Fishing and farming inventions and other yarns

Saturday we spent another relaxing day in Bourke. Another walk around town, trying to catch photos of the red-tailed black cockatoo. A bit difficult to take great photos of a pretty plain bird with such exquisite markings when it fans its tail.

We stopped in at the Port of Bourke Hotel for a pub lunch; the terrace area under the front balcony was a lovely spot to sit and relax in the sun. We packed up the site in the evening, so we didn't have to do too much before we departed in the morning.

On Sunday morning, we left Bourke and headed east via the Kamilaroi Highway to Brewarrina, then onto Walgett. The road very roughly followed the Little Bogan River, then the Barwon River to Walgett. The Aboriginal meaning of 'Walgett' is 'meeting of two waters' as the town is located by the junction of the Namoi and Barwon Rivers.

Brewarrina is located on the Barwon River and is where the fascinating Baiame’s Ngunnhu (fish traps) can be found. Click here to view and listen to the dreamtime story of Baiame and his sons. The fish traps are a complex arrangement of rocks running about 500m down the river, that are still used to farm, herd and trap fish in the river.

The age exact age of our fish traps are unknown however, undertaken studies suggest they [are] one of the oldest human constructions in the world. They have been listed on the State Heritage Register and the National Heritage List.

The pelicans certainly know where to find an easy catch of fish.

Heading out of Brewarrina, we passed the sister bridge to the North-Bourke bridge we saw a couple of days ago - this one across the Barwon River.

Arriving in Walgett mid-afternoon, we settled into a very popular free-camp, Alex Trevallion Park, which has a resident cantankerous goose, hot showers, clean toilets and is walking distance into town.

We spent Monday and Tuesday in Walgett.

The more notable people associated with Walgett include:

• the country singer Jimmy Little, a Yorta Yorta man, who was also a beloved Walgett resident during the mid 20th century after marrying Marj Peters who was born and raised in Walgett. He has been honoured by a mural on the town's water tank.

• one of the artists on that water tank mural was Frank Wright, who grew up near Walgett, not only painted these emu murals with fellow artist John Murray from Lightning Ridge (who also painted the Elvis emu mural we saw in Parkes), but also supported the local school students with the following mural

• the first mechanical shearing handpiece/machine was invented by Frederick Wolseley with assistance of his blacksmith and shearer Jack Gray, of nearby Euroka Station. This provided more efficient and quicker way to shear larger numbers of sheep, revolutionising the wool industry in Australia.

• the 1965 Freedom Ride included Charles Perkins

Spurred on by racial segregation in the United States of America, a group of students at the University of Sydney formed the Student Action For Aborigines (SAFA). Charles Perkins, one of only two Aboriginal students at the university at the time, was elected president of the newly-formed group.

Their mission was to shine a light on the marginalisation of Aboriginal people in New South Wales towns. During their fifteen day journey through regional New South Wales, the group would directly challenge a ban against Aboriginal ex-servicemen at the Walgett Returned Services League

• and Banjo Patterson wrote a couple of poems about Walgett; the Alex Trevallion Park where we are staying, has a monument to commemorate the centenary of the publication of his poem 'Been There Before', depicting the laid-back nature of life in the bush.

If you can't read the poem above, you can read it here. This is actually quite relevant to the moment, as we have spoken to a few people while we've been here; one said they'd been here before; another didn't think they had but when they arrived, they realised they'd been here before; an another thought they'd been here before but actually hadn't. Now, we can say that we've been there before. Very fitting that they were all staying alongside this commemoration of a great poet.