To reach the East by driving West

Various Christopher Columbus quotes came to mind today. It all started when someone asked me where we were headed. I answered, after thinking for a while, “Brisbane… but it will take some time”. There really is no other answer, as we don’t really have any other destination, just a journey. It was reinforced later in the day crossing the bridge north of McKinlay when we drove on roads farther from home than we had ever been before.

Day 5 saw us start deep in Waltzing Mathilda territory in Winton. I won’t bore you with the details of the history here, but Winton, Kynuna, Dagworth Station and the Combo Waterhole all compete for bragging rights over the story. While Winton is probably winning in terms of cashing in on the story, you still can’t buy bread there before 11am. I left the rest to soak up some history while I did some chores and found this out.

As we had little time to spare, we decided not to spend money in the new “Waltzing Mathilda Centre” in Winton, but instead chose the more authentic experience of visiting the Combo Waterhole on Dagworth Station just south of Kynuna. This is the site of both the waterhole where the striking shearer met his watery end rather than being taken by a strike-breaking trooper, and also where the story was soon after recounted to Banjo himself. Here we met up with a grey nomad woman travelling alone in a Coaster bus campervan. She turned out to be travelling to a gig as the evening entertainment in Kynuna. Here she would be singing the common Waltzing Mathilda, and the now largely forgotten “authentic” version. She turned out to be a “Richard Magoffin” disciple, and had not visited the waterhole, and so was doing some research in order to be a little more authentic. On our last visit to these parts, Richard Magoffin, a descendent of the original owners of Dagworth station, had a marquee setup as a museum attempting to correct some historical inaccuracies in the Waltzing Mathilda story, as well as to try to stop Winton from claiming it. With his passing a few years ago and with it the closing of his tent, and the opening of the new centre in Winton, the fight is now practically lost.

At Combo Waterhole we walked over stone “overshots”. These were constructed by labourers in the time of Cobb & Co for the dual purposes of providing safe all-weather creek crossings for the coaches, but also to dam the billabongs to provide more reliable water for stock in the days before Artesian bores. The waterhole itself is apparently little changed from those days.

Instead of having lunch here we went on to Kynuna in an attempt to solve our lack of bread, but with no more success. We went to the Blue Heeler Hotel, which is famous, as far as I can make out, for no other reason than that it is famous.

Here I made a note to myself that I could probably subsidise my next trip out here by carrying a piano tuner, as we were serenaded but a young woman who was not without talent, but hampered by a piano that was probably even making the bar-room blush.It was famous enough for a guy named Greg Norman to visit a couple of years ago, with his mate Mr Nuske.

Next stop was Mckinlay and another hotel with a more obvious, but dubious link with history. This was renamed “Walkabout Creek Hotel” and  used for the original Crocodile Dundee movie back in the 80s. I don’t think much has changed in the 15 years since we were there last time. Even my favourite cartoon from that time was still there.

Crossing the bridge out of McKinlay and we said an almost immediate goodbye to the vast plains around Longreach and into the rocky low hills of Cloncurry and Mt Isa.It also saw and end to the Brigalow and Gidgee Wattle country, and the arrival of Desert gums with the pure white trunks.   

Statistics for the day. 500km Winton to Mt Isa via Combo. Arrived Mt Isa 5:45, before sunset this time. Diesel in Winton a heartening 139.9. Managed to also buy lettuce and tomato which was a surprise.