back at the hotel, and I thrashed them. Seeing as neither of them had played before, and Bethy is only nine, this wasn’t a big deal. I had another sauna. God, I’m going to have to find one in Canberra. Trouble is you have to be careful as "sauna’s" can attract, well work it out for yourselves. Not that I have anything against that sort of behaviour, it’s just I want to be able to relax at one.

That night we ate at one of the most odd restaurants it’s ever been my pleasure to eat at. Imagine two railway carriages parked at a station. The carriages were the dining rooms, the platform was the bar and service area. When I say "imagine it" I don’t mean it somehow resembled this, it actually was two railway carriages, still on the bogeys, and a real platform between them!

The food there was reasonable, I was having pizza for the second night running, through lack of choice rather than choice. The girl brought the wine menu, and I chose a mid-priced bottle of red, a local one of course. "I’m so glad you chose that one," said the waitress, "That’s from my Dad’s vineyard." Blimey!

 

 

The next morning we were heading off, so we took some more pictures of the "Big Murray Cod," and some of the "Burke and Wills Fig". It’s the largest Morton Bay Fig in the country, apparently.

The Burke and Wills Tree is a beautiful and enormous Moreton Bay fig which was planted from a seed by a Dr Gummow, who played host to the explorers when they passed through the town in 1860 on their ill-fated excursion to the centre of Australia. The tree, one of the largest of its kind in the country, is in Curlewis Street, opposite the bowling green.

To be fair it’s a bloody impressive tree; my photo doesn’t do it justice.

We drove off to a town that had another historic theme to it, called Echuca. (Bless you!)

This place had taken every good idea that Swan Hill had and reversed it. It was overpriced, commercialised, not educational, and tawdry.

At the café we ate at there was a guy stood outside who looked like Billy Connolly. Well, to be more accurate he looked like Billy would if his career had nose-dived in the 70’s, and he’d spent the rest of his time living rough, and hitting the meths hard. He was having a fair old argument with a several people invisible to the rest of the world. He looked like he needed my help, but fuck’im, I’m on holiday.

In the cafe I decided to have scrambled egg on toast. I walked up to the counter and ordered. The girl gave me one of those slightly puzzled looks that you get when you have to deal with people like Billy from outside, or the Welsh; "A hamburger???" she guessed.

After leaving Echuca, I got us lost. I managed to turn right instead of left on the way out of town.

This was a stroke of good fortune, serendipity even, or, as it was me, genius.

We drove on in ignorant bliss, stopping only to take photographs of a place that made giant metal insects. A neat idea, but I’m fucked if I know who’d actually want to buy a seven-foot tall metal preying mantis?

We eventually realised my folly and searched the map for a way to our proper route. Fortunately we had just passed a turn off that looked as if it would get us back on track. We headed back and turned off the main road. To my great delight, a dead straight dirt road stretched off to the horizon. I love driving on dirt roads; it takes some balls to do 130 kph on a dirt track. I think Lee Anne still has mine somewhere.

So in the distance was a small mound, which kept getting bigger. Then we saw a sign; "Pyramid Hill" 40 K. "I hope we go past it" I said to the girls, and as fortune would have it we did. We stopped at the foot of the hill, and found a path up. The last bit was a scramble, and Bethy got a bit of a fright on it. But the views we go from the top I can only describe as the sort of views you’d get from a low flying plane. Wonderful.

After soaking up the view we headed down. At the bottom of the path was an egg shaped rock with a curious hole in it. Bethy scrambled inside and curled up in the fetal position for us to take photos of her. It looked very womb-like. Strange.

We drove on and passed through the village of Pyramid hill itself.

We passed through several lovely rural towns and villages on this trip, and spotted many lovely old rural homesteads far from anywhere. On spotting them we’d look at each other and smile. One day, one day.

Some way down the road we passed the biggest flock of cockatoos I’ve seen to date, there must have been 500 or more of them. The image of such a mass of these beautiful white and yellow parrots will be with me for a long time.

We also stopped off at a nature reserve, a huge swamp filled with dead trees, scary place.

We eventually got to our second stop off Albury. Due to my ad hoc navigation we got there rather late, and the hotel restaurant was closed. We asked the girl at the desk if there was anywhere good locally. "There’s a great Thai place just over the road," she said. Being knowledgeable in the cuisine of the world I put a damper on that suggestion; "Thai grub is never ever veggie Babes, we’ll not get anything there for us two."

So we had a shit, shave and shampoo, well I did that, the other two just had a shower, and, dressed in our town gear, set off. I was convinced that I’d be on my third night of pizza. Just on the off chance, we checked the menu at the Thai place.

They had two pages of vegetarian food.

Lee Anne gave me one of her "looks".

The food was some of the best grub I’ve had in Oz outside of our own kitchen, it was superb. The wine was succulent, and to finish off, we had bananas cooked in coconut milk, which were to die for. I’ll not say owt about foreign grub again, not till I’ve checked the sodding menu first.

We slept, and then loaded the car up for the last leg home. Lee Anne had somewhere she’d been itching to show me. (I’m miles ahead of you, don’t even bother.)

Ok, you’re a bonza Ozzie bloke who really enjoys a cartoon about larrikins in an outback pub, so what do you do?

You build the place.

Yup, this mad arsed Ozzie geezer spent half a million dollars recreating a cartoon pub. Complete with outward sloping walls, it’s own outdoor dunny, a jail, a crashed plane in the yard, and a truck on the roof. He also painted the cartoon characters, and their sayings all over the bloody place.

Just 15 km north of Albury, situated along the Hume Highway is the Ettamogah Pub. The Ettamogah Pub was inspired by cartoonist Ken Maynard who along with the genius of Lindsay Cooper turned it into Australia's most famous comic strip hotel. Maynard once lived in Albury, so the site is quite appropriate.

Complete with old truck on the roof, outward leaning walls, a bar filled with memorabilia, a tree that stands right in the middle (through two floors), a dog kennel out the back, talking cockies and old work boots; these days the Ettamogah Pub is the centre piece of a whole village that's brimming with attractions and activities for all the family.

The word Ettamogah is Aboriginal for 'place of good drink'.

It was a fucking hoot! Unfortunately we were there far to early for me to try their beer, so we bought some plonk they were hawking, and set off once more. Going back there, and getting mercilessly slaughtered, is high on my "to do" agenda.

We decided as we had just spent three days in wine country, that we’d stop off at the next vineyard and buy a batch of good wine. I had all these dreams of starting my own cellar, and laying down wine until it was vintage. You know, ten, fifteen, twenty weeks old or so. Guess what we didn’t see another of all the way home?

The last stop on the trip was at a place called "The dog on the tuckerbox, nine miles from Gundagai." This was every bit as riveting as the name implies. It’s a statue to a dog, that shat, and no I haven’t added an extra "h" in there in jest, it shat on someone’s lunchbox. So hysterical was this, it was commemorated in a poem. And this was such a major event in the area they put a fucking statue up to it.

 

 

Nine Miles from Gundagai' by Jack Moses

I've done my share of shearing sheep,

Of droving and all that;

And bogged a bullock team as well,

On a Murrumbidgee flat.

I've seen the bullock stretch and strain

And blink his bleary eye,

And the dog sit on the tuckerbox

Nine miles from Gundagai.

I've been jilted, jarred and crossed in love,

And sand-bagged in the dark,

Till if a mountain fell on me,

I'd treat it as a lark.

It's when you've got your bullocks bogged,

That's the time you flog and cry,

And the dog sits on the tuckerbox

Nine miles from Gundagai.

We've all got our little troubles,

In life's hard, thorny way.

Some strike them in a motor car

And others in a dray.

But when your dog and bullocks strike,

It ain't no apple pie,

And the dog sat on the tuckerbox

Nine miles from Gundagai.

But that's all past and dead and gone,

And I've sold the team for meat,

And perhaps, some day where I was bogged,

There'll be an asphalt street,

The dog, ah! well he got a bait,

And thought he'd like to die,

So I buried him in the tuckerbox,

Nine miles from Gundagai.

But even more bloody weird than that was that the place was heaving. People had come from all over to see a statue of the dog that crapped on its owner’s lunch. There were three cafe’s catering too them. Lee Anne, just to add some poignancy to the day, bought a fucking T-towel of the poem!

Heh, revenge!

Lee Anne ordered at one of the cafes, a box of chicken nuggets and chips for Bethy, and a vegeburger each for her and me. When her number was called, she was presented with a box of chicken nuggets and chips, and two vegemite sandwiches! Not just me that needs an interpreter then?

A fun holiday was had by all.

 

The other day at work I was seeing one of my regular punters. This lad has been the most paranoid person on the planet in the last six months, but is now on the up and up. He had gone to the extent of drilling holes in the ceiling beams of his bedroom, looking for any cameras that were spying on him, and accusing everyone who had a mobile phone of tracking, recording, and taking pictures of him, he believed "The Trueman Show" was a mockumentary of his life. Seriously paranoid!

I was just chewing the fat with him and his mum before getting into the clinical shit. The conversation went thus;

Me; "Do anything nice over the past week?"

Mum: "We went to the coast."

Me: "Nice, where about?"

Mum: "Lilli Pilli"

Me: "That’s where we always stay down the coast, lovely place!"

Mum: "Where do you stay?"

Me: "At the top of the hill that runs up from the beach."

Mum: "Oh, that’s were we go."

Me: "It’s a nice place we stay, two storey house, veranda’s front and back, and a wood burning stove."

Mum; "Sounds exactly like the place we use."

Me: "My missus rents it of a guy she works with at environment ACT, guy called Jeff."

Mum: "That’s my brother in law, it’s the same place! Ummmmm Taff…."

I turn round to see that the lad has been following this conversation with increasing horror, and is now halfway up the wall, with eyes like saucers. It took me a good hour to talk him into accepting I hadn’t been stalking him!

Ok, I've done something incredibly stupid. Nothing new there I know.

I've decided to do the Canberra 10K fun run.

So what, you may ask. Well it's this coming September the 8th, and just to add a bit of interest, I thought I'd give you the chance to have a flutter on it. So here we go, the person who guesses closest to the time I cross the finish line, wins a bag of Ozzie goodies for them and/or their kids.

Factors to consider;

I started training last week.

I used to be a reasonable club middle distance runner, with several marathons, half marathons under my belt.

I used to do 10 K's as warm ups.

I haven't run, not even for a bus, since 1992.

I only gave up smoking 3 months ago.

I still drink far too much.

My knees and ankles are fucked.

I'm 6'1" (184 cm) and 13 stone 8 lbs. (88 kilos or 194 pounds)

Lee Anne, Beth and Mary are walking it; they may finish before I do.

My goal is to beat the hour mark.

Ok, I'll update you as things progress.

You can have three stabs at the time, and all guesses must be in this format 1:13:35 (Hours: minutes:seconds)

Go here to put your guesses up. You’ll have to register a nickname first. (It’s free.)

 

We saw Shrek 2 and the latest Harry Potboiler movie at the cinema the other day. Shrek is the funniest film I’ve seen in yonks, but Beth had to explain all the intricacies of Harry P to me.

Also I highly recommend the film; "Touching the Void". A marvelous story of survival. Go see it tomorrow, take a friend!

 

Well, enough blather from me, the cat sends his love, I don’t….