To "The Good Country" - Australia Day 2020

Tatiara.

That is our destination for Australia Day 2020.

Tatiara is the name of the District Council region which has invited me along as its Australia Day Ambassador. It encompasses two significant towns, Keith and Bordertown, and several delightful small, historic settlements: Mundulla, Padthaway, Willalooka, Wolseley, and Wirrega.

It’s part of what is known as South Australia’s Limestone Coast country and it is about three hours south of Adelaide on the Dukes Highway which leads to Melbourne and Sydney a well as Mount Gambier in the South East. Hence, it is much passed-through by zillions of motorists and transporters and trains.

This geographic factor, the phenomenon of being en passant rather than “destination” town, will be thematic to my Australia Day speech. Of course, as agricultural territory, Tatiara is vastly respected and appreciated. It is a thriving food bowl, its name, “Tatiara” translating from its the Aboriginal origin to “good country”. And that is exactly what it is. Gorgeous good country populated by strong communities with a backbone of expert farmers and graziers. It is a sophisticated and aesthetic corner of Australia's rural world in many ways and I am really charmed to have been invited here as Australia Day Ambassador.

Saturday 25th January 2020

As catsitter Deb arrives, we pack bags and the customary travelling chili bush into the car and hum southwards, pausing only at Jager’s Roadhouse in Tailem Bend for the ritual brunch. Grilled butterfish and salad and a macchiato with a glorious view of the River Murray. Tummies are full and happy, the car’s tank also full.

Our destination is Bordertown where the managers of Clayton Heritage Farm Museum, Vicki and Michael Eckert, have offered to give us a private tour of the place, warning that it takes a good two to three hours.

Clayton Farm is one of the super special tourist attractions of the Tatiara country, owned by the Council and run by the Eckerts with the help of a world of skilled and dedicated volunteers.

As we arrive, Vicki and Michael can be seen riding twin mowers on a huge, lushly green front lawn - a verdant contrast to the miles and miles of flat, summer-brown landscape stretching out around the property. We park in the shade of some massive gum trees and open the car doors to the most exquisitely fragrant fresh air in the world. Oh, my. The air! The air!

As we approach the house, the fragrance intensifies with the added perfume of new-mown grass. Vicki greets us and we have a sweet-smelling session, crushing lemon verbena and pelargoniums between our fingers and discussing plants which scent the air and deter the mosquitos. Such were the garden friends of early settlers. The well and pump sit strategically in front of the house, reminding one that the settling farmers had to work for their water like everything else. Michael finishes mowing and joins us and we begin exploring the vast collection of

early settler farm and domestic equipment, utterly fascinated by the wooden washing machines. I’ve never seen them before. Coppers and wringers, yes, but hand-worked wooden washing machines? Their motion still works smoothly, even if they can no longer hold water. As for the early twin tubs, they look like machines of torture - and I daresay they were.

The farmhouse itself is a gracious old country homestead replacing what was a two-room cottage when the

property was first settled in 1872. Its interior has been lovingly preserved as a museum with the long dining table set as if the family is about to arrive for a feast. The Wieses had a large family of 12 children.

Thereafter the rooms suggest purposes but also serve to house a large and eclectic collection of memorabilia.

The master bedroom, with its original bedstead, features a zany old bathing suit laid out on the bed. A sign warns

“Do not touch. We are old and fragile”, but as official collector and custodian, Vicki Eckhert proudly shows a collection of wedding attire from a coarse dark 1946 wartime frock made from a wool blanket to a delicate 1885 lace wedding veil. This, she suggests I touch. Oh, my. It as soft as gossamer.

There are assorted family and historic photos around the house but none, points out Vicki, of old man Wiese himself. It seems he committed suicide and Lutheran

rules of the period forbade images of those who had died by their own hand.

Many of the exhibits are items uncovered in farmhouse sheds, often long-concealed (and protected) under old blankets and bags. Among them is a perfect Edison record player. Michael cranks it up and the voice of a long-dead opera singer fills the room.

There are early-model telephones here and there, crank phones and early rotary phones which fascinate today's

school children. And, on the hall table, there is a 1935 SA telephone directory; not a large thing despite its covering country towns as well as Adelaide.

“Check and see if any of your family was on the phone back then,” suggests Vicki.

Unlikely, I think. My late parents were still schoolchildren in 1935.

But, no, to my utter delight, there is my grandfather’s

name, address and phone number. His phone number was simply 4000! Wow. And there he is: “Hutton Wm Dntst CML Bldg King Central William Street.” I swoon over this discovery.

There are so many things to ring distant bells with older visitors to this wonderful museum, and so much to surprise and enlighten young ones. Old medicine bottles list scandalously lethal ingredients. Old cartoon books suddenly are scandalously politically incorrect. It is not only technology which has changed with the years but also our views and understandings.

As we move around the massive property which stretches from large sheds of farm machinery history to the blacksmith’s shop, to the grain store, and to the most aesthetic and extraordinary ancient shearing shed I have ever seen, it is clear that Vicki and Mike have everyone considered in the range of carefully restored attractions.

In the vehicles shed there is a truck with zany old manual “hand signals” back from the days before indicators. The kids can’t believe there was ever such a thing, laughs Vicki. Nor can we. It is impossible not to pause and play with it.

And, what's with all the milk separators? Every farm used to have at least one, says Vicki. A large number of them have ended up here.

Then there is the gorgeous restored buggy.

“Climb up and sit in it,” instructs Mike.

I am nervous. It is high. It is what ladies used for horse-drawn transport in the pioneer days, with wonderful

suspension to ease the comfort over the rough and rutted tracks. But, to me it seems impossible to access. Just two metal steps, but far apart and high and perilous.

"We're insured," says Vicki, clearly amused at my timorous hesitation. In my jeans and safe and sensible rubber-soled shoes, I eventually clamber awkwardly up and haul myself onto the upholstered leather seat. I am triumphant. I did it! And I quietly wonder how on earth the likes of Mary MacKillop managed in her copious folds of long habit and slippery lace-up leather boots. Suddenly one gains new respect for those pioneer women, on yet another level.

Such are the gifts of Clayton Farm.

From massive shed to shed we go seeing thatching machines, huge early reapers, ploughs, glorious ancient tractors, scythes, and lovingly-restored old cars and trucks.

We see fields of stump-jump ploughs, famously invented hereabouts.

Vicki and Mike are generous with their time, energy and knowledge.

We marvel over the beautifully-made Border Toll gate,

a handsome strong old metal gate made with no bolts at which people travelling between the states had to pay massive tolls, 4 pence per pound of coffee, which was a fortune in those days, two shillings and six pence for doors and door frames, a penny a pound for candied fruits, sweets, cheese, ham, nuts, and spices. Who knew?

We explore the cool old chaff shed, the stables, the stone hut, the hay shed, the cellar, oh, and that shearing shed with its huge hollow tree trunk troughs.

"Feel inside here, feel the texture of the old wood, rubbed smooth by years of cattle leaning in," says Mike.

Yes, indeed. Cattle-worn several lifetimes ago.

We hear stories of the Wiese family, some of whom still live in the area today. The Eckerts, also old German stock of the area, bring the history to loving life. They are employed by the council which owns the farm but to keep the place humming along in this very fine form, they depend on a team of dedicated and expert volunteers in maintaining the property. We meet two of

them, Neil and Shirley Smedley, who are cleaning up and logging one of the piles of fallen eucalypts.

They live a few fields away and have been giving their time to the Clayton Farm cause for years. They love it.

And so do we. We resolve to return.

But today's clock has ticked too far. Our farewells are fond and heartfelt. We have been in the company of two champion rural souls who are keeping out country's history vivid and tangible.

We hurtle over to Keith from Bordertown to check in to our digs for the night.

Two Cow Cottage, a classic Aussie-suburbia brick and sandstone bungalow on the main heritage drag. We are immediately charmed to find a water bucket and windscreen cleaner ready at the back door. Very thoughtful, Very country. It is sadly ironic that the insect population has plummeted and the old splattered windscreen problem has diminished.

Two Cow Cottage has been sleekly renovated with glossy wooden floors and large, very smarr living room and dining room. Ooh, is that a carafe of sherry in the centre of the dining room table? Yes, indeed. Love it. Albeit some other day.

There are two bedrooms and a very efficient and

welcoming modern kitchen.

Like an excited child in a new house, Bruce immediately snaffles the room with high, olde worlde twin beds. He might be nearer the loo, but I, by happy default, score the main front bedroom which features a wonderful mural of two cows, which is the work behind the name of the cottage.

Lots of running around, unpacking, setting up connectivity etc. Bruce manages to run into a windmill blade. Big ouch. For heaven’s sake, what a thing, there’s a whole windmill rotor as decor on the dining room wall. The tail section is found on the wall outside the bathroom. Now that’s a wild and unusual decor concept, if a little dangerous. Finally, Bruce mixes us weak G&Ts which we sip while nibbling nuts and sitting on the front porch watching the world go by. Aaaah.

Then we change and walk down the road to the Keith Hotel where we are to dine with the Tatiara District Council Mayor, Graham Excell, and his wife, Cheryl, and the CEO, Anne Champness and husband Andrew. We settle around a large round table with drinks and get chatting. It is easy and convivial. These are just lovely, likeable people. Graham has a local country background featuring lots of shearing. Anne, surprisingly, is German. She is a tall, slim and striking young woman who has married a man from Kaniva, a gorgeous wee town just over the border in Victoria. They met in Germany where he was living and working with classic Volkswagen restoration. He now has a VW specialist business in his home town and a wife who is CEO of the Tatiara Council. She is thoroughly interesting and we hit it off.

Then again, Graham is a delight on the other side of me. It is a lively and convivial gathering which also features decent pub food and lots of animated talking. I have steak so generously covered in bechemel sauce that you can’t see it at all. It is quite late when we break up. We hadn’t noticed the time passing.

Bruce and I stroll back to the cottage where I make assorted changes to my speech and then turn out the lights to let the sound of the trucks and trains lull me to sleep.

Trucks and trains. This is the Dukes Highway, a major artery between South Australia and Victoria. Actually, the trains are quite loud and dramatic when they come, It is a rocky night’s sleep.

Sunday January 26, 2020

Australia Day dawns mild and overcast.

Bruce makes us nice, strong coffee and we head to the park just down the road. Action starts at 7.30 but we had agreed to arrive at 8 with the official proceedings scheduled for 9.

The park is already busy and a-flutter with flags. Tables laid under a marquee feature gorgeous Aussie flora and flag centrepieces . Another marquee houses the lectern and tables with a row of bulging, cellophane-wrapped gift baskets waiting to be presented to the new citizens and further huge floral arrangements.

Uplifting music is blaring merrily from the rotunda where The Austins are playing. Just back from Tamworth, they’re a stunning C&W duo, Rohan and Candice Austin. Rohan not only sings; he’s a local copper.

The Lions Club blokes are already serving

queues of hungry folk. It’s $8 for a piece of white toast with bacon and an egg on it. A glass of orange juice is included in the price. These are not the greatest cooks in Australia, despite the price. But they are cheerful and keep the production line whizzing along. We take our breakfast and sit under the marquee with some pleasant local matrons.

I go for a wander to mix with the people, chumming up to a group of CFS volunteers. They are proud of their cadets but desperately need more, they say.

I spot a cluster of men with their heads under the bonnet of a car and wander to see what is so interesting. Ah, car enthusiasts are swooning over a glorious, gleaming, midnight-blue beast of a classic collector’s limousine, a LaSalle, they tell me. It’s apparently a Cadillac product produced in the 1930s and 40s. It seems to be in showroom

condition. I swoon, too.

Gingerly stepping out of a car parked next to it is a woman I learn is called Meredith. She is a former Keith resident who has returned to share Australia Day here because, she tells me, this is the kindest and best community in the world. When she lived here, she lost her husband in

sudden and traumatic circumstances and the community gathered around and supported her in the most uplifting and generous-spirited way. She has family ties in the district and feels an abiding love for the place.

I run into Taylor Hervey, the Border Chronicle’s local journo and the only reporter for miles, since

Fairfax did a major rationalisation of its rural media. Taylor, who grew up in nearby Tintinara, qualified in journalism at Adelaide Uni and now covers a swathe of the South East with his trusty notepad and camera whence he later supplies some excellent photographs for this blog and for the Australia Council's official records. Thanks, Taylor. We talk shop until noted local VIP Bob Hender tracks me down to introduce himself as MC for the morning.

By now, the park is crowded. People have brought comfy camp chairs and have organised themselves neatly in audience formations both to the left and right of the main marquee where Bruce still sits at the table. Chatting with the mayor and CEO, I’m

told about 300 are expected. This park is popular for its monorail which has been closed during the proceedings since it is very noisy and so exciting, its passengers squeal as they ride. CEO Anna Champness admits that she also screamed when she had a ride. It’s fast, she laughs.

It is a well-dressed and handsome crowd which is now neatly arrayed in a huge semi-circle.

Bill Hender opens proceedings. The mayor speaks, acknowledging the original custodians of the land and welcoming the present ones. Then

Bill Hender introduces me. It’s an odd thing how, whenever someone lists one’s achievements, they seem to come as a surprise. I’ve had a lot of firsts in my journalistic career and as Bill rattles over them, my mind swarms with memories. And, of course, the longer the list, the older the subject.

In that spirit, I thank Bill, greet my hosts the mayor, CEO, and local VIPs, plus local member

Nick McBride who has been sitting beside me on the stage and, with mic in hand, and looking out on 180deg of the sprawling, colourful and friendly crowd, I begin my official Australia Day Ambassador speech.

I talk of the history and interesting location of the Tatiara towns of Keith and Bordertown. Everyone has been through them because they are on the route to everywhere. Passing through, stopover towns. But Keith has a particular claim to fame among travellers which outstrips Bordertown. People hang on to get to Keith.

It has the best public convenience in the country. I award it an Oscar for its welcoming cleanliness, space, access and double convenience location beside a top country bakery. The Keith people laugh and ruffle their feathers. The Bordertown folk shuffle in their seats. But, of course, this is The Good Country. Tatiara is an Aboriginal word meaning “good country” and the region has proven so, just as its original Potarwutji tribes defined.

The area abounds with Aboriginal names, Wirrega, Ngarkat, Challa, Cannawiriga, Kongal, Brimbago, Nalang, The swamp is Moot-Yang-Gunya. It shelters canoe trees and magical toe trees.

One of the special things about today's people of the good country is that they are ferociously heritage minded. It is easy to learn a lot about the area because they have gone to the trouble of having their history fastidiously researched. Their Heritage Survey of a few years ago is a huge and fascinating read, a marvelous insight. Then there is their own Tatiara Visitors' handbook which Mandy Clarke from the Council had sent me. I cite it as deserving another award for its thoroughness and quality of writing. It is a model to SA tourism. Among its described attractions are surrounding historic settlement towns of Mundalla, Willalooka, Padthaway, and Wolseley.

So much to do. Already I have been immersed in the farming history at Clayton Farm. I intend to do more before leaving, to lift a veil on the passing-through world which has never been in itself a destination.

Except, of course, for these people, its proud and successful inhabitants and their history of farming, of wheat and sheep and cattle and oats and lucerne. More recently meatworks have brought immigrant workers from nations such as Afghanistan and they have been welcomed to the heart of the community. This I know because it has been written and recorded, another feather in the cap of the good people of this good country.

Not only but also, this is Mary MacKillop country.

Australia’s first saint rode these roads and set up schools for farm children here as she and her Sisters of St Joseph did all around the country. But it is different here. This is a political electorate in her name. The local MP, Nick McBride, holds this seat of MacKillop. The good country folk are therefore saintly voters. It doesn’t get much better.

My father, Max Harris, grew up in Mount Gambier, just down the road. He instilled in me a love and respect for the country, for the rich world which lies on the other side of Tailem Bend. City people think the world ends at Tailem Bend. I say it begins.

My father loved the Limestone coast’s mysterious honeycombed geology. He loved the local myths and legends and the poets who roamed the landscape: John Shaw Neilson and Adam Lindsay Gordon. He thought and I do too, that Neilson was one of the country’s unsung greats. He called this region “the land of white man’s dreaming”. He taught me about Mary MacKillop and Julian Tennison Woods and, while he is now buried in MacKillop Park in Kensington, I have been working with Mary's Josephites in setting up a new Mary MacKillop Museum in Kensington. It is wonderful and modern; everyone is encouraged to visit.

Other things I know about Tatiara. Its people are readers and writers. As a girl I used to help pack postal order books in the back room of Mary Martin Bookshop, and vast numbers of books were sent to the farms around these towns. And, in the last 30 or so years on The Advertiser in Adelaide, I would receive letters from people of the area, the last of the letter writers. Country people write letters.

And they look after each other with strong community awareness, everyone volunteering from an early age. They create book clubs, lions clubs, sports clubs, and mens sheds. Here in the Purple Paddock shop, their volunteers make the most extraordinary range of handiwork, a sensationally original and enterprising shop from which it is impossible to emerge without purchase.

My fellow Australia Day Ambassador, Peter Goers, and I never fail to drop in and buy goodies there. Incidentally, since I now work with Peter on the Sunday Smart Arts program as resident critic, I asked him why he always referred to Keith in a gutteral “Keeeeeeeeeth”. He thought a while and then said, he did not really know. It had come to him as fun shtick and he had kept it up. I ask the audience if they like the way he says “Keeeeeeth”.

They call out “yes”.

And so I talk on, about the wonderful 2020 Australia Day recipients nationally and here: the impressive young-citizen awardee and firey, Matthew Gaden; the staunch community organiser and senior citizen, John White; and the Keith Area School which turned on an important community event in a mental health expo.

Of course I mention the area’s

most famous son, PM Bob Hawke, the famous white kangaroos at Bordertown, that town’s cultural reputation, its gallery and theatre, the local skate parks, cycle trails, golf, walks, heritage, hospitality, and, of course, the Border Chronicle, a very old regional paper and a great training ground for journalists. I tell of how my cat-sitter was inspired when she learned I was coming to Tatiara and wrote a lyrical piece about her childhood holidays with cousins at Wirrega, wild and free unruly days running through the bush and making cubbies, coming in to dining tables laid with country cold collations and jugs of powdered milk. Happy, memorable days for a city girl. And then, after a quick joke, I explain why I am here. I talk of the history of Australia Day, ongoing as people debate the date. But that there should always be a day to stop and think about our country and who we are, to appreciate the freedom of our system. I talk of migrants from war-torn countries, our new Australian citizens, who are always ready to remind us of the merits of our lifestyle and climate. I talk of our ever understated patriotism and the many ways in which it comes home to one.

The applause is gratifying.

The day’s proceedings move on to meeting and presenting the Australia Day Awards to the above-mentioned and then to the citizenship ceremony for several Afghan families and one Dane.

The mayor winds up the day’s events and we are about to repair for photos when Bill Hender rushes a woman to the

stage. I don’t catch her name but she is an assured and confident speaker and she surges into a speech. It seems that a subsequent ceremony celebrating 75 years of the Soldiers Memorial Community Centre has been rather spontaneously moved from after this event to being tagged on to this event. People stop preparing to move. We all remain sitting. A very long speech ensues about the good souls of the area, generations of community achievement...

the volunteers and makers of parks and...

Oh, dear...awkwardly, my phone rings.

It is the ABC 891 Smart Arts show producer telling me that time has come to go on the radio show. I apologgise to the speaker and slip away and tell Peter Goers and his statewide audience about these wonderful Australia Day events in Keith…oh, and about the last theatre show I reviewed.

Then back for photos and more meeting and greeting.

The kind and endorsing comments I receive from audience members makes me relax and feel that even my cheekiness about Keith having the best loo, was well received. Several people seemed pleased that I knew so much about the area and loved being reminded of how good is the place they live. "We often forget, take it all for granted," said one. Some wanted to reminisce about my father.

Some wanted to know how they could find this blog. Some wanted to tell me about why they had moved to Keith. “I like the values of the people and want my children to grow up with them,” a young mum tells me.

Finally, saying bye to the mayor and CEO and the local pollie, we join the departing stream and walk back to our digs. Two Cows has a 1pm checkout and we don’t have a lot of time. With no cafes open for lunch, we make a last-minute dash into the IGA which is just open until 12:30. We buy cold meat, avocado, tomato, pickles, and a jar of asparagus and repair to a quick repast at the cottage kitchen table, wash dishes and pack, and then indulge in a last pleasure, a cup of tea sitting on that dear old front verandah where the white standard roses are merrily budding and bees are buzzing over the little clover lawn. Lovely.

Wish we had more time.

But, on the dot, we leap into the car and head off to play tourists.

"You must visit Mundulla," the mayor had said. It is his old home town.

The road to Mundalla is the world of the stately gum tree. On lovely clear roads, we stream past vast, smooth acreages of golden summer stubble generously dotted with mighty old trees.

This is a special landscape.

Breathtaking.

Oh, the trees!

I drive slowly, stopping from time to time to take it in. I send loving thoughts to the farmers with the foresight to keep this land so proudly adorned with native trees.

Mundulla is just a wee town. Some of it is proudly residential; some is a little down at heel.

The Wirrega Council Chambers is its primary heritage claim to fame, and rightly so. It is a wee, charming one-room hall. Looking through the windows, one assumes it must still be used for something. There’s a meeting table in there and boxes of fat manila folders. The front door tells another story. Its lock has long been occupied by an enterprising spider.

We drive around noting the lovely memorial sculptures and the gorgeous old trees. Then we head out to find the Moot-Yang-Gunya swamp just out of town.

We turn in at the signpost and park the car. We can hear frogs and cicadas in the distance. I head for a footbridge over a dry creek to be met with an electrified fence and a padlocked gate. There is another entrance. But, no. More electrified fence and padlocked gates, despite a signpost indicating the trail is right there. Oh, how mystifying and disappointing.

Back on the road. we head into Bordertown which, on this Australia Day, is quite deserted. We admire the

fantastic Council Chambers, the lovely tile mosaic outside, and the bust of Bob Hawke, and go in search of the traveller's best friend, the public loo.

Like Keith, the travellers' friend is beside a bustling bakery.

The loos are set in the old town gaol. Of all places. Very characterful.

There’s a park and a lovely little lake beside it. People are having picnics. Ducks are gliding about.

Hmm. I have to acknowledge that it is pretty good in the roadside loo department. Onya beaut Bordertown.

We drive back to Keith where we are booked into the Keith Motor Inn. Bernadette welcomes us and explains the security system which I really admire. Each room is keyed by its inhabitant’s mobile phone number. The room is impeccable. We unload,

settle in, and make G&Ts which we drink sitting outside the room on a blue metal table setting Bernadette has allowed us to move nearer our room. There are just two of these and they seem to be intended for smokers. There is only one other car in the spacious parking lot. We gaze at the beautiful gums in the distance and study the diligent ants busily exploring the ground. We nibble olives and nuts and reflect on the day. Australia Day 2020. A long and full day, suddenly it seems. A good day.

The Keith pub is open for dinner. It is a terrific pub, hospitable and efficient. The food is most acceptable. Again.

When we settle into our room for the night, looking out the window we note that there is still just one other car in the carpark.

Monday January 27

On the dot of 7am, Bernadette taps on the door and delivers a wonderful hot breakfast to the room. Perfect eggs and country sausages. What a treat.

I do love a good motel.

As we pop the empty tray outside I realise that the empty carpark is now totally full. There is not one vacant space. Masses of travellers have checked in through the night. Travelling north or south, passing through, they have all paused for their sleepover in Keith.

By the time we have showered and caught up on the news and our reading, the carpark is empty again. All those people are back on the road. And, with the motel’s checkout very strictly at 10am with a warning that late stayers incur a charge, the travellers have taken no risk. They were just passing through and they have passed.

We head off to explore more of the sights recommended in the Tatiara Visitors Guide.

Wolseley has an extraordinarily interesting history.

It has a field of wartime fuel storage tanks. Great big wheat fields with great round tanks. They loom into view just as one is about to enter the township, a very strange sight indeed. In their striking aesthetic incongruity, they made me think of a Jeff Smart artwork and I am sure if that marvellous superrealist had seen them, he would have been spurred to the

brush. They were built by the RAAF in WWII when Australia felt the need for defensive resources against potential Japanese attack. They were built in two bursts from 1941-43 and camouflaged to look like farm buildings. They stand as the oldest and largest inland fuel depots in the country, and the best preserved. Others at Gladstone and Port Pirie were semi-underground and severely damaged during the removal of the tank linings. One at Crystal Brook IAFD has had a railway line re-routed through the middle of it.

It is a beautiful, mild sunny day and we enjoy standing at the fence and marvelling at the bold forms of the tanks. They are no long disguised but stand as an historical curiosity with a comprehensive information shelter to explain their presence. Bruce is something of a war historian and he had no knowledge of this aspect of Australian defence history, so he is particularly intrigued.

Little Wolseley is and was a railway town and a very long, much-graffitied goods train rumbles along its tree-lined track as we stop in the main street. There is a very pleasant-looking country pub welcoming visitors on this holiday Monday. We are extremely well fed by the Keith Motor Inn, so we pass the nice pub and pause at the handsome old Wolseley Institute building. The terra cotta coloured corrugated iron of its darling old bull-nosed verandah roof matches perfectly with the writing on the building’s facade. ’Twas once “the dance mecca of Tintinara”, the information board informs us. It still has a sense of pride and grace to it. Next door are less salubrious pieces of heritage with much rusted corrugated iron. Then again, many of us are partial to the aesthetic of that particular Aussie phenomenon.

Ballinger’s General store just down the road is a bit rusty, too, with dusty old showroom windows filled with equally dusty but beautifully fascinating old wartime photos and souvenirs.

Peering through the grimy glass door panel, one can see that the Inside of the shop is derelict, but someone has created a vivid and

freshly-painted Velvet Soap advertisement on the side of the building. It is vividly photo-worthy for tourists and I cannot resist taking a snap.

There’s a very acceptable public loo a block down the road near the town’s sports fields where giant sprinklers are nourishing the grass ready for footy. There’s a memorial iron sculpture there, too. And across the road on the verge, there are citizens digging and weeding what seems to be a thriving and extensive community garden. We wave as we drive slowly past. They wave back.

And suddenly, Wolseley is behind us.

On the road out of town is a sign to Serviceton. It is not in Tatiara but I have read about it and am curious. We drive through flat rural country along the route of the railway line and past some of the most skew-whiff telegraph poles one has ever seen and within a klick or two, we have entered Victoria. The wonderful Wimmera, no less. But once, the history books tell me, this land was shared by SA and Victoria and they built a state-of-the-art border railway station to enable its role in the changing of gauges. When the border was eventually properly defined, the station was just inside the Vic border. Checking Wikipedia, I find an hilarious anecdote about it which will amuse South Australians aware of their dynastic Downer family:

The Premier of South Australia, John Downer, wrote to his Victorian equivalent, James Service, suggesting that the new border railway town and station be named Downer after him. Service wrote back and said that as it was in Victoria, it would be named Serviceton after himself,…

We have no sooner climbed the time-worn old slate steps onto a sleek old Serviceton railway station platform which seems to go on for ever than a voice from behind asks what we think of the place. And there is Les Millikan, unofficial official caretaker of this remarkable piece of Australian history. Retired from a life of shearing and 'dozer driving,

he’s been tending the station and showing visitors around for 12 years. Unpaid. He does it for love and because, well, somebody should. He is a wry, droll fellow with pale blue eyes and the brown leathery skin of a man who has worked long under the Australian sun.

Would we like to see inside? Oh, yes, please.

And thus begins one of the most surprising and intriguing tours of all time.

Being on the border, this incredibly extensive railway station had ticketing offices for both South Australia and Victoria. It also had a customs office as well as waiting rooms, guards rooms, and a huge, very grand high-ceilinged refreshment hall. Oh, so handsome. Behind it are extensive kitchens which come to life from time to time, says Les, because the station is popular for weddings. Well, well, well.

There are little old guest bedrooms and loos down a back corridor, a small annexe

refreshment parlour with a window through which women, segregated from the men, used to be able to order drinks. Ancient foot-worn stairs lead to an upstairs world we don’t visit. But we do visit the cellars. So many of them.

There is a great chain of cellars beneath the building which housed further guard and officer rooms and, of all things, rows of brick prison cells where German and Italian prisoners of war from the North African campaign were shackled to the walls while the trains were turning and changing gauge above. Les demonstrates how the prisoners were shackled to the wall. It is a very

unexpected and spooky revelation. One wonders what the feelings and fates of those hapless men may have been.

Up and down cellar stairs to one underground room after another we traipse They would have been cool rooms in summer, but they all have fireplaces, no matter how pokey they seem. Les says there are 28 fireplaces

spread out around the station. There are also assorted collections of railway remnants and rural eclectica, gathered and set out by Les over the years. Back on the platform, one feels the spirit of the place and can almost see the bustling crowds and women in their long skirts and laced boots. The platform was even longer, back in the day, says Les.

Several hours have slithered away in this wonderful experience. Shyly we slip Les a wee tip for a beer or two. He’s a bit surprised. He has been doing this as a volunteer for all these years. Unsung.

We hum back over the border back into Tatiara country and head to Bordertown to hunt out a late lunch.

Bordertown is a nice, strong, sensible country town with some glorious heritage architecture. There is a gallery and theatre but nothing is open on this holiday Monday. The town is again quiet except for the bakery and the Foodland supermarket both of which are doing a roaring trade. I buy half a hot chook from Foodland and we devour it sitting at a picnic table by the town lake watching ducks and holidaymakers with dogs; very pleasant, really.

Next stop is Humble House, an organic garden and farm, very much after my own heart. We feed its address into Google Maps and head off.

We are becoming deeply fond of this Tatiara "Good Country". The fields of lucerne are many and they are just beginning to turn purple. The Tatiara respect for elderly eucalypts gives one very deep pleasure. I don't know when I have seen so many grand old gums. Hans Heysen, eat your heart out. Car conversation is frequently punctuated by "oh, look at that tree!".

En route, through the soothing rural beauty

of this marvellous landscape, is a sign for Poochera Swamp. It is featured in the Tatiara guide book.

I hang a u-ey and we drive in to a circular parking area. The gates are not locked but there are intimidating signs warning: “DANGER. Runaway Holes. Steep Slopes And Deep Water.” There are,

indeed, steep slopes and deep holes. Tree roots cling perilously to the rough earth walls. There’s long dry grass everywhere and it is definitely a perfect day for snakes. We stomp around making noises and make tentative exploration. There is no water. But what gum trees. Oh, what trees. Great, gnarled, knotted, fat ancient beasts of trees. And there are sulphur crested cockatoos wheeling through them and shrieking at us, telling us to go away, this is their territory. We obey.

Our messages have crossed and when we arrive at Humble house, the family is just having an even later lunch than we had. We explore the property while they eat. Oh, what lush and healthy fruit trees and what a smashing vegetable garden. There’s a ginormous strawberry patch, biggest I’ve seen in a private garden. There’re rhubarb and raspberries and chard and a beauty of assorted exotic lettuces. The zucchini is running riot, as it does if one does not crop it daily. Rachel explains, when she joins us, that they have been away for a few days and there is a lot in the garden calling for instant attention. She picks vegetables as we talk. She and husband Wade work the property

and produce jams, sauces and preserves for sale. She has been working on sugar-free products, using xylitol, which is a drawcard for those of us on sugar-free diets.

Inside the house they have shelves of all sorts of jams, chutneys and sauces. She also has unsweetened dried strawberries. And the growing

range of sugar-free creations which are challenging, since sugar substitutes are not as co-operative in setting and shelf life as sugar. Also, they are costly and time-greedy to make which makes their prices higher and therefore harder to sell. So Humble House does not have a lot of retail outlets. We take some photos of Rachel and Wade and their goods. I purchase some and Rachel gifts me some, plus a punnet of those strawberries from out there in the field. We’re going to love them, she predicts. We do. They are among the most exquisite strawbs either of us has ever had.

We repair back to our Keith Motor Inn in time for a sundowner drink over which to reflect on what a wonderful world this Australia Day visit has opened up. It is because Tatiara Country is really close to home and on the main route to other states that most of us simply stop for an en passant sleepover without seeing it as a destination. Madness. There is much to see and do: campgrounds, bike trails, and impressive places of art and heritage. Our “Good Country” is truly good - and I’ve barely scratched the surface.

Country South Australia rocks.