Continuing the Melbourne people series - a series of images that highlight the current preoccupation with cell phone use and taking selfies. I wonder how all this self-obsession will be viewed fifty years from now?
Eyes on Australia
Observations and experiences from my new life in Victoria, Australia - through art, architecture, photography, travel, people, design, food, the quirky, the bizarre, the comedic - a few of the things I am passionate about.
Sunday, July 7, 2019
Tuesday, June 25, 2019
Ballan, Victoria
When I drove
into Ballan and saw the ‘Watch for Koalas’ sign in the middle of a residential
neighbourhood, I knew I was going to like the place. Anyone who looks after
these furry little Australian icons gets a pat on the back from me. However, it
should be noted early on, that despite looking in every tree I passed, I never
spotted a single koala myself.
My visit to
this little town, 78 kilometres northwest of Melbourne, was a fleeting one –
but not quite as fleeting as the first time I discovered it on a trip to
Geelong a year before. I had liked the look of the place then, as I flashed
through on my way south, but I didn’t have time to stop. And I was reluctant to
visit during the searing hot summer because I had to drive through several
forested areas to get there and I was apprehensive about bush fires.
As a footnote
to that paragraph, many of the farmers in the area are descendants of members
of the Australian Defence Forces, who settled their families in the wider
Ballarat district after the war.
I probably
could have walked around the whole of the township in an hour or so but I chose
to drive – after all, I had gauged fairly quickly that unless you had chosen to
live there, Ballan wasn’t the sort of place that commanded a lingering visit.
That said, it does have a clutch of wonderful old buildings and ‘wonderful old
buildings’ always set my imagination to wondering about life in the early days
– who lived there and why? How much they had paid to build their handsome
dwelling, who lived in it now? Where did they work? Were they one of the
hundreds who now commute to Melbourne by train to work every day?
Located near
the Werribee River (I never even saw that!), Ballan was established in the
1830s when one Robert von Steiglitz settled in the area. He named the new town
that sprang up in 1838, after Ballan in Ireland. Gold was discovered in 1851
and the town’s population more than doubled in the years thereafter. The Ballan
Hotel in fact, dates back to that gold rush era.
The first
Mechanics Institute was built in 1861 but the current building sits on land
that was purchased in 1881 and the building, complete with a new 1922 façade,
now houses a hall and library.
It seems
though, that Ballan is a town large enough to have an industrial estate, AND a
uniformed meter reader. And judging by the posters around town advertising
groups and classes, a lot DOES go on here – from quilting groups and assorted
other stitchery to fitness groups, community luncheons, baby groups, floral
arranging (single session $50), Hatha yoga, art classes, high teas and belly
dancing classes.
For all its
quietness, there was something about Ballan that appealed to me – some
intangible that ‘dwelt’ in the wide, tree-lined streets, the pretty old houses,
the quaint old public buildings and the smiling residents – the few I saw at
least. I might not choose to live there at this particular point in my life,
but I would certainly visit again.
Tuesday, November 6, 2018
A Town Called Katherine
Katherine is a
girl’s name. I know two people called Katherine, although one is called Kathy
and the other is Catherine (with a C), usually called Cathy, or sometimes, by
family members, Cate; so maybe they don’t count. And this story isn’t about
Katherine, Kathy, Catherine, Cathy or Cate, it’s about a town called Katherine
– a very hot, sunny place in Australia’s Northern Territory, 320km south-east
of Darwin.
Ahead of my
visit there in July as part of the 5,500km road trip my friend Leanne and I
undertook, from Melbourne to Darwin, I’d been told it was a great place to base
yourself for a few days.
“There’s plenty
to see and do around there,” an exceptionally fit and adventurous rock climber
told me.
I took a mental
note and booked two night’s accommodation on the strength of his recommendation,
hoping Leanne would be as unlikely as me, to want to go rock climbing.
So there we
were, on Monday July 9, 2018, three hours after leaving Daly Waters, driving
into Katherine on its wide approach, sweltering in 25-degrees. This was
mid-winter remember and with its lush vegetation everywhere, it was easy to see
why it’s often known as the place where the outback meets the tropics. The air
felt different, much more humid; and I knew I was going to feel sticky and
uncomfortable for the duration of my stay. I knew immediately there would be no
rock climbing – in any way, shape or form – and that I would be actively
seeking out the town’s best air conditioned retreats.
As it turned
out, there weren’t a lot of those about, so with sunscreen, dark glasses and an
old straw hat, I walked the streets of Katherine (it doesn’t take long), hoping
I wouldn’t meet anyone I knew. You get a feel for a town that way – at street
level, getting amongst it. You get to see how the locals go about the business
of daily life – in this case, with hundreds of black kites (birds), circling
overhead like starving vultures. The sky above the supermarket carpark in
particular, was spotted black with hovering birds of prey. They’d obviously
learned that human beings could be pigs when it came to throwing edible litter
about.
When I think
back to those two days, there isn’t much about the town itself that has lodged
itself firmly in my memory – just a general sense of relaxed tropical living
and the pleasure of being able to leave out bags unpacked for longer than 6
hours. I recall a few things strongly – the Aboriginal street art, the fish and
chip shop topped with a large shark and the large numbers of Aboriginal people
walking the streets, or sitting in friendly huddles on street corners or in the
town’s parks.
I’m intrigued by Aboriginal
culture – the ancientness of it and how after 40,000, 60,000 or 80,000 years in
Australia (depending on which research paper you read), the indigenous people
are still working hard to maintain strong ties to that culture. There’s no
doubting that that has been an uphill battle since the arrival of the first
Europeans here and I was saddened, not only in Katherine but also in Alice
Springs, to witness a distressing amount of overt racism from white locals.
When you remember that many indigenous people speak multiple languages and have
survived in this sometimes savage climate for thousands of years without the
aid of air conditioning, western medicine, vehicles or food retailers, I wonder
why so many white Australians consider themselves superior.
Blue-Winged Kookaburra |
Top of most
people’s To See list in this area – and ours too – was the Katherine Gorge in
Nitmiluk National Park.
Everyone tells you the place is swarming with
crocodiles – Leanne even got a text from her aunt in New York, warning us to
keep our hands and bags well within the boat –and while “swarming with” may be
an exaggeration, it is home to both freshwater and saltwater crocodiles; and when
encountering any killer creatures with big teeth, I always like to err on the
side of caution. I was more than willing to obey all the warning signs.
A convoy of
tourist boats set off up the river and if you kept looking up at the amazing
1,650 million-year-old sandstone cliffs, you could pretend the others weren’t
there. The tour explores the first three of the 13 gorges that run up the
river. With rocky escarpments separating each of the gorges (except when the
river is in flood), there’s a chance to disembark and walk to the next boat
along well-maintained walkways, and to see a section of Aboriginal cliff art
that has been estimated to be between 8,000 to 10,000 years old.
Nitmiluk means
‘Cicada Country’ for the Jawoyn people, who own the land in this area, and
Nitmiluk Tourism, which runs the boating operation (which also includes helicopters,
planes and a tourist lodge).
I learned a lot
that day. That freshwater crocodiles (freshies to the locals) are light green
and saltwater crocodiles (salties) are black; that freshies will swim away and
salties will attack; that 46 different fish species call the gorge home and
that the deepest part of the gorge is up to 30-metres and is home to the
Rainbow Serpent.
It rains a lot
in Katherine too apparently. A whole lot. And in 1998, the Katherine River came
right up to the bottom of the railway bridge (above). The whole town was under
3metres of water, 1,200 people were evacuated and the military were called in
to clean up after what was declared a state of emergency. That Australia Day
(January 26, 1998), 220.8mm of rain fell in 24 hours, the river rose by 20.4
metres and more than 1,000 square kilometres was inundated, as torrential
floodwaters hit the area, when the tail end of Cyclone Less fell in the
Katherine River headwaters. Standing on that railway bridge, looking down into
the deep ravine to the river below, it was a scary prospect to imagine.
Blue-Faced Honeyeater |
When I’m
travelling, getting photographs of the things that make an impact me –for all
kinds of reasons – is one of my key goals. Not only does it help retain
memories, photos also act as visual prompts for my writing and painting. So,
after travelling over 4,100km by the time we got to Katherine, and passing
thousands of green ants’ nests in the roadside foliage along the way and not getting
a photo of a single one, I was unreasonably excited that in Katherine I finally
committed these fascinating little insect creations to film.
Then there were
the pet wallabies that we held and fed (slices of fresh sweet potato) at an
Aboriginal art gallery; the Katherine Museum that still had its open signs out
but was apparently closed, with an officious lady owner who was determined that
we would not get in. There were walks to several other art galleries; a
leisurely amble up the main street; the memorable purchase of ‘the bird dress,’
and finally, our last hurray to Katherine - dinner at the local RSL- another
new Aussie experience for me that came with a giant’s serving of lamb shanks
and potato mash (and a menu filled with numerous schnitzel options).
Food for thought.
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