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POSTED: 26 JUNE 2010
A sweet sojourn in Queensland’s Outback
By Adrienne Costin*
It’s mid-May and the tourist season is about to begin in earnest. Already, swags of travellers are beginning to arrive in the central-western Queensland town of Longreach, population 3000, and home to the popular Australian Stockman’s Hall of Fame and Qantas Founders Museum.
Our group of four arrives in town early afternoon on the Qantaslink flight from Brisbane via Barcaldine to a perfect Outback autumn day — a canvas of blue sky and clumps of trees dotting the horizon of the vast open spaces surrounding the town. We don’t have the luxury of time enjoyed by many of these travellers, but were still determined to make the most of our two day visit.
The impossibly wide main street is busy but we still find a car park right outside our first stop, the Station Store. Here visitors find a stylish collection of Outback-themed items and the Changing Station Café where we meet the first of the family members involved in this vibrant business. Abigail Kinnon — a slip of a 17-year-old with expert barista skills — is doing her best to put Longreach, and the café, on the map.
Abigail is the oldest child and only daughter of Richard and Marisse Kinnon, enterprising landowners who turned to tourism when drought made it impossible to live off the land. Kinnon and Co is still growing but has already been so successful that they have been able to keep their properties. While we enjoy a tasty afternoon tea, we meet Richard who, along with youngest son Lane, is hitching up the horses for our evening adventure — ‘Clancy’s on the Thomson’.
The campout is the diamond in Kinnon and Co’s collection of Outback adventures. They also offer a three-hour ‘Gallop thru the Scrub’, a 45-minute Royal Mail Gallop, and the new Starlight Spectacular one-hour show.
“We wanted it to be something really special. You’ll see what I mean when you come along tonight,” says Richard.
“There need to be 10 to 14 people for the experience to be at its best,” he adds as he settles us into the replica Cobb & Co coach — some on the back seat on top of the coach, another in the front with him and the horses, and the remainder inside. Rusty, the red cattledog, keen not to miss any of the action, jumped on to the little running board at the back.
An hour later we reach our destination at the hotel on the banks of the Thomson River, where we meet Marisse and Lane’s older brother Jeremy. The boys are home-schooled by their mother so they can be part of the daily activities of Kinnon and Co.
Nature provided the walls and the ceiling of our home for the night — just the bush around us, and the sky above. Our beds are swags on stretchers set out in formations of four, the dining arrangements bench tables above which hang gum leaves and hurricane lamps, the bathroom amenities a portaloo, bowl and a pitcher of water, fresh, fluffy towels and a mirror hanging from a branch. Slingback canvas chairs surround the smoking camp fire and another set sits on the edge of the river, ready for us to settle back and watch the sunset.
Ahead is a night of laughter and bush poetry, fishing in the river as the sun goes down, delicious food cooked on the open fire, a perfect star-studded sky and a snug sleep in stylish swags complete with doonahs. It was as Richard promised — very special!
He tells us the next morning that Clancy (of the Overflow) generally rides out with the coach but that the actor had been injured and couldn’t join the first campout of the year.
The campout completed, we head to the Australian Stockman’s Hall of Fame to see the new Outback Stockman’s Show. Our introduction to the host, Luke Thomas, comes when we found him literally lying on the back of his unbridled, unsaddled horse at the entrance to the hall. An amazing sight, but once you’ve seen his show, watched that same horse collect and return a fallen hat, and learned his training secrets, then all is explained.
The other stars of the shows are six huge bullocks.
“These were the original semi-trailers,” explains Luke as he settles heavy wooden yokes across their backs, linking them up with huge chains, all the while offering a running commentary interspersed with bush poetry. All set up, Luke then gets the team to drag a huge telephone pole-sized log in from the paddock and up onto the back of a cart. It’s an amazing display of man and beast working together, and an indication of their strength.
Speaking to Luke — a former horse breaker and drover — after the show as he poses for photographs with his beloved bullocks, it’s hard not to comment on his devotion to the giant beasts.
“How could you not love them. There are so very few teams left in Australia now and they are just amazing animals,” he says as he leans over to plant a kiss on a whiskery, wet nose.
Before we fly out we also fit in a visit to the Qantas Founders Museum, a must if you are to truly understand Australia’s aviation history. Located at the airport, the ultra-modern museum offers an intriguing collection of memorabilia of Australia’s air history.
Also on the site is the original Qantas hangar and three aircraft that played major roles in Qantas’s history: Qantas Empire Airways DC-3 Aircraft;a fully restored Boeing 707, the first passenger jet registered in Australia and Qantas’s first jet aircraft; and, dwarfing them all, an ex-Qantas 747-200 Jumbo.
The museum is also preparing to welcome its latest acquisition, a Catalina, the last flying boat operated by Qantas. The aircraft is currently in Spain and is expected to arrive at the museum shortly.
All too soon we had boarded the plane to return to our homes, taking with us memories of a short and very sweet Outback escape.
*Adrienne Costin was seconded by Tourism Queensland to write this article.
GETTING THERE
Qantas flies daily to Longreach from Brisbane. www.qantas.com.au
Rex Airlines flies between Townsville and Longreach on Tuesdays and Thursdays. www.rex.com.au
The QR Spirit of the Outback train runs twice-weekly services from Brisbane. www.traveltrain.com.au
ON THE GROUND
Clancy’s Campout — refer to www.longreachtravelcentre.com.au for departure dates. Bookings are essential. Adults $198, children (nine years and over) $99.
Australian Stockman’s Hall of Fame — Open daily 9am-5pm except Christmas Day. www.outbackheritage.com.au
Qantas Founders Museum — Open daily 9am-5pm except Christmas Day. www.qfom.com.au
For more information on the Queensland Outback visit www.queenslandholidays.com.au