Date: May 1st 2009

Westprint Friday Five May 1, 2009  

Included this week are:

·         Strzelecki Track

·         Books for Mother’s Day

·         Canning Stock Route Book by Eric and Ronele Gard  

Next week:

·         Information about Great Victoria Desert

 

Have you missed any copies? Use this link for archives

To view the range of products from Westprint use this link

www.westprint.com.au

Unless otherwise noted all special prices listed in the

Friday Five are valid for seven days.  

Friday Five 01.05.09

1. Australia Street . Whitehead Ann. Friday the thirteenth of February 1948 is Hannah Gordon's thirty-sixth birthday. Her daughter Allie turns sixteen on the very same day. What's more, it's a full moon. Hannah doesn't need Grandma Ade's warning that bad luck is coming to realise the odds are against them. Hannah Gordon has always wanted to be someone important, yet she's stuck in an inner-city back street, fighting to keep hold of her children, her home and her sense of self. Then a devastating accident sets off a chain of events that will rock the family foundations to the core and change lives forever. Full of wonderfully colourful characters and evocative period details, Australia Street is a vivid domestic drama about a turbulent year in the life of an unforgettable family of battlers. $42.45 including post. 

2. The Call of the High Country. Tony Parsons. A story of three generations of the MacLeod family battling to make a living in the rugged high country. $29.45 including post. 

3. The Waddi Tree. Kerry McGinnis. Two branches of the McAllister family lead very different lives on cattle stations in Central Australia . Rob, a stickler for correctness, manages a wealthy, company-owned property, while his easygoing brother Sandy struggles to support his wife and son on impoverished leasehold. When tragedy throws the families together, before ultimately driving them even further apart, it's Sandy 's young son Jim who suffers most. Left to rebuild his shattered world, he depends on the larger-than-life station characters and the comfort of horses. This is tough country, where personal heartache is kept in perspective by drought, fire and isolation. The times are just as unforgiving, and as the years pass, Jim discovers that he must pay for his father's mistakes as well as his own. Yet this harshly beautiful land is full of promise, a source of strength to Jim on his road from innocence to independence. $34.45 including post. 

4. Diamonds and Dust. Sheryl McCorry grew up in Arnhem Land carrying crocodiles to school for show and tell. When she was 18, Broome beckoned, ant is was there that – only hours after being railroaded into marriage by a fast-talking Yank – she locked eyes with Bob McCorry, a drover and buffalo shooter. When her marriage ended they began a romance that would last a lifetime. Sheryl soon learned that to survive in the outback a woman needed goals. Hers was to become the first woman in the Kimberley to run two million-acre cattle stations. But it was to come at an unimaginable cost. 292pp. $34.50 including post. 

5. Left for Dead. Ricky Megee. How I survived 71 days lost in the outback. No shoes, no vehicle, no food, no water. I'd always been one of those blokes who ragged on people who found themselves lost in the desert. Now I was one. It was harsh desolate country for a man all alone in bare feet. Nevertheless, I started to walk, and walk. The more I walked, I figured, the less distance I'd have to travel to get found. It was faulty logic, but it was the best I could come up with. Ricky was abducted on the Buntine highway, and then left for dead. S/Cover 260 pages. $42.45

Postage Rates. These items will usually not be found on our website. Orders will be supplied on a ‘first come, first serve’ basis. Postage rates are $9.50 for one book, $12.50 for two books, $14.00 for 3 or more books. Free post applies to orders of more than $150.00. Postage rates apply to Australia only. Airmail postage rates apply to overseas orders.

An important message.

Please note that the opinions and articles included in the Friday Five are not necessarily those of the Westprint mob. Nor do we endorse products (other than our own) listed in contributed articles.

Friday Forum

Jo’s forum comments in green.  

Canning Stock Route Book

·         We received a phone call from Eric Gard this morning. The Canning Stock Route book has been reprinted and is on its way to Westprint (expecting stock to arrive by the end of next week). This is the best book available about travelling the Canning Stock Route and has been out of print for some time. Please note that this is a reprint of their 3^rd edition Canning Stock Route book, not a new edition. Eric is working on the 4^th edition but several issues relating to access need to be finalised before printing can go ahead. This is proving to be a lengthy process. More details on how to order your copy of the Canning Stock Route in next week’s Friday Five (or when copies arrive).

 

Other products relating to the Canning Stock Route

Canning Stock Route - Map by Westprint

Canning Stock Route - DVD

Spinifex and Sand - Book

The Beckoning West - Book

To The Great Gulf - Book

And If Her Droughts are Bitter - Book

Last of the Nomads - Book

Journal of the Calvert Expedition - Book

In the Hands of Providence - Book

The Old Strzelecki Track

From the Westprint archives. © John Deckert

The Strzelecki Track is one of a small group of Australia 's best known stock routes. Only the Birdsville Track and the Canning Stock Route may be more widely known. Unfortunately, the original Strzelecki Track that ran along Strzelecki Creek could be destined for obscurity as it becomes less and less used by the general public. Since the establishment of the Moomba oil and gas field a new section of road has been built north of Monte Collina Bore and is not where the old stock route originally ran.

The Strzelecki Track, which follows Strzelecki Creek, is one of the oldest of the outback stock routes and the area has an important European history. Charles Sturt named Strzelecki Creek in 1845 as he explored the northern section to its junction with Cooper Creek . Sturt was intending to explore a huge part of Central Australia but was repelled a few months later by the vast sand-hills of what is now known as the Simpson Desert , North West of Birdsville.

Sturt's information about Strzelecki Creek was most useful to A C Gregory who, ten years later, was searching for traces of Leichhardt, the polish explorer who had disappeared while trying to cross Australia from east to west. Gregory followed Strzelecki Creek southwards to Lake Blanche , establishing a route from Cooper Creek to the Flinders Ranges and Adelaide . During this trip he also dispelled the myth of the horseshoe lake that was thought to block the way for all travel north of the Flinders Ranges .

In 1861 Burke, Wills and King tried using Gregory's route along Strzelecki Creek in an attempt to reach civilisation after their journey to the Gulf of Carpentaria . Their weakened condition and lack of pack animals forced them to return to Cooper Creek where Burke and Wills died some time later. King, befriended by Aborigines and the only survivor from the party of four who left for the Gulf almost six months earlier, was eventually found in the dry bed of Cooper Creek by Alfred Howitt.

Perhaps the most infamous explorer to use the Strzelecki Track was Harry Redford, the man who established the track as a stock route. Redford had spent most of his life in the outback and was an accomplished bushman, drover and station hand. In 1869 he was living on a property near Bowen Downs in south western Queensland . Redford was also experienced in 'lifting' or 'duffing' cattle. He knew that Bowen Downs, a relatively new property, was so large that any cattle stolen from its remote areas would not be missed for months.

Redford took small mobs of cattle and moved them to his property further south. Two accomplices travelled north from Adelaide along Strzelecki Creek to join him and it is most likely that their knowledge of the abundance of feed and water from the heavy summer rains of 1870 persuaded Redford to attempt to sell his cattle in Adelaide .

Redford 's two friends, William Rooke and George Dewdney were also competent stockmen who knew the stock routes in north eastern South Australia . The oft-quoted myth that Redford plunged into the unknown relying on his infallible natural bush instincts is quite false. His cattle were not even the first stock to be driven along Strzelecki Creek. Sometime earlier, John Conrick of Nappa Merrie had overlanded a mob of horses from Adelaide to his property on the Cooper, a feat of which Redford would have known.

Redford was successful in driving the stolen mob of about 1000 cattle along the full length of Strzelecki Creek and then on to Blanchewater station where they were sold. The dispersal of the cattle into the Adelaide saleyards, the tracking of the stock by men from Bowen Downs, Redford's arrest, trial and subsequent release are all well recorded facts of Australian history extensively researched by Patrick McCarthy in his books 'The Man And The Myth' and 'The Man Who Was Starlight'.

The use of Strzelecki Creek for a stock route developed during the 1880's after settlement and stocking of land along the Cooper. Pioneers like John Conrick on Nappa Merrie, James McLeod on Callamurra, and Bostock & Ware on Coongie were all active station owners with stock to be delivered to Adelaide . By 1885 many of the small runs had been consolidated into Innamincka Station by Sidney Kidman, the Cattle King. Other stations to the north like Cordillo, Haddon, Cadelga and Arrabury also ran large numbers of stock whose only access or exit route was along the Strzelecki Track. A series of wells and dams were sunk at strategic intervals to supply permanent water for stock. However, constant use denuded the vegetation causing erosion which constantly filled the wells with sand. Waterholes were unreliable and the only permanent water was a bore that was drilled on Monte Collina near the edge of the Cobbler Desert .  

During periods of prolonged drought the stock route waters evaporated effectively imprisoning large herds of stock that in most cases ultimately perished. On Innamincka Station alone at least three herds of 15,000 head of cattle were completely wiped out by drought during the period prior to 1945. During these droughts it was common for mobs en-route along the Strzelecki Track to perish from thirst as waterholes dried and drovers desperately tried to force cattle from one useless puddle to another. Much notoriety has been given to the Birdsville Track but it is believed that the Strzelecki Track was much more difficult. Some drovers would not work on the Strzelecki due to the unreliability of water and the danger to both man and beast.

The Strzelecki was also an important supply route for stations on the lower Cooper. 'Afghans' and camel teams were brought from their homelands in Pakistan , Afghanistan and the Punjab for exploration purposes but it was quickly found that these hardy man and their remarkable beasts were eminently suited to the task of transporting supplies and produce across the vast waterless expanse of inland Australia . Camels could travel long distances between water and also carry up to 500 kilograms each of water and supplies. Thousands of camels became the transport service to most of the outlying areas of outback Australia .

Hundreds of camels walked from railheads at Lyndhurst , Farina and Marree to supply stations along the Birdsville and Strzelecki Tracks. On the return journey each camel would be laden with two bales of wool from the sheep runs of Cordillo Downs, Arrabury and Nappa Merrie.

The importance of the Strzelecki began to decline about World War Two as stock were pushed along safer routes, supplies came by road from south western Queensland and aircraft became widely used for mail and supplies. The Strzelecki Track was not suited to conventional vehicles mainly due to the deep sand of the Cobbler Desert .

For almost 20 years the Strzelecki lay idle until the push for outback tourism saw a renewal of use in the 1970s. The construction of a new road on a completely new alignment designed to serve the mining needs of Moomba and Jackson may again cause history to be repeated as the Strzelecki Track is likely to once again lie idle. However, it may still be possible to travel most of the old stock route between Monte Collina and Innamincka. It is a very remote area but still within easy reach of the eastern states. It has several entrances and exits to the main road giving it a high degree of safety. It can be travelled in three or four days making it suitable for two week holiday periods and it has one of the oldest and richest histories of all the major stock routes in Australia . The Old Strzelecki Track could become one of Australia 's most popular four-wheel-drive routes.  

NB: This story was written several years ago when the South Australian Department of Environment and Heritage had no objection to the use of the track within the Strzelecki Regional Reserve. At that time it was possible to drive through the reserve to the boundary of Merty Merty Station. However, it was then necessary to by-pass Merty Merty land and enter the old track again near Merty Merty Homestead to follow the original track to Innamincka. Permission must be obtained before entering pastoral land or driving on station tracks.  

Condamine Bells 

·         In response to a reader's inquiry about Condamine Bells on Westprint Friday Five, My wife and I have recently published Australia 's only known comprehensive guide. 'Bells of the Australian Bush' is a full colour hard cover edition and is available from us and good bookshops. More info about the book, bells and Aussie history can be found at www.cowbells.com.au

Did you know this year is Queensland 's 150th as a state and the Condamine bell is a state icon? Paul Knie. books@jinglestix.com.au

Bull Ant Stings

·       Reading about the bull ant problems if you carry a can of cool spray works an absolute treat on that any burns if you spray it on a bandage pad and on jammed finger in a car door as we have had on atrip healed really quick not mine but turned my stomach when I saw it and works really well on a ant bite (sting) takes the pain out straight away found that out at the high country again not me thankfully quite painful. Anyway hope it might help one of your readers at some stage well worth keeping a can in your emergency pack. Mark

I had not heard of cool spray, but a quick check on the internet found that it is a first aid spray, available for about $15.00.

Friday Funnies

Q. What is the difference between a pigeon and a merchant banker?

A. A pigeon can still put a deposit on a Ferrari.  

A young boy was looking through the family album and asked his mother: "Who's this guy on the beach with you with all the muscles and curly hair?" "That's your father." "Then who's that old bald-headed fat man who lives with us now?"  

GREAT TRUTHS THAT LITTLE CHILDREN HAVE LEARNED:

1) No matter how hard you try, you can't baptise cats.

2) When your Mum is mad at your Dad, don't let her brush your hair.

3) If your sister hits you, don't hit her back. They always catch the second person.

4) Never ask your 3-year old brother to hold a tomato.

5) You can't trust dogs to watch your food.

6) Don't sneeze when someone is cutting your hair.

7) You can't hide a piece of broccoli in a glass of milk.

 

GREAT TRUTHS THAT ADULTS HAVE LEARNED:

1) Raising teenagers is like nailing jelly to a tree.

2) Wrinkles don't hurt.

3) Families are like fudge...mostly sweet, with a few nuts.

4) Today's mighty oak is just yesterday's nut that held its ground.

5) Laughing is good exercise. It's like jogging on the inside.

6) Middle age is when you choose your cereal for the fibre, not the toy.  

To all of our Faithful Friday Five readers.

Please be aware that there are numerous reasons why your email address may be deleted from our system. One of the main difficulties is that many spam companies also use the program we use for publishing and this means the Friday Five may be rejected as spam. If you do not regularly continue to get the Friday Five please check with Graeme at info@westprint.com.au

New email addresses are constantly and automatically being added to our list. If you do not wish to be part of our Friday Five group then please unsubscribe from the link at the bottom of this newsletter. This takes effect immediately. Westprint apologises for any inconvenience.

 

Cheers for now,

Jo

 

 

 

 

The link below is to UNSUBSCRIBE from this Newsletter only.