The latest from the expeditioners on the track

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22 Sept Darling River

27 Sept Broken Hill

Media Coverage along the track

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Barrier Daily Truth - Broken Hill

The Northern Times - Kerang

Longreach Leader

Burke and Wills story to appear in The Age

The Age


Dushka Silichhi: Insight

EXPLORERS STILL LIVE ALONG TRACK

Although 150 years may seem like a long time to most readers it is just the blink of an eyelid out here on the 1860 Burke and Wills track where many local residents are still talking about their links with the great explorers.

It seems every town in Victoria or southern New South Wales has a local character with connections to the mythical but ill-fated anti-heroes who passed this way heading for the Gulf of Carpentaria trying to be first to cross the continent.

Inspired by the Gillard government’s $9. 9 billion offer to regional Australia we are giving a badly needed voice to the outback in the spirit of the Independents who helped form the new government in return for help for the bush. We are retracing Burke’s journey all the way from Melbourne to the Gulf for an environmental audit on film using the detailed journal of Wills to report on changes and challenges specifically for the federal environmental minister Tony Burke’s “Caring For Our Country” program, to which we have applied for financial assistance to help offset the costs of our self-funded mission.

But everywhere we go locals flock to our two colourfully decorated Pajeros (standing in for camels) and our Get Around Campers (standing in for horse-drawn wagons) with stories some taller than others. It actually started in Melbourne where the book keeper at the Melbourne Club claimed Burke set off on the expedition without paying his drinking bills but conceding those responsible did cough up although many decades later. There are similar clams in Essendon Burke’s first camp where the local historical society claims he left his shaving mirror behind hanging from a tree (now in their museum). Locals in Lancefield proudly pointed out the large rock memorial beside the road but said Burke ‘did a runner’ from the local butcher after getting as much meat as he could carry for his hungry explorers. The angry butcher proved faster than the great caravan of 24 camels, 23 horses, 19 men and a long string of wagons and got his money.

Further up the track near the fabled crater painted by Burke’s artist Ludwig Becker, Paul Dettmann of Baynton, near Mia Mia appeared out of nowhere s pointed to the crater and claimed, “My great great grandfather fell in with Burke’s party, showed them this local crater and walked with them from here up towards the New South Wales border, planning to walk to the Gulf”. Says Dettmann, “But even before they reached the border he worked out that Burke was not a qualified bushman, so he dropped out of the party”.

It was just as well because the incompetent Burke lost seven brave explorers who died unnecessarily on that badly planned and executed race to the Gulf, including himself. Yet according to local farmer Paul Haw of Boort, the trip north in 1860 should not have been too difficult as Burke actually followed the Aboriginal tracks and had he listened would have been guided by Aboriginals all the way to the Gulf. “But he was not the sort of bloke who listened to locals let alone to Aborigines” said Haw.

At Mt. Hope station near Boort, where Ludwig Becker painted Pyramid Hill local grazier Peter Barker took me into the darkened bedroom of the great leader and in hushed tones pointed to the old brass bed in which the slumbering Burke had snored, the blind that had not been raised since for fear of waking his sleeping ghost, and the bullet holes in a window from shots fired by his angry men fighting over rum rations which Barker said may have explained why Burke left Mt. Hope in a hurry.

Nevertheless any connection with the ill-starred Burke seems worth boasting about and Ron Duryea a shearer of Balranald rode up on his bike at a great speed to our parked convoy and blurted out, “My great great grandmother cooked for Burke here at the old Wharf Hotel, down by the Darling River – come and I’ll show you where” he said leading us off on his trusty two wheeled steed.

Right or wrong – and Buke stories are a bit like Ned Kelly’s suit of armour as everyone seems to have an original one – Duryea showed us the old hotel site, described the menu on offer, Burke’s culinary preferences and the spot where – to save weight Burke had auctioned such vital supplies as lime juice and fish hooks; the lack of which would claim lives including his own.

Just past Turlee Station heading north where locals claimed Burke had dumped one of his wagons which had disappeared in the Mallee scrub, Patty Byrnes at Wamberra Station revealed how her great great grandmother had fed the hungry Burke cooking on Arumpo Station which her family owned in 1860 . Her generous great great grandfather also carted some of Burke’s excess baggage up to Menindee to hep the overloaded explorer whose vision splendid had inspired him to leave Melbourne with a piano and oak dining room table.

At the tiny hamlet of Pooncarie local publican Trevor Bigg who said Burke had actually paid his drinking bills at the pub showed us the old wharf site by the Darling River where Burke’s entourage had camped.

But it was in Menindee – the last great base camp in 1860 - that Burke burst back into life because Tom Paine’s hotel is still there – more or less. It has had the odd fire like most bush pubs but owner Wayne “Bungy” Williams showed us Burke’s bed room “where he actually slept for the last time in a bed before he died in the desert” and also a disparaging convict arrow he had carved in a moment of protest on a beam. Burke is everywhere in Menindee, the riverside camp site is still there, the gum trees on the river bank which Ludwig Becker had painted and which Ballarat artist and Becker expert Leslie Sprague had driven up especially to photograph proving the trees are still there from Becker’s painting with. There is the grave of the Moslem cameleer from Burke’s party Dost Mahomet’s who settled in Menindee then died there and Ah Chung’s bakery where Mahomet had worked.

But the last word – and perhaps the most accurate now we were closer to the front line - really went to Noeline Ratcliff whose ancestors have owned the pub, since Burke was still known in the town. Asked what she thought of the great explorer she said “Do you want the truth ? I think he was an idiot. Anybody who sets off north from the last outpost of civilization into the scorching desert in the summer would have to be a total idiot . No wonder he died a terrible death out there”.

But now it was time for us to go north where we believe the stories will become even taller as we enter the deserts where visitors can only expect to encounter regular doses of bulldust.
Jonathan King is leading the 150th anniversary Burke & Wills Environmental Expedition, supported by The Age.

1st despatch from the expeditioners

4 September 2010

Instead of camels the 2010 Burke and Wills Environmental Expedition is using two Mitsubishi Pajeros to travel from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the original 1860 exploring party which was the first to cross the continent of Australia.

“Having used the Pajero to cross Australia myself on family trips from the nineteen eighties I know they are reliable”, Dr. Jonathan King, the expedition leader told journalists at the 20 August departure from Melbourne’s Royal Park 150 years to the day that Burke and Wills left with their camels and from the same spot.

“As a father of four young children I drove our trusty “Pajo” as the kids called it from Melbourne to Uluru and then right up to Kakadu and deep into Aboriginal territory” said Dr. King “and some days we drove 1000 kilometres a day on back roads without seeing another car – so we had to have faith in the vehicle”.

Dr. King said he even allowed his children to learn to drive on the remote dirt tracks where on some days they drove for hours at a time perched up on pillows as they were so young. “That is why our kids are such good drivers today, they learnt in the open spaces behind the wheel of a rugged Pajero” he said.

Speaking at the 20 August departure, expedition patron Jack Thompson said the environmental expedition being conducted with the aid of the Pajeros was “a timely audit of the countryside which will enable us to see just how much the bush has altered since Burke and Wills reported on the outback 150 years earlier”. Thompson, who played the role of Burke in the 1985 classic film “Burke and Wills,” said Wills had written a very descriptive diary which Dr. King and his team would use as a basis for comparison. “The bush needs friends” Thompson said, “as we have used it pretty hard in the last 150 years and we have to make sure we can use it productively for another 150 years”.

The famous actor also said there were many environmental issues to be examined along the 1860 track including feral pests like rabbits, foxes, pigs, goats, camels and cane toads all causing damage to the soil. It was time, he said, to repair the outback along the track of Burke and Wills and replant trees and vegetation to keep the topsoil intact so that it does not blow dust storms onto Sydney like it did in September 2009.

Dr. King’s honorary team of four environmentalists – the same number as Burke’s - includes himself as the Director, Documentary Film Presenter and journalist ; and also his deputy Steve Broomhall, the Outback Operations Manager and Stills Photographer who was a stockman on the legendary Brunette Downs cattle station; Michael Dillon, the world renowned film maker who is Director of the Documentary Film being produced for Channel 7 and who has filmed on Mt. Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary, the first man to climb this mountain – the highest in the world; and Ben Beeton, the Expedition’s Artist in Residence who has served on many outback projects and who will be recording the environment through which they pass.

They have also named their two Pajeros after Burke’s horse “Billy” and Burke’s camel “Raja” and painted these names on the front of the vehicles. They also fitted two trailers to the Pajeros courtesy of Get Around Campers of Gordon, Victoria to carry their film equipment, tents, sleeping bags, camping gear and supplies. Fully outfitted, and with supplies of food stashed in the two huge 60 litre Engel fridges, fuel and water, these modern adventurers can travel in the Outback for long periods of time in relative comfort. The original expedition was plagued by shortages of food and water and moved through the landscape under extraordinarily arduous conditions. Telstra has provided the modern expedition with satellite phones and are paying for the data transmission in case they need to make or receive calls outback.

After leaving Melbourne in their two Pajeros, the four adventurers started following Burke’s route as faithfully as possible interviewing old timers along the track whose ancestors had met Burke and Wills or who had inherited their stories. They drove to Moonee Ponds, where they parked the Pajeros for the first night stop over camping nearby with Victorian Operations Manager Christine Lasowski and husband Henry and where they spent time interviewing local environmentalists fighting to preserve local creeks and MP Kelvin Thompson, Member for Wills .

They then followed the route through driving rain with the Pajeros performing well despite their heavy load to different places Burke visited or stopped at including in order Bulla, Clarkefield, Lancefield and Mia Mia where they stayed with Heather and Andrew Paterson at the Burke & Wills Winery right on the original Burke and Wills track. The intrepid adventurers enjoyed conversation and splendid glasses of Dig Tree and Burke & Wills wines deep into the night. They also visited the memorial to John Dighton the farmer who became the first Australia to fly a powered plane in the early nineteen hundreds. The people of Mia Mia also put on a 150th anniversary festival to greet the modern expeditioners with Land Care displays explaining how the locals were caring for the land today. They also visited the Mia Mia Art Exhibition celebrating the 150th anniversary of Burke and Wills where Jonathan interviewed the artist and TV presenter Peter Russell-Clark and bought a painting of the two 1860 explorers he had done called “Ghost Riders in the Sky”.

After Mia Mia the Pajeros pulled the smart purpose-built trailers past Bendigo where they interviewed local experts on film about conserving the water in the rivers. Pressing onwards to Boort, they visited Mt. Hope Station where Burke had stayed and also Pyramid Hill which Burke’s artist Ludwig Becker had climbed and from where he painted a view of Mt. Hope.

The first of the resident environmentalists then visited their campsite - Alfred Hupermann, a specialist on the rising salt levels and Doug Small a specialist on environmental issues in that part of Victoria. They explained in great depth the impact settlement had had on the environment over the last 150 years and what local farmers were doing to improve their land and ensure production for future generations.

The famous “Fish Lady” Fern Hames then joined the Pajeros as the next environmental specialist. She spoke about the need to study riverine ecology and the interactive part played by various species including native fish. Such studies will help protect and build up the native fish populations in rivers like the Loddon which the expedition visited. Fern displayed models of Murray Cod and Silver Perch and explained the strategies that were being developed to protect these species against introduced species like European carp

The expeditioners then interviewed old Laurie Martin who confirmed how difficult it was to catch fish in the Loddon compared to the old days when he would catch more than sixty a day “just sitting by the bank of the river”. Another local Ollie Jane confirmed the decline in native fish stock and blamed this on dams, reservoirs and pollution. He went on to explain how the rivers were being repaired for future generations.

Moving on to Swan Hill in the tracks of the earlier explorers Dr Jonathan King interviewed local Aboriginal elder Ivy Bell whose tribal people were living on the track in 1860. She reflected on the enormous cultural and social changes that occurred to the detriment of her people after early pioneers swept into the country in the wake of early exploration. She pointed out that over the ensuing years much of indigenous culture had disappeared. Although she blamed ignorance and racism Ivy said things had improved in recent years and she had high hopes for future generations of Aborigines who would not suffer from the same discrimination she had suffered from.

Then it was time for the Pajeros to pull the Get Around Campers trailers over the mighty Murray River and into New South Wales. That proved a lot easier than ferrying across the thirty or forty camels, horses and heavy wagons and equipment that Burke and his team struggled with at the same spot 150 years earlier.

Although Jonathan suggested they try and drive the Pajeros across the water – just as he had done with his children back in the nineteen eighties in the outback when crossing shallow rivers – he was persuaded to use the interstate bridge.

Once in NSW the expedition drove the Pajeros on to smaller bushy tracks where Burke and Wills had actually travelled inland west from Balranald. While in Balranald they met Ron Dueyea a shearer whose great grandmother had cooked the meals for Burke and Wills when they stopped in Balranald. As Dr. King remarked “It just shows how close our history is when a .local comes up to you in the street and explains their family connection with explorers from 150 years ago!”

Striking out across the Mallee and driving through Mulga Scrub country the Pajeros took to the gravel roads as smoothly as if they were on bitumen despite the heavier weight on the towbars exerted by the camper trailers. “It just goes to show” Jonathan said “I was right to select Pajeros for this challenging expedition. Their suspension is terrific, and being able to move from H2 to H4 at speed makes for stable and safe driving in sand and gravel”.

Whilst staying at “Turlee”, a 145,000 acre sheep station, they interviewed owner Des Wakefield. Speaking on camera for the documentary of the expedition Des said, “Well, like most graziers we’ve learnt to live with the weather. These days they call it climate change. But for 37 years we’ve been coping with fluctuating weather patterns by adjusting our stock numbers to the seasons. Our stocking strategies have always been closely tied to climate and with well-planned stocking and supplementary feeding strategies we’ve found we can run a good business.”

Driving over to Wamberra the expedition interviewed on film the most visionary pastoralist they had met to date – Patti Byrnes. Patti’s great grandmother had also cooked for Burke and Wills when they camped on her ancestor’s property Arumpo Station and her great grand father had carted supplies for Burke up to Menindee. She explained how she was saving native vegetation and protecting native species like the Mallee Fowl by building large reserves on her land and reducing stock levels to give the land a chance to recover from past levels of over-stocking. Working with indigenous people she has built fences around their reserves to protect the Mallee Fowl and native trees, shrubs and bushes – the names of all of which she knew off by heart.

Hearing that heavy rains were forecast the expeditioners then decided to follow local advice and drive a couple of hundred kilometres through the Belah and Mulga trees to Mungo National Park and then on to Pooncarie which was the first inland village on bitumen. Although the Pajeros and their trailers would have got through despite the forecast rain the party decided to play it safe and not get caught on these sticky roads. Because four-wheel drivers and heavy vehicles can cause enormous damage to these clay-based roads during and after heavy rain, there was also the possibility of road closures being enforced to prevent damage.

It does pay to get local advice because no sooner had the Pajeros reached the bitumen at Pooncarie than the skies opened up and it rained steadily all night as the happy campers lay snugly in their sleeping bags inside the Get Around, safely in Pooncarie.

Now after more than one inch of rain the expedition members are waiting for the rain to stop and then – even though they have two trusty Pajeros which can cope with muddy roads and would undoubtedly get through – they will resume their trek up to Menindee, where Burke and Wills established their first major base camp after leaving Melbourne.

It may take days for the rains to stop and then they have to wait at least two more days for the gravel roads to dry out before they set off deeper into the outback again but they are more than happy to wait in the sure knowledge that come what may once the roads have been declared open by the authorities they will get though to Menindee and then resume their drive to the Gulf of Carpentaria. As deputy director and Outback Operations Manager Steve Broomhall said “We may have to set off along wet roads eventually but at least our Pajeros will not get bogged like Burke and Wills camels did and we wont have to abandon them like the explorers had to do with one of their camels because they could not get the camel out of the bog. From my experience of years in the bush – come hell or high water I know our Pajos will make it for sure”.

Update from the track - Menindee

8 September 2010
Report from Minindee.

Although it may seem like a long time ago, Melbourne’s 1860 Burke and Wills expedition is still being talked about along their track especially where this colourful and controversial circus stopped at little towns or properties where little else seems to have happened since.

Take Ron Duryea, a shearer of Balranald for example. Riding up to our colourfully decorated Pajeros on his bicycle stopping at our Burke and Wills signage he blurted out, “My great great grandmother Elsie, was cook at the Wharf Hotel on the river and cooked for Burke when he stopped on his way to the Gulf – and that’s fair dinkum, come, I’ll show you where the pub was”.

Ron Duryea

Right or wrong – and like Ned Kelly’s suit of armour there are many Burke and Wills stories out here on the track – Ron showed us the hotel remains, described the menu on offer and Burkes culinary preferences, all handed down orally Aboriginal style through generations. Hard to document admittedly, but what he lacked in evidence he made up for with passion. For Ron this was clearly the biggest event in the history of the Duryea family and he was glad we stopped to hear the news.

The Wharf at Balranald and hotel where Burke wined and dined in 1860 a big event for the town still recalled to this day by descendants like Ron Duryea

Then there was Patty Byrnes a little further north whose great great grandmother hosted Burke on her family’s original property ‘Arumpo’, helped him set up camp and also cooked a meal before the hapless Burke and his entourage moved on. Not only that, Patty’s great great grandfather also transported some of Burke’s baggage from that overweight entourage to Menindee.

Mind you the visionary Byrnes is an exception because so much has actually happened on her nearby property Wamberra which she now owns, in the last 150 years. For a start she and her husband Ned have de-stocked dramatically from the unsustainable old days when settlers following Burke in the late nineteenth century cleared as much land as they could, put as many sheep into their paddocks as possible then when the soil wore out added fertilizer to maximize returns.

“For some years now we have been regenerating native vegetation by creating stock-free reserves protected by fences erected with indigenous support and the land has responded beautifully returning to its original pristine condition” she said showing us around her showcase property. Byrnes also shelters threatened species including more than 100 Mallee Fowls building mounds in the peace and quiet of her reserves. Although pioneering this sustainable strategy successfully she wants help from the government to combat increasingly large herds of feral goats which were certainly not there when Burke and Wills came through in 1860.

Of course there have been many other changes since Burke and Wills came along this track including more feral pests - rabbits, foxes, pigs, camels (some may have escaped from Burke’s herd) and cane toads – not to mention a host of feral weeds taking over the wide brown land.

Victoria’s Native Fish Strategy Co-ordinator, Fern Hames who visited our camp near Kerang for Department of Sustainability and Environment claimed 90% of fish had disappeared from the rivers since Burke and Wills passed by thanks to dams, weirs, tree clearing and introduced species like Carp.

Visiting environmental consultant Alfred Hupermann blamed salination for declining productivity around Boort but Ngyampaa elder Beryl Carmichael at Menindee blamed mines for damaging land along the Darling River. “It’s terrible what miners have done to our sacred sites digging up traditional land, putting roads everywhere and disturbing the spirits of our ancestors.” Says Carmichael, “ Something has to be done to stop the destruction of our environment”.

And that is why we are mounting this investigative expedition. Patron Jack Thompson says it is “a timely audit of the countryside to see how much the bush has suffered since Burke and Wills described the outback 150 years earlier and how we can repair it”. Thompson who played the role of Burke in the 1985 classic film “Burke and Wills” said Wills wrote a very descriptive diary which can be used as a basis for comparison. “The bush needs friends” said Thompson a former stockman “as we have used it pretty hard in the last 150 years and we have to make sure we can use it productively for another 150 years. It’s time, to replant trees and vegetation to keep the topsoil intact to stop dust storms hitting Sydney like September 2009.”

Our honorary team of four environmentalists – the same number as Burke’s - includes Steve Broomhall, outback operations manager, former stockman on Brunette Downs; Michael Dillon, documentary cameraman for Channel 7 who filmed on Mt. Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary and Ben Beeton Artist in Residence who with Dillon is reporting to Arts Victoria’s Culture Victoria website for schools: http://www.cv.vic.gov.au/

Having converted our Get Around Campers to computerized film and photographic studios, editing suits, editorial offices we are producing reports comparing today’s environment with 1860, interviewing stakeholders to give the outback a timely voice that will help guide the expenditure of the $9.9 billion allocated by the Gillard government for regional Australia.

Jonathan King

Jonathan and Jack on 60 minutes

http://sixtyminutes.ninemsn.com.au/webchats/7956728/chat-dr-jonathan-king

Singer/Songwriter Neil Higgins' tribute to Burke and Wills "Endless Dreams"

Neil Higgins Singer/Songwriter

Beechworth Vic.

Singer/Songwriter Neil Higgins, writes & performs a combination of mostly original songs that are delivered from a contemporary, Australian cultural, environmental & humanity prospective.
Some of Neil’s songs have gained deep acceptance across the broad community such as with his new song, “Endless Dreams” (Burke & Wills). This new song, together with many other original songs Neil has written include;
“I’ll Stand Alone” (Ned Kelly),
“Out of the Ashes-Into the Sun” (Vic Bushfire Tribute),
“Perfect World” (Humanitarian),
"Shearing the Rams" (Tribute to the great painting of Tom Roberts and the early shearing industry)
“The Filling of our Lakes" (Environmental inflows of the Murray & Darling River system)

and many others.
Neil can be contacted on Mobile 0427 176 742



“Endless dreams” (Burke & Wills)

Words & lyrics written by Neil Higgins.
All rights reserved Neil Higgins 2010.

Journey to the centre, Discovery of the red earth
Entering the place of the Spirit land, Is there any hope for return.
Wagon wheels in motion, Camel trains move forward
Burke & Wills set upon an unknown course, Are there any lessons to be learned.
Journey to the centre, Calling of the ‘Red Earth’
Expedition trekking on an unknown course, Is there any hope for return.

And as the cavalcade rolled out of Melbourne toward the plains
From the ‘Great Southern Ocean’
through the Sandy Desert to the ‘Northern Seas’.
This great exploring conquest then had set out to fulfil the dream
To break through the ancient heartland
held in the interior desert scene.

Journey to the centre, Destined for their glory
Burke & Wills trekking on an unknown course, Is there any hope for return.
Timeless geographics offer the serenity unexplained
From the banks of the sleepy River ‘Darling’ - to the oasis of the ‘Cooper Creek’
Overland exploratory within a land that holds no scale
Through the home of the ‘Yandruwandha’ People, to the Northern ‘Gulf’ they now had trailed.

Journey to the centre, Discovery of the red earth
Now re-entering the Spirit land, Is there any hope for return
Is there any hope for return
Journey to the centre, Discovery of the red earth
Now re-entering the Spirit land, Is there any hope for return.

Instrumental:

Confusion at the ‘Dig Tree’ spells their glory and their fail
The death of Burke and Wills tells a grim and torrid tale.
While ancient Tribal Laws respect the Nature and the land
John King found his salvation, in ‘Yandruwandha’s Tribal hands.
The Spirit of the land beholds the hardship and the pains
A Spirit that is free fills the heart with Endless Dreams.