A Western Odyssey

By Peter Cowman

In early August, I accompanied my friend, Bruce McLaughlin (Ag. 1973) on a road trip from Woolgoolga to Broken Hill. Bruce and his wife Phyll (Ag. 1973) have a daughter in Perth who they wished to visit and also see inland Australia.

Phyll sensibly decided to fly to Perth and I was roped in as a travelling companion for Bruce. I agreed to go part of the way, to Broken Hill and fly back to Sydney while Bruce continued on alone. The road trip became quite a social reunion with old Agriculture friends so I thought I would document it and circulate to classmates.

The trip got off to a bad start when Bruce’s mobile phone fell into the toilet at Woolgoolga and we immediately found that; (a) phones don’t float, and (b) they aren’t waterproof.

So off we set, towing caravan and down one phone.

Our first two nights were at Deepwater, north of Glen Innes, staying on a large rural property with Butch Hollingworth, a friend from Glen Innes days in the 1970’s. By way of background, my first posting with the Soil Conservation Service was to Glen Innes in February, 1975. Bruce arrived at the same time as a Research Agronomist with Department of Agriculture. Butch breeds Angus cattle on the Deepwater property, then weans and fattens them on another nearby property.

After a look around Glen Innes and the Ag. Research Station, we headed west to Inverell. Time has not been kind to Glen Innes, with many Public Service front line positions axed in the name of economy and the population unchanged in 50 years.

Inverell looked far more prosperous with the Soil Research Centre and workshop very prominent and tidy. And so, on to Moree and chez McNiven (Ag. 1971). We stayed two nights with Mal and spent a day on his large rural property with cattle feedlot, 70km out of town on the black soil plains. He is negotiating to buy an adjoining property from Kerry Easey, who attended St Andrew’s College. Kerry and I were in the University Shooting Team in 1970. Small world. Mal invited Roger Fitzgerald (Ag. 1975) around to dinner in Moree and many old memories were relived.

From Moree we headed south to Narrabri and Coonabarabran, then through the Warrumbungle National Park to Gulargambone. We had arranged lunch with Peter Nethery (Ag. 1971) and Jim Thompson (Ag. 1975) and caught up on all the news from the Central West. Jim had just sold his property in Gulargambone and moved to Dubbo for retirement, but had never met Peter who has a small rural property with fat lambs at Dubbo.

Onwards to Warren for the night. Since we didn’t know anyone in that area, we took a motel room to avoid using the caravan (now dubbed the dog box).

Breakfast in Nyngan, an attractive town. We then spent some time at the Nyngan Ag show, which hadn’t been held for three years due to covid restrictions. Good weather for the Show and recent rain so plenty of happy faces as we watched the sheep dog trials.

On to Cobar for the night and another motel. At $115 for a twin room, it is not expensive.

Next day we had the 450km run into Broken Hill, with a lunch break at Wilcannia to see the Darling River in full flow, overtopping the banks. What a lovely sight.

At Broken Hill we were staying with Rob Maxwell (Ag. 1971), who retired to this isolated inland city a few years ago. Rob took us out to Merindee Lake and showed us around town.

From there, I flew back to Sydney and took the train home to Nowra. Bruce set off for South Australia and further west. What a great road trip, seeing old friends and different aspects of land away from the coast.

Arrived home totally exhausted. All that socialising!!

Peter Cowman (Ag. 1975)

A Western Odyssey

A Western Odyssey

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