Barcoola – Jenn J McLeod – small-town storyteller

Posted on 19/09/2014 by Jenn J McLeod — 10 Comments

You’ll never believe this birthday blog

On the occasion of my 54th birthday I thought this little bit of information about the place I am now living in the caravan rather interesting.

Corindi (as in the small northern NSW township) is from the Gumbaynggir word ‘girriida’ meaning…

Can you believe this…?

“Place of Grey Hair”.

How very appropriate!

So, where are we exactly? If you look at the picture below and find the last white spec to the north, that’s us! And the big round thing/corn circle/alien spacecraft landing spot? The old Corindi horse race track. Today we discovered a looooooong boardwalk winding its way to the beach, found a brown snake (dead!), caught a brim (just one – but legal) and had a big Barcoola birthday burger and beer feast!

And here is the big Barcoola birthday burger and beer feast.

What a terrific day. I guess if one has to turn 54, this is a pretty good place to do it.

Cheers for now

Posted on 29/08/201429/08/2014 by Jenn J McLeod — 4 Comments

Happy Barcoola Anniversary to us!

It’s one week since the house settled and WE settled into our new mobile home for life on the road.

Okay, so we are not ON THE ROAD exactly. We travelled about an hour north and stopped at Corindi Beach Caravan Park. We will make this lovely spot our base for a while as we find our ‘caravan legs’.

Dad is visiting a couple of times a week now as we are only 10 minutes up the highway (and he brings scones every time he visits!)

This last week has tested us, though: the notorious east coat low has brought five days and nights of pelting rains, lashing winds, thunder, and lightning strikes that saw the van park in black out for four hours. (Dad will be bringing scrabble when he next visits!!) Mind you, we got lots of reading done: Greg Barron’s Lethal Sky (another riveting read from Greg), Dawn Barker’s Let her Go (love, love, loved it), and about to start Anna Romer’s highly anticipated Lyrebird Hill.

Apart from having so much reading time, there are LOTS of things to get used to.

Good things: the roar of the ocean only twenty paces from our door, the endless entertainment provided by wives frantically waving hands at husbands for the Van Reversing Ritual that takes place every evening, and stare-offs with the local roos.

Not so good things: limited data for Facebooking and blogging and drinking too much coffee (yes, the coffee machine came with us!)

The pups seem to have settled in just fine and tonight we christened the Weber Baby Q because the weather is finally being good to us. Tomorrow I will be hitting the book again. Edits for Season of Shadow and Light going well.

Posted on 14/08/201431/12/2014 by Jenn J McLeod — 9 Comments

Here she is! Our new home – Barcoola

On the outer Barcoo where the churches are few,

And men of religion are scanty,

On a road never cross’d ‘cept by folk that are lost,

One Michael Magee had a shanty.

From: ‘A bush christening’ by A B ‘Banjo’ Paterson (1893)

In their brochure, the designers of our new home (Southern Cross Caravans) called this 4WD edition “The Barcoo” so when I Googled the word I found the Macquarie Dictionary has three references featuring Barcoo:

‘Barcoo Rot’ a scurvy-like ailment from poor diet resulting in skin lesions, sometimes described as ‘outback scurvy’ and the scourge of explorers, stockmen and drovers.
‘Barcoo Salute’ meaning the ‘waving about of hands to keep flies away from your face’
and the ominous ‘Barcoo Spews’ which is vomiting caused by extreme heat.

Okay, so not a great start to our big adventure!

Thomas Ingham “Barcoo Rot Ointment” potlid, c. 1890’s. IMage and reference source John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland.

I then discovered the word ‘Barcoola’ is an Aboriginal word and the Barcoo River divides country belonging to two tribes, suggesting the Barcoo River serves as a boundary between two groups in the region [Yandjibara and Dharawala in the Blackall Region which is the headwaters of the Barcoo River].

THEN… I discovered that in these tribal languages ‘Barcoola’ is given as the word for ‘two’.

So, here we are – “two in a Barcoo” – writing in and under the southern cross – no scurvy, spews or rot in sight!! (But I do hope theBarcoo Hotel still welcomes country pub dwellers.)

Mail Coach at the Barcoo Hotel Blackall, 1897 Photo courtesy of John Oxley Library, State Library of Queensland

Come August 21, 2014, we will be grey nomads, wandering writers and “of no fixed address” – time period unknown. I hope you will join us here (or as my friend/follower on Facebook) as we hit the road.

My thanks to John Oxley Library, State Library of QLD. For more reading: http://blogs.slq.qld.gov.au/jol/2012/05/22/the-meaning-of-barcoo/