Memoir

T-Team Series–Hermannsburg Back in Time

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The T-Team With Mr B (28)

[Extract from The T-Team with Mr. B: Central Australia 1977, a prequel to Trekking With the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981.

The T-Team with Mr B — In 1977 Dad’s friend Mr Banks and his son, Matt (not their real names), joined Dad, my brother (Rick) and me on this journey of adventure. I guess Dad had some reservations how I would cope… But it soon became clear that the question was, how would Mr B who was used to a life of luxury cope?

And our accommodation in Hermannsburg had sent us on a tour back in time…]

 Living in History

I lay in bed and gazed up at the ceiling. Wish I hadn’t. A hessian sheet hung above me, pinned to the four corners of the room and sagging in the middle. It appeared the sand from the Central desert had worked its way into the sheet, threatening to burst all over me. How long before the sheet would no longer be able to contain its weight? I sat up and swung my feet to the floor. A cockroach scuttled under the wardrobe made of oak. I shuddered. Better sand fall on me than cockroaches.

I grabbed my towel and toiletry bag, then padded out my room and down the dark hallway to the bathroom. There I gazed around the small room, sealed with green and white tiles, some broken. In the 1950’s wash basin, waist-high and looking like an enamel pastel-green pulpit, a line of rust coursed from the faucet to the drain. The matching bath suffered a permanent rusty-brown ring, a reminder of how full to fill the tub. I scanned around the room and above the bath. No shower—not even a rusty one.

[Photo 1: T-Team Next Generation waiting for the outside dunny © L.M. Kling 2013]

I heard a knock at the door. ‘Lee-Anne, are you in there?’

‘Yes, Dad,’ I replied. ‘Where’s the shower?’

Dad opened the door and poked his head through. He screwed up his nose and swivelled his head left, right, up and down. ‘Oh, no shower. I guess you’ll have to have a bath.’

‘Oh, al-right.’

‘Hurry, though, we’re off to see Mr. C and his school.’

‘Oh.’ Last year Mr. C was my mathematics teacher. Then, in 1977, he’d taken up a position teaching the Arunta children in their camps near Hermannsburg.

I turned on the tap. Water dribbled into the bath, brown and making the pipes groan. I gazed at the tea-coloured brew pooling at the base of the tub. I like baths, normally. Not sure about this one.

‘Don’t fill it too full,’ Dad said.

‘No, Dad.’ No danger of that happening. The bath looked like it’d take an eternity to cover even to the depth of an inch.

‘Don’t take too long,’ Dad added.

‘No, Dad.’

I reached in and tested the water. Cold. I then placed my fingers under the dribble from the tap. Cold. Great! Not much water and it’s cold. Yep, I’ll have a quick wash.

I stopped the dismal flow and rushed through the motions of washing. After raking dry shampoo through my limp strands of hair, I bunched them into pig-tails and returned to my room to change.

Then I walked into the kitchen. Light through the louvers reflected dust motes drifting through the air.

[Photo 2: School Room © C.D. Trudinger circa 1955]

Dad looked up from his bowl of porridge. ‘Oh, you’re finished already?’

‘Yep.’

I helped myself to the saucepan of porridge on the ancient stove. The cooker squatted there in the corner, brass fittings attached to afford gas to the rings on top. And lime green. I could see Hermannsburg had a theme going—shades of green. Except the table, washed with the thin coat of white paint. Perhaps it was green once, at the turn of the century.

[Photo 3: Green the Theme outside the school © C.D. Trudinger circa 1955]

As if taking advantage of my abbreviated bathroom visit, Dad took his sweet time. So, while we waited, Richard and I played cards, on the kitchen table.

‘Mr. B and Matt are taking their time,’ I said gathering up the cards.

‘They’re sleeping in,’ Richard laughed. ‘I think Mr. B’s exhausted.’

‘He didn’t know what he was getting himself into coming on this trip.’

Richard snorted. ‘Bet he’s never been camping in his life.’

‘No, all motels and luxury for him, I reckon.’

[Photo 4: Certainly not the Chiefly Motel Alice Springs © L.M. Kling 2013]

Dad stood behind us and coughed. ‘What are you talking about?’

We turned and widening our eyes to feign innocence, my brother and I chorused, ‘Nothing.’

‘I hope so.’ Dad cleared his throat again. ‘Now, come on, Mr. C’ll be here soon.’

‘Can I see Mummy’s house? Did we get permission?’

‘Er, um, later. Mr. C’s waiting. We’re late,’ Dad said and then strode out the door; the green door.

*[Photo 5: Tantalisingly close…but so far, Mum’s (Mrs T’s) old home © S.O. Gross circa 1950]

Richard and I followed.

‘We know whose fault it is we’re late,’ Richard muttered as we followed Dad out the historic hospital to meet Mr. C.

[to be continued…]

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2016; updated 2019; 2022

Photo: Spruced up Mission home, Hermannsburg Precinct © L.M. Kling 2021

***

Get ready for some holiday reading or begin planning your escape to adventure in the centre of Australia.

Click the link below:

Trekking With the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981,

And escape in time and space to Centre of Australia 1981…

Remembering Dad–Picnic at Brownhill Creek

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[Remembering my Dad, 10 years since he passed from this world to be with his heavenly father. Wonderful loving father, beautiful memories, amazing adventures…]

Happy Hunting Ground

[Picnics on special days have been a “thing” for years. Not sure when this experience happened, but it was a picnic all the same.]

Dad leaned on his shovel and with a wrinkled handkerchief patted sweat from his head displacing the few strands of hair masquerading as a “comb-over”. Then with grunts sounding as if he were puffing billy, he attacked the garden bed. With each load of soil, he groaned, puffed and wheezed, demonstrating how hard he was working. A closed cardboard box sat near the cauliflower patch, a counterbalance to the growing pile of dirt the other side of the hole Dad created.

[Photo 1: Dad digging in the garden © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger 1977]

‘Daddy, what are you doing?’ I asked strolling across the lawn to Dad.

Dad grunted some more and then flung a heap of soil into the mound behind him.

‘Daddy, why are you digging this deep hole?’

Dad stopped digging. ‘Huh?’

‘Daddy, what’s this hole for?’

‘Never you mind, Lee-Anne.’ Dad must think at six years old, I’m too young to know.

‘But Daddy, I just want to know.’

Dad tapped the box with his boot. ‘I’m sending puss to her happy hunting ground.’

‘Wilma?’ I asked. ‘But Daddy, why are you digging a hole, Daddy? Are you digging your way to Wilma’s happy hunting ground?’ I had visions of my cat chasing mice in China.

Dad glanced at the box and cleared his throat. ‘Oh, er, no, not really. Just a bit of gardening, dear. Now, run along and get ready for the picnic.’

[Photo 2: Dad resting after his hard day at work in the garden © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1977]

Ah! A spring picnic at Brown Hill Creek. I loved picnics with Mummy, Daddy and Richard, my eleven year old brother. Brown Hill Creek in the Adelaide foothills had paths lined with eucalyptus trees, and a creek filled with yabbies and tadpoles for Richard and me to hunt. I imagined Brown Hill Creek as the perfect “happy hunting ground” for cats.

‘Is Brown Hill Creek Wilma’s happy hunting ground?’ I asked.

Mum, her mousy curls covered with a scarf, poked her head out the door and called from the porch, ‘Hurry up, David!’

[Photo 3: Mum hanging up the washing before we go out © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1971]

‘Yes, dear,’ Dad said and with huffing and puffing, dug with increased speed.

I jumped up and down and flapped my arms. ‘Hooray! We’re going to Wilma’s happy hunting ground!’ Then I ran back to Mum standing in the back porch. ‘We’re going to Wilma’s happy hunting ground.’

‘Yes, well, I suppose,’ Mum said her blue eyes averting mine.

***

All the way to Brown Hill Creek, I filled the stale air in Bathsheba, our Holden car with my constant babble. As the only blonde in the family, it was my calling to be the family entertainment.

[Photo 4: Bathsheba, our trusty Holden car in the background © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1969]

‘I bet Wilma loves it at Brown Hill Creek. There’s so many birds…Mummy, do all the cats go to our picnic park when they go to their happy hunting ground?’

‘Mmmm,’ Mum replied.

I took that response as a “yes”. ‘Mummy, why did Wilma go to her happy hunting ground? Why didn’t she want to stay with us?’

Mum sighed. ‘Wilma wanted to go. It was her time.’

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Are dogs there too?’

‘Wouldn’t be a happy hunting ground for cats, if dogs were there too,’ Dad said.

‘Maybe dogs go somewhere else.’ I tried to think where dogs would go. ‘Like where there’s more trees, I guess.’

Richard shook his square head topped with brown curls. ‘Why do you always talk so much, Lee-Anne?’

I shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Anyway,’ Richard said, ‘Wilma is—’

‘Shh!’ Mum glared at my brother and narrowed her eyes.

‘Gee, Brown Hill Creek must be full of cats,’ Richard muttered.

‘Oh, goody, when we get there, the first thing I’m going to do, I’m going to find them all,’ I said.

Richard rolled his eyes and shook his head.

***

Clouds shrouded the sky casting Brown Hill Creek reserve in a pall of grey. Dad manoeuvred Bathsheba into the gravel carpark. Richard and I then scrambled out. While Richard checked the water-levels of the creek, I gazed up at the lofty branches of the gum trees. Was Wilma up there? The leaves rustled in the breeze.

Mum found an even patch of ground near the creek and spread the rug. Dad lugged the wicker basket loaded with cheese and gherkin sandwiches and a thermos.

‘Richard, would you help carry this?’ Dad asked as he held a bag containing a spare set of my clothes. A picnic was never complete unless I fell into the creek at least once.

I raced along the path and began calling, ‘Wilma! Wilma!’

As the distance between my family and me widened, Dad yelled, ‘Don’t go wandering off—we don’t want you getting lost—again.’

‘I’ll go with her,’ Mum said.

‘Wilma! Wilma!’ I sang.

Birds twittered in those lofty branches. I looked up and called, ‘Wilma! Wilma! Here puss, puss, puss!’

A kookaburra cackled.

[Photo 5: Kookaburra © L.M. Kling 2016]

Mum pointed up at a bunch of blue-green leaves high in a tree. ‘Hey, look!’

‘Wilma?’

‘No, look!’ Mum said, ‘A koala.’

‘What’s a koala doing here? I thought this was the cat’s happy hunting ground.’

[Painting: Koala and baby© L.M. Kling 2013]

Mum took a breath and began. ‘Wilma’s in a better place than this, she’s—’

‘Hiding?’ I peered in the scrub. I parted the stubbles of grass by the side of the path. I looked behind tree trunks and logs. ‘Wilma! Come Wilma!’

My brother strode up the path and stood next to Mum. ‘You have to tell her, Mum.’

‘What?’ I asked.

‘You won’t find Wilma here,’ Richard said.

‘Wilma’s gone dear,’ Mum said.

‘Dead, Lee-Anne,’ announced Richard.

‘No! Richard, you’re wrong. Dad said Wilma went to her “happy hunting ground”, I said straining my voice.

‘Richard’s right,’ Mum said. ‘Wilma’s happy hunting ground is in heaven, not Brown Hill Creek.’

***

We ate our cheese and gherkin sandwiches in silence. If I wasn’t talking our little family usually ate in silence. Mum sat me on her lap and wrapped her arms around me as I forced small bites of sandwich past the lump in my throat. I looked at the creek frothing and bubbling from good spring rains. The yabbies and tadpoles were safe from my jar and net that day. I was in no mood to hunt them. My spare set of clothes would stay a spare set for another picnic. I decided to break the silence.

[Photo 6 and feature: Happier times at Brownhill Creek © C.D. Trudinger 1964]

‘Will I never see Wilma again?’ I asked.

‘I’m afraid not,’ Mum said. ‘But you have Barney, Wilma’s brother, to be your special cat to look after.’

‘Why does Lee-Anne get a special cat?’ Richard asked.

‘Well, you’ve got Timothy, Wilma’s other brother, he’s your special cat,’ Mum replied.

‘Oh, yeah.’

‘So Wilma’s in her happy hunting ground in heaven,’ I said.

‘Yes,’ Dad said. ‘Wilma’s in heaven.’

[Photo 7: Wilma and Me © C.D. Trudinger 1968]

And I imagined Wilma stalking through a hole from our world and into the next; her happy hunting ground in heaven.

***

[Photo 8: Holly 2000-2016© L.M. Kling 2011]

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2016; updated 2020; 2022

Feature Photo: Picnic at Brownhill Creek. Photo taken by David Trudinger 1964

***

Want more, but too impossible to travel down under?

Why not take a virtual journey with the T-Team Adventures in Australia?

Click here on Trekking With the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981…

And escape in time and space to Central Australia 1981…

T-Team Series–Snake

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T-Team with Mr. B (23)

  [Extract from The T-Team with Mr B: Central Australia 1977, a prequel to Trekking With the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981.]

The T-Team with Mr B — In 1977 Dad’s friend Mr Banks and his son, Matt (not their real names), joined Dad, my brother (Rick) and me on this journey of adventure. I guess Dad had some reservations how I would cope… But it soon became clear that the question was, how would Mr B who was used to a life of luxury cope?

This time the T-Team encounter a snake…

SNAKE OF PALMER RIVER

We sailed onwards from Curtin Springs. On this stretch of road, Matt and I were the Captain and Skipper of the good ship Land Rover. We rode up and over waves of copper-coloured sand dunes, juddered along stormy corrugations, and crept through stony creek beds.

*[Photo 1: Riding on the Rover © C.D. Trudinger 1977]

As the sun hovered above a line of gum trees in the distance, a sign to Palmer River rose out of the mirage. Crossing the dry creek bed lined with eucalypt trees, their trunks white and thick and branches covered with lush green leaves, Dad slowed the vehicle to a crawl. He then turned into the creek and drove the Rover along a track of soft sand. After travelling some distance down the dry riverbed, he stopped. The men stepped out from the Rover.

*[Photo 2: Finke River with Mt. Hermannsburg © S.O. Gross circa 1955]

‘I think we’ll camp here tonight,’ Dad said.

‘You’ve got no argument with me,’ Mr. B replied. He gazed around at the cream-coloured sand and shady gum trees. ‘Now why didn’t you find somewhere like this before?’

Dad shrugged.

Mr. B rubbed his hands together. ‘Right time to get the BBQ together and fire it up.’

*[Photo 3: Camping in the Finke © S.O. Gross circa 1955]

While the older men cooked the meat, the lads ventured out to shoot some meat of their own. I followed at a safe distance. Walking over to a track that crossed the riverbed, I spotted a dark long object.

‘Hey, look at this,’ I yelled to the boys.

They stopped and turned.

‘Careful,’ Richard said.

‘Is that a snake?’ Matt asked. He raised his rifle.

I tip-toed up to the long dark creature and peered at it. A brown snake, two metres in length, lay across the track.

‘It’s a snake,’ I said.

*[Photo 4: Snake (not a Brown) © S.O. Gross circa 1950]

‘Get out the way,’ Richard said. He raised his rifle and squinted lining up the target with his “iron sight” (the bit at the end of the rifle’s nozzle that helps with the shooter’s aim).

I trod a couple of steps closer. ‘It’s not moving.’

‘What are you doing? It might strike,’ Richard shouted.

‘They’re poisonous, you know,’ Matt added.

‘It’s alright.’ I walked up to it. In two places the snake appeared to be flattened. ‘There’s tyre marks across its body. It’s dead. Very dead.’

Richard crouched down beside the effigy and then picked it up. ‘Yep, it’s dead.’

‘And some car’s the culprit,’ Matt said.

As the sun sank into the horizon, casting its tangerine magic on the trunks of the river gums, the T-Team gathered around the BBQ.

‘Well, ma boys,’ Mr B flipped a steak in the pan, ‘you got anything to add?’

Richard and Matt glanced at each other and then gazed at the pink and grey waves of sand of Palmer River.

*[Photo 5: Memories of dinner on the campfire past © C.D. Trudinger circa 1955]

I giggled. ‘They wanted to, but their shooting venture was fruitless.’

‘That’s a shame,’ Dad said. ‘Ah, well.’

‘We could have the snake,’ I said.

‘I don’t think so,’ Dad cleared his throat, ‘we’re not that desperate.’

So, while parrots chattered in the gum trees celebrating another brilliant day in the Centre of Australia, having escaped the boys’ efforts to shoot them, we savoured our juicy steak from Curtin Springs Station.

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2016; updated 2018; 2022

Feature Photo: Snake © S.O. Gross circa 1950

[Palmer River is a tributary of the Finke River. Some of the photos above remind me of our Palmer River campsite.]

***

Read more of the adventures of the T-Team in my memoir, Trekking with the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981 available on Amazon and Kindle. Check it out, click on the link below:

Trekking With the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981

Or

Download The Lost World of the Wends

Free till 2 August 2022.

Monday Musing–Be Still

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BE STILL

I go to the shops as I do every second day. At the checkout, the girl asks, ‘And how has your day been?’

‘Busy,’ I say.

‘That’s good,’ the girl says with a sage nod as if involved in some conspiracy to keep me on the hamster wheel of busyness.

In the Twenty-first century world “busyness” is good. Not being busy, then, is undesirable. Our Western Protestant work ethic touts, ‘Idleness is the devil’s workshop’. The state of “idleness” is to be avoided at all costs. These days, we equate idleness with boredom.

‘I’m bored,’ say your children (so did mine, when they were children many years ago, back in the good ol’ 1990’s), and terror strikes at the heart of each mother when they hear these words. Bored? We can’t have our children bored—idle—just imagine what devils will come to play if we allow boredom to fester. First, the grizzling, then, the niggling at each other, and before long, World War Three amongst the siblings and the house ends up looking like the Apocalypse.

*[Photo 1: The computer, the answer to all who cry, “I’m bored!” © L.M. Kling 2007]

No, we can’t have boredom.

So, in my quieter times now, I reminisce the days as a young mother, structuring each day, every hour—especially during the holidays, to avoid boredom—any strategy to avoid my tribe from becoming restless.

‘What’s wrong with a bit of boredom,’ my mother would say. ‘They need to learn to entertain themselves, you know, use their imagination. Nothing wrong with being still for a while, I say.’

Mum should know, she grew up in the Centre of Australia on a mission in the 1940’s and ‘50’s. Those were the really good ol’ days with no shopping centres, no electronic games, nor television. They did have radio, but her minister father only allowed the news to be heard from it. Heaven forbid they listen to modern music. During the War, even the radio was confiscated by the allies. So all my mum as a girl had to entertain herself were books. Even so, the Protestant work ethic was a major value in mum’s family as her mother, when she found her daughter reading would say, ‘Isn’t there some housework you should be doing?’

*[Photo 2: In the good ol’ days, being productive. Making kangaroo-skin rugs © S.O. Gross circa 1940]

As expected, then, I grow up in a world that values industry, productivity and filling each day to the full. The schools I attend are hot on producing good grades, projects and students who go on to university and become wealth-producing citizens.

Then, at sixteen, I have a revelation. We sing a chorus at church, “Be Still and know I am God”.

Being still…forget the homework…forget the housework…put aside my racing head of worries…centre my thoughts on God and his greatness. Pause for a moment and remember, God is God and He’s in control.

So at sixteen, I do just as the chorus bids. I hop on my deadly treadly (bike), and pedal down to the beach. I figure that’s the best place to be still; the waves lapping the sand, the sun on my back as I comb the shore for shells. Or on a sunny afternoon, I lie in the backyard and sunbake, think and ponder.

*[Photo 3: Entertainment of Seal, Glenelg South © L.M. Kling 2022]

The result? Wow! Those mountains? School and pedantic teachers going on about uniform—my socks, my hair? Boyfriends or lack of them? Life and my future? …All my concerns become molehills.

December 1979, I write a poem “Be Still”. Perhaps not the greatest work of literature, but the values stick with me…until I embark on university, work, and then a family. The poem hides in a book of my teenage missives. Ten years ago, I pull it out for a devotion. I preach being still, but I fail to apply the principles. I must keep busy. If I stop, even for a few minutes, what will others think? There’s just too much to do. Everyone’s depending on me as wife, mother, bible study leader, committee member …to produce the goods. I can’t let them down.

The culture to keep moving is ingrained. Go to meet people for the first time and they ask, ‘What do you do?’ The doing has to have a dollar sign attached to it. Not enough to do all the above as a mother. Must produce money to have status in the group. Without status, I am not heard. Ironic how the under-valued creative arts of writing and painting, though, afford status. I am creating. I am producing.

*[Painting 1: Life after Lock-down, Port Willunga © L.M. Kling 2020]

Even so, in this creative phase of my life, if I stand still, I feel guilty. Now, there are novels to write and art to produce. My “work”. I’m on the hamster wheel, but I can’t get off.

However, in all the busyness expected of me, the cogs of my life are unravelling. I drive to a cafe to meet a friend. She’s not there. I’d forgotten my mobile phone. I drive the thirty-minute return home and check my phone and then ring her. I’d gone to the wrong place. A misunderstanding. If I had taken the time to listen and ask the right questions…

The voice of my sixteen-year-old self still convicts me. ‘Be Still’.

For over forty years, I’d not been following my own advice. After the misunderstanding of the other day, I give myself permission to have time each day to rest…Time to be still…time to know God.

*[Painting 2: Sleeping Beauty on Huon, Tasmania © L.M. Kling]

So in the voice of my sixteen-year-old self, the poem:

Be Still

Exhausted, yet restless to advance

Ever onward in a trance,

A weary traveller

Refused to look around

So lost the intimate beauties which could be found.

Be still,

And know God the eternal creator.

Furtive, frustrated, fraught we flee,

When confusion bears down on thee,

A weary traveller.

Failure looms, chaos glooms,

In life, this lonely room.

Be still,

And wing your eyes

To soar above the clutter.

Marvel at the vastness of creation

Where God lies.

If what we infinitely fear

Will produce a lonely tear,

Of a weary traveller,

We blind ourselves with sorrows

Clinging to illusions of good morrows.

Be still,

Capture destiny in your heart,

For God said, “Let it be”.

See the beauty of it’s part.

Learn from what it has to offer

Ignore the scoffer.

A weary traveller did relent,

When Jesus was sent.

Be still,

While He,

Our hungry souls will fill.

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling (nee Trudinger) 1979

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2016; updated 2022

*Feature Photo: Cradle Mountain, Tasmania © L.M. Kling 2009

***

If you’d like to polish your writing skills or find out more about our new project, a self-publishing collective, click on the link to Indie Scriptorium…

Or…

Catch up on the exploits of Boris the over-grown alien cockroach, and Minna and her team’s attempt to subdue him.

For good holiday reading click on the links below…

The Lost World of the Wends

The Hitch-hiker

Mission of the Unwilling

Or…

Join the Journey, click on the link below:

Trekking with the T-Team: Central Australian Safari

100-Word Challenge–Worked

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…Into a Corner

All afternoon, our backyard echoed with the hum of the cement-mixer, and intermittent scraping. Dad, armed with a trowel, smoothed the cement over an area pegged to become the back patio.

Metre by metre, he pasted his way back.

Mum stood on the porch, and with hands on her hips, remarked, ‘And how are you going to get out of this one?’

In an ocean of soft cement, Dad looked around him, lost. ‘Er…um…I’ll work it out.’

Tracks back to the lawn-edge smoothed, Dad stood and admired his DIY job.

Next morning, paw-prints made their way to the rainwater tank.

© L.M. Kling 2019

Feature Photo: Dad Concreting back Patio © M.E. Trudinger circa 1978

***

It’s Holiday time.

Time to read more on the adventures of the war against the fiend you love to hate, an overgrown alien cockroach, Boris.

Click on the links below:

The Lost World of the Wends

The Hitch-hiker

Mission of the Unwilling

 Or

Longing for more travel adventures? Dreaming of exploring Australia?

Read the T-Team’s Aussie adventures, click on the link below:

Trekking the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981

100-Word Challenge–Putt-Putt Pa

/ lmkling / Leave a comment

[Have been engrossed in a murder-mystery, come thriller manuscript that I wrote in 2009, and then filed away. Wrote it so long ago I have to read it to find out what happened. So, completely forgot to post my 100-word challenge last week.

Anyway, Dad’s mid-life crisis vehicles keep rolling in. Was this new development a reflection of the direction Dad’s mid-life crisis was taking? Or was he just having a go?]

100-Word Challenge — Have a Go

After lunch at Grandma’s one Sunday, my cousin showed off his prized Ducati. Inspired, Dad resolved to have a go, and buy his own motorbike.

The first hint that Dad was dissatisfied with current transport-arrangements, was expressed in a progressive story game, where he described money-saving qualities of a motorbike. I pointed out the dangers, my cousin’s friend had died in a motorbike accident.

Soon after, Dad came puttering down the driveway on Putt-Putt, a bright orange motorbike. From then on, for a time, Dad puttered his way from Somerton to work in Port Adelaide. Everyone was happy, until…the accident.

© L.M. Kling 2019; updated 2022

Feature Photo: Born to be free: Dad on Putt-Putt in Grandma’s backyard © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1978

***

Indie Scriptorium

If you’d like to polish your writing skills or find out more about our new project, a self-publishing collective, click on the link to Indie Scriptorium…

Or…

Catch up on the exploits of Boris the over-grown alien cockroach, and Minna and her team’s attempt to subdue him.

For good holiday reading click on the links below…

The Lost World of the Wends

The Hitch-hiker

Mission of the Unwilling

Or…

Join the Journey, click on the link below:

Trekking with the T-Team: Central Australian Safari

Dad’s Mid-Life Crisis Cars–The Mazda

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My dad’s midlife crisis took a turn … for the worse. The Mazda. Not sure what type this less-than trusty steed was, suffice to say, he purchased it for a bargain as it had a damaged rear-end. So, the Mazda became the butt of many car-jokes with my friends.

A reblog, in memory of our much maligned Mazda.

An Ode to the Mazda

Now every time the battle-axe we release,
We pray:
Keep our Mazda running from police
Particularly today.

Grant us all green lights, for our brakes may fail,
And may thy Mazda’s effervescent light shine forth
At both head and tail.

Forgives us our blinkers, our wipers, the lot,
As we forgive those who are enemies and gripers
Of the Mazda we’ve got.

© L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1982; updated 2020; 2022

Feature Photo: Behind Rick’s green machine (Cleo), the Mazda lurks © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1978

***

For my Northern hemisphere readers, it’s Summer Holiday time. Time to read more on the war against the fiend you love to hate; an overgrown alien cockroach, Boris.

Click on the links below:

The Lost World of the Wends

The Hitch-hiker

Mission of the Unwilling

Or

Longing for more travel adventures? Dreaming of exploring Australia?

Read the T-Team’s Aussie adventures, click on the link below:

Trekking the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981

100-Word Challenge–The Holden

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The Dream Car—Holden Premier EH, Serena

[Another fond memory from my childhood…and Dad’s catchcry, “for the time being” took a breather when, after being promoted to Deputy Principal (Primary School), he bought the Holden Premier.]

Serena, our dream family car ferried the T-Team to Canberra. In 1975, hardly a maiden for this voyage, she drove us to our destination; a comfortable, safe ride over the Hay Plains. No breakdowns. No stranded waiting for road service on the hot dusty side of the road. A smooth ride that rocked me to sleep; the vinyl with scent fresh from the caryard to us.

She mounted the snow shovelled roads to Thredbo. From her window, my first sight of snow on a brilliant sunny day, snow shining on twisted eucalypt branches.

Memories.

When Dad sold her, mum cried.

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2019; updated 2022

Feature Photo: Not the Holden Premier, but one of my brother’s first car-building projects, a 1970 Holden Monaro HG. Salvaged from the wreckers, he lovingly spent hours panel-beating, arch-welding and engine-fixing this model back to life. © Lee-Anne Marie Kling circa 1982

Note: in the back of the photo, you’ll see the lurking the unfortunate successor to the Holden Premier and focus of the next week’s blog featuring my childhood family’s cars.

***

Catch up on the exploits of Boris the over-grown alien cockroach, and the mischief and mayhem he generates.

Click on the links below…

The Lost World of the Wends

The Hitch-hiker

Mission of the Unwilling

T-Team Series–Climbing Ayers Rock

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The T-Team With Mr B (16)

 [The last few months I have revisited The T-Team with Mr. B: Central Australian Safari 1977 which is a prequel to Trekking With the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981. In preparation for its release later this year, I will be sharing posts of this adventure.

In this episode we climb Uluru/Ayers Rock and Mr. B startles us with his dream for the Rock…]

Mr. B’s Dream for the Rock

Tourist buses lined the carpark. They looked like caterpillars all in a row ready for a race. People swarmed like ants around the base of the Rock and a steady stream of them marched up and down the slope.

Dad slowed the Rover to a crawl and slotted into a space at the end of the carpark. ‘Well, there’s the tourists,’ he said.

‘And what are we?’ Mr B asked.

‘I like to think we are travellers.’

‘What’s the difference?’

‘Tourists come to a place like the Rock, they climb it, snap a few photos and then they move on,’ Dad said. ‘Travellers take their time. They explore. They get to know the people who live here. They appreciate the culture and history of the place.’

‘So we’re tourists then,’ Mr B remarked, his expression dead-pan.

Dad scratched his brow. ‘Oh, no, I wouldn’t say that.’

‘I’m climbing the Rock,’ Matt said and then bolted out the back door.

Richard and I chased after Matt. We scrambled up the slope following the painted white line. Further up several tourists inched their way grasping chain rails that were secured into the rock.

*[Photo 1: Open at Last to climb the Rock © L.M. Kling 2013]

‘Hoy!’ Dad yelled. ‘Wait! We all go together.’

‘You forgot your water-bottles and lunch for the top,’ Mr B said.

‘Come on Matt,’ Richard called out to Matt who’d sprinted ahead, ‘better get our packs and stuff.’

Matt, Richard and I plodded back to Dad and Mr B where we collected our backpacks of supplies from them. Then as a group we recommenced our haul up the monolith.

The first part was treacherously steep. Before I even reached the rails, my shins ached from the gradient. We followed the broken white line. Deviation from the nominated path could be fatal. A plaque at the base of the Rock was a solemn reminder that several people had fallen to their deaths.

And yet, while climbing, I recall my mum telling me that when she climbed Ayers Rock back in the 1950’s, there was no white line, and not rail to clutch onto. Then she told me a funny story about an earlier time when a filmmaker took footage of the climb up the Rock with a local Indigenous guide. I have seen this film where at the top of the rock, there were pools from recent heavy rain, and the guide can be seen splashing in the water. Perhaps life and the way the Rock was viewed was different back then in the 1940’s and 50’s.

*[Photo 2: No rails or white line back in the 1950’s © S.O. Gross circa 1953]

Richard and Matt scampered ahead of me. I puffed my way up the slope behind them and soon lost sight of them. Dad and Mr B laboured behind me. Mr B rested every few steps. He swore he’d die of a heart attack before he fell to his death. Dad stayed with him and encouraged him to keep on going.

*[Photo 3: Climbing with Help © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1981]

Tourists passed me as they descended the Rock. They nodded and said, ‘G’day’ and remarked that the climb was well worth the effort.

Spurred by these recent Uluru conquerors, I took a deep breath and continued the climb.

The steep slope eased into endless ridges. Up and down. Up and down. At least my shins experienced some relief. But I seemed to be hiking over these rocky hills and dales forever, as if Uluru was the Tardis of distance. I glanced at my watch. I’d been hiking over an hour. Was the Rock that big?

*[Photo 4: Those undulations © R.M Trudinger 1981]

I stopped, took a swig of water from my canteen and surveyed the plain beneath. The Olgas shimmered like mauve marbles above the land striped in sienna and gold in the afternoon sun.

‘You’re almost there,’ Richard called. He raced up to me and then pointed. ‘The cairn is just over there.’

‘Where?’

‘Are you blind?’

‘I can’t see it.’

‘Come on.’

Richard led me to the pile of stones set in concrete. Half a dozen tourists plus Richard and Matt milled around the cairne, posing for photos and pointing at the various landmarks below. Richard, Matt and I conformed to the way of the tourists taking turns photographing each of us standing next to the cairn with Kata Tjuta behind us.

*[Photo 5: The Young Ones On the summit © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1977]

As we waited for our fathers, we admired the awesome scenery; the land below bathed in waves of pink, purple, blue and yellow. The boulders of Kata Tjuta changed from deep purple to blue with the movement of the sun as it travelled west. ‘Wow!’ I exclaimed. ‘This climb was well worth it.’

Other tourists summited, stayed a few minutes to snap a few shots and then trooped away down the Rock.

After Richard, Matt and I had eaten our sandwiches, signed the log book on the cairn, explored some bushes that grew out of the Rock and then watched the third lot of people arrive and disappear, Dad and Mr B staggered to the summit. Their faces glowed with perspiration.

Mr B clutched his chest and slumped down by the cairn. ‘I thought those corrugations would never end!’

Dad patted Mr. B on the back. ‘Ah, well, we made it.’

Mr B slurped water from his canteen, then standing up, he paced around the cairn while scrutinising the landscape with his binoculars. Dad pointed out the landmarks, Mt. Conner to the east, Kata Tjuta to the west and the Musgrave Ranges to the south, and so directing Mr B’s binocular-gaze.

*[Photo 6: The Oldies finally reach their goal © L.M. Kling (nee Trudinger) 1977]

After several minutes admiring the view, Mr B remarked, ‘Amazing! Certainly well worth the climb, ol’ boy.’ He then sidled up to Dad and put his arm around his shoulders. ‘I dare say, ol’ chap, the experience could be improved.’

‘What? A cable-car up to the top?’

‘Oh, hadn’t thought of that. No, I suggest there should be a fast food restaurant up the top here. The place needs refreshments. I mean to say, all these people have spent two hours climbing up here. They need some refreshments, don’t you think?’

Dad cleared his throat. ‘Er, um…’

Is this man for real? I thought. On the climb and also when we visited the cave, I sensed the Rock was holy, sacred. How could Mr B even contemplate building anything on its surface? ‘I reckon there should be less people climbing the Rock, not more,’ I said.

‘And another thing,’ Mr B was not finished, ‘the Rock needs a swimming pool halfway up. I’ve already picked out the perfect location. You see, while I was resting and contemplating during that terrible steep climb, I saw it, the perfect place for a pool. What do you say, ol’ chap?’

‘The Indigenous owners will never agree,’ Dad replied.

‘Well, I have some advice for the natives,’ Mr B said. ‘They need to get with the times. I mean, look at all the tourists. Look at all the opportunities.’

‘I doubt it,’ Dad shook his head, ‘come on, we better get down.’

After Dad and Mr B signed their names in the log book, we made our way down the Rock tracking along the white line. We nodded at the people climbing up and said, ‘G’day’ to them and advised them that the climb was well worth the effort.

*[Photo 7: Uluru rest finally at sunset © S.O. Gross circa 1953]

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2016; updated 2022

*Feature Photo: Uluru Climbers Like Ants © Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2013

***

Want more but too expensive to travel down under?

Why not take a virtual travel with the T-Team Adventures in Australia?

Click below:

Trekking With the T-Team: Central Australian Safari 1981…

And escape in time and space to the Centre of Australia 1981…

100-Word Challenge–Dad’s Midlife Crisis Cars (2)

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The Austin

[My dad’s catchcry, “for the time being” dogged the choice of cars he brought home. The Austin was no exception… ]

The Austin appeared one winter’s afternoon in our backyard; Dad’s solution to the worthless Wolseley, and of course, just for the time being.

Only cost $100. What a bargain!

Next morning, his breath steaming with excitement, Dad marched up to the green lump of a car. I sat sulking in this woe-begone wreck, the vinyl seat threatening frostbite on my delicate buns.

Dad hopped in and turned the ignition key. Nothing. Not even a squeak on this icy morning.

‘Ah, well, we have to crank it,’ Dad said.

Crank it? Yep, we had to crank this ancient Austin to life.

© Lee-Anne Marie Kling 2019

Feature Photo: Not actually the Austin, obviously…but was it the same end? © L.M. Kling 2010

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For good holiday reading click on the links below…

And catch up on the exploits of Boris the over-grown alien cockroach, and the mischief and mayhem he generates.

Click on the links below…

The Lost World of the Wends

The Hitch-hiker

Mission of the Unwilling