We’re frisked at the gate and our bottle of water and Diet Coke are confiscated. You’d have to be kidding, wouldn’t you – water banned in stinking hot Townsville? But it might be gin or vodka and the Coke might have bourbon in it. They don’t want punters bringing their own grog. And no one under the age of 18 is admitted to the track. This is a serious, adults only piss-up. Overheard on the way in – “I’m only here to drink”.

This is racing in FNQ – that’s Far North Queensland. I’m starting to fear the worst. I’m expecting a crowd full of bogans, Hansonites and redneck punters in Bob Katter ten gallon hats – but I’m wrong. Everywhere I look there are beautiful, nubile young women and smartly dressed young men in suits and ties. About 80% of the women have a tatt, and about 80% of the men have a tie, and about 40%, both blokes and girls, have a hat. I’d say the average age is about 23 years. I feel a bit old and crumpled.

Conditions for horse watching are poor. The public are not allowed into the horse stalls area and I can only gain access after paying $20 to get a members pass. Many horses seem to be unattended in the stalls, which I regard as a serious negative, and some are even hobbled. The mounting yard is long and narrow so that only about half the field parades past before going on to the track. Most of the mounting yard fence is taken up with the catwalk for the fashions on the field. The conditions are so bad for horse watchers that I don’t even have a bet. But it’s ideal for people watching. Hats and tatts. The boys go for the Gleeson, the pork pie hat popularised by the retired VRC steward, Des Gleeson. And the favoured tatt spot is at the base of the neck on the back.

Tora Tora Tora wins the Cup.

We leave before the last race. Heels are coming off now. And blokes are falling out of trees.

1 comment

I see the forecast for Melbourne today is a Min 6 and Max 12. Here at Palm Cove, in the spelling paddock, it is Min 19 and Max 29.

Wish you were here. On second thoughts, maybe not.

0 comments

Carnarvon Gorge has long been on my list of must-do walks. We arrive just in time to get a map from information and check into our lodgings – a safari tent. Camping with an en suite. Now that’s what I call camping!

The walk is a there-and-back-again, criss-crossing the Carnarvon Creek on stepping stones over 20 times, with side trips to canyons and aboriginal art galleries. The ranger asks me how long it would take me to walk 14 km and I reckon about 6-8 hours. So he suggests I aim for the Art Gallery and then check out the Amphitheatre, Ward’s Canyon and Moss Garden on my return.

I head off at 0830. It’s crisp and clear – cold really. I soon encounter a tour group of geriatrics. They are so deaf they can’t hear me calling out “coming through”. And soon after, another tour group blocking the path, closely inspecting the trunk of a tree. And then I have the gorge to myself. It’s lovely and quiet. At last. Solitude, stillness, spirituality. The only sound is the soft trilling of treecreepers, the flapping of currawong wings as they abandon the path ahead, and the incessant tinnitus in my head.

I reach the Art Gallery at 0945 so I push on another 4 km to the Cathedral Cave. A seductive sign points to the end of the main gorge track at Big Bend, so I fang it and reward myself with a nice cup of tea. 10 km in two and a quarter hours – not too bad for an older person. Plenty of time to explore everything on the return. Binaroo Gorge is a side trip of about one km, but is absolutely stunning, with steep, narrow, moss-sided walls. Cathedral Cave has wonderful art and etchings. On closer inspection some of the etchings look a bit dodgy. And indeed. They are images of the human vulva. Wow! Thousands of years old. And I thought sex was just a recent invention. I spend a good half hour inspecting the works in detail. Back to the Art Gallery, and oh no, more vulvas. Everywhere, in your face, vulvas. Lunch, taking it all in, then Ward’s Canyon, cool and intimate with king ferns, the Amphitheatre, an awesome chamber, nearly 200 feet deep, entered through ladders and a slit in the rock. A womb, perhaps, to accommodate all those vulvas? And finally, with my boots dragging and scuffing the track, the sublime, dripping, Moss Garden. Back at the start at 1700 – eight and half hours and 25 km. No wonder my legs feel like cramping up.

The walk is definitely in my top five day walks. Number one must remain the yet to be completed Tongariro Crossing, with three failed attempts. Number two must be the walk of a lifetime in the Grampians – the exhilarating Mt Stapleton-Hollow Mountain challenge. Any walk at the Prom ranks highly, and the Murchison River at Kalbarri is good, but I’ll give Carnarvon Gorge number three.

The Missus gives me two Panadol Osteo to ease the aching legs, but it’s hard to sleep. Tossing and turning, dreaming about vulvas.

0 comments

 The Missus and I are heading north, like migrating swallows, seeking some respite from the Melbourne winter. Our first stop is Lightning Ridge, outback New South Wales, where Nigel, a childhood friend of The Missus has an opal mine. But it’s still cold – minus two overnight with a heavy white frost.

 We lob into our comfortable lodgings at Chasin’ Opals and then head out to explore the town. It’s mostly a tourist town now, with most of the holes filled in and only about 50 miners left out in the bush. The architecture is fascinating – just grab anything that’s at hand. Bottles, cans, stone, scrap cars, caravans, cobbled together with bits of tin. The hot artesian bore that once soothed miners’ aching muscles has been turned into a swimming pool for tourists. The Missus flops in.

 Next day Nigel takes us on a 150 km tour of the active opal fields. They all have evocative names – Moonshine, Allah’s Strike, Eagles Nest, Dead Man’s Lead, Les’s Rush. It’s a maze of rough bush tracks, camps, humpies, mines, hoists, agitators, bores, tanks and rusted, discarded machinery. The usual deal is to drill a nine inch hole to find the opal dirt and then a three foot shaft if it strikes some colour. The opal dirt goes up in a bucket on a hoist and is then washed in an agitator, a large cement mixer barrel. The Missus confronts all her fears of claustrophobia and descends 60 feet into the mine, clinging hopefully to Nigel. It is an amazing experience. A rabbit warren of tunnels. And a helluva lot of work for little reward. But it’s the lifestyle that seduces them.

 Nigel says that the people out here are all social outcasts, misfits and alcoholics. I think I could fit in here. And they even have a 1200m racetrack. I would call the going, ah, let’s see, puggy.

1 comment

This is my last day for the season and it looks like being a bit of a fizzer. The forecast is for rain all day and the track is a deteriorating DEAD 4. I’m just going along for the colour and movement. Besides, it gets me out of the house. A bet seems pretty unlikely. I’ve been scared off from the last three mid-weekers because of the HEAVY 8. So my season is petering out. And as soon as I step onto the course the track is downgraded to SLOW 6. This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper.

 In the first race the two-year-olds run a time of 72.55. The late and great EJ Minnis’s par time for a genuine DEAD track is 72.62, so that’s quite reasonable. And you’d expect that first use of the track is likely to produce a better time before it gets all chopped up.

 In the second race, the good thing Our Baby Bonus, runs 59.88 compared with EJ’s par of 59.83 for a genuine DEAD. Again, not too bad.

 In the third I’m quite taken with the appearance of Stoneblack, but hold back. The horse nearly wins with a terrific run, with a race time of 98.01. EJ’s par times rate that as a GOOD track! I coulda backed that horse! $2.90 the place. Damn!

 I miss the fourth, a 3000 metre race for plodders, and fool around photographing cannon bandages. I still don’t like them and they are still a serious negative. But at least they provide some colour and movement.

 In the fifth, only seven horses. But I’ve now decided that the track is bettable, it hasn’t rained all day, it’s my last day, and I’m going for it.  Tindal looks terrific with his two strappers and I go for him. He hangs on to win in 97.72. The track is still GOOD and I’m up and running with $3.30 for the place.

 In the sixth I can’t split El Mandon and Gran Sasso, so I leave it. The time of 71.75 is a GOOD/DEAD time.

 In the seventh Believe’n Achieve looks the goods and wins like a good thing at $1.80 the place. And the time of 91.45 is better than the par of 91.88 for a GOOD track

 And in the last Elumino is faultless in the yard and showing $2.90 the place on the tote and $1.55 with the books with five minutes to go. I know it will be crunched but I back it on the tote at $1.80 with one minute left. Elumino ducks along the rail for third and I get $1.60. And the time for the last? A SLOW 60.33. It’s all too late now to stop betting!

 Three out of three for the day. It’s nice to go out with a bang.

 I’m off to the spelling paddock now and will return in the spring. Hopefully I’ll find time to send a few postcards from the paddock.

0 comments

I’m feeling fairly average. In fact , I’m quite ordinary. Well, really, I’m a bit poorly. My head is full of germs. But there is no point staying at home moaning about it, so I’m off to Caulfield to share the germs around. I’m stuffed full of cold and flu tablets, but they hardly seem to make an impression on an insistent, dull headache. And the congestion in my ears and nose seems to amplify my tinnitus, so that it sounds like the entire Melbourne Symphony Orchestra is tuning up inside my brain. It’s so noisy in there that I can’t even think. It looks like a dangerous day for decision making.

 And it doesn’t start too well. The omen bet Pray for Me is a standout in the second. No faults, perfectly behaved, head in towards the strapper. I have crossed out all the other horses, so I double my bet. The horse has a perfect, faultless run with cover, but just fails to hold on for third. Oh well.

 In the third I don’t like the favourite War Ends, mainly because it was tossing its head around repetitively out the back. I offer to lay it for the place at $1.40 on my betting instrument, but the bet goes unmatched. The favourite weakens to run fourth. Oh well.

 In the fifth race Patrick Payne’s Fieldmaster looks the goods, with a nice positive strapper. The horse has the race shot to bits but is just nosed out on the line. It’s times like these that I’m glad I’m a place punter! Thank goodness. Back to square one.

 One more roll of the dice in the last. Das Machen and Delyara both look good, and I settle on Das Machen. She leads from pillar to post with Delyara running a very good third at $5.90. But I happy with my $2.80 and two out of three for the day. My long term average.

 And I’m still feeling quite average. Home to bed to nurse my poor sore head.

0 comments

I’m only here for five races today. As unlikely as it sounds, sometimes other events take precedence in your life over horse racing. Today is such a day. I have to go to a birthday party – and I love parties! Of the five races I only manage to look at the horses in three. I miss one race trying to photograph Golden Tabby’s marvellous stereotypy, smacking his lips. But the movie function on my camera won’t work properly. I later discover that the “M” setting on the camera means manual, not movie! And I miss another race talking to Ken Fythe, the Stony Creek trainer of Rockpecker. Apparently the stewards listen to Radio 927 and quizzed him about an injury to his horse, and then broadcast the details over the course PA. Important information really – now that you can lay horses.

Lloyd Williams’ imported Cup horses are on show in the sprint race. They both look very good in the mounting yard, led by the usual two strappers. Mourayan is the smaller and lighter of the two, and Alandi, the dual Group 1 winner, is stocky and solid with a deep chest – plenty of room for a large heart! They are very similar in appearance. Both of them are dark bay or brown in colour, with Mourayan more bay and Alandi more brown. And both of them have similar white facial markings – a star and strip – despite having different sires. I couldn’t fault their behaviour. They finish down the track, barely beating the ambulance home, as you would expect for 80/1 chances. But watch out for them in the spring!

Yummy birthday cake

In the end, I didn’t even have a bet. But the party was good. Happy Birthday Amy! Now we are one!

0 comments

I’m a bit fearful as there has been rain about overnight and I’m not allowed to bet on Slow tracks. And apparently they have been putting water on the track as well. I hate that – why can’t they just leave it be! The track is rated a Dead 4 but the word from the jockeys is that it’s at least a Dead 5. I check my par times for a Slow track at Flemington compiled by the late and great EJ Minnis and find a figure of 85.95 seconds for 1400 metres. In the first race they run a time of 86.26 for 1410 metres. If I allow 0.5 seconds for the extra distance of 10 metres it still looks like a Slow 6 track. CAUTION!! DO NOT BET!!

But in the third race I’m still quite keen to back The Comedian, very relaxed, head in towards the strapper. And the favourite Undeniably looks a risk, a bit sweaty and bulky. There’s a fall in the race. Luckily The Comedian misses the trouble but he gives up in the straight and compounds quickly to finish seventh. What a joke! He couldn’t pick up his feet! Whenever I lose I look for someone or something to blame apart from myself, and in this case it is quite clear that the track is at fault. I had better shut up shop! I probably should have laid the favourite who finished ninth at $1.10 the place. The punter’s lament – should’ve, should’ve.

What to do at the races when your hands are tied? Photograph some horses, of course. And today everywhere I look I see a pony. A plethora of ponies. When I wrote Watching Racehorses it was quite uncommon to see a pony. Of the more than 10,000 horses that I observed only 176 were accompanied by a pony, about one every meeting. It was the most positive of all the variables that I scored. Now that everyone has read the book they all bring a pony to the races, and the advantage, while still positive, has been much reduced.

 Today I saw nine  ponies. Two could not be identified because they were occupying the wrong stall and three were over 14 hands, and didn’t fit in the photo,  and so should really be called horses. Here are the best six.

And the winner is …… Golden Charmer, don’t you think? How could you resist it? I broke all my rules and backed it for a place on the tote at $2.70. I watched the race on the TV and the horse was so far behind the first and second horses that it was out of the picture when they hit the line. But it survived for third. And the final result for the seven horses identified with ponies was two placings and five unplaced runs. Not too bad, but not what it once was.

2 comments

My mission today, should I decide to accept it, is to photograph Tesbury Jack’s splint on his nearside foreleg. Splint bones are the remnants of pre-historic toes and run down either side of the cannon in the horse. They can get bumped or knocked and the area can become inflamed and swollen, but will heal with time. Often cannon bandages can conceal them, but Jack’s is on full view. It’s tricky to photograph when he is moving, but here are a couple of attempts. It looks to be a “cold” splint as Tesbury Jack does not appear to be in pain or lame. Wikipedia has a good account of splints if you are interested in more.

The horse is unhappy in the mounting yard and very fractious, with his ears back and grabbed by the clerk. He’s not worth laying at $6.80 for the place and drops out of the race to finish last. On return to scale he’s bleeding from both nostrils. Back in his stall he’s a sorry sight. This is his second conviction for bleeding so he’s now banned from racing in Australia. A sad end for a terrific racehorse.

On a more positive note I was shat on from a great height by a flying swallow. I checked with all and sundry and confirmed that it is a sign of immense good fortune if you are struck by avian excreta whilst at the racetrack. And so it proved.

I successfully layed Johansky for the place as she was not at all happy in her stall and let out an almighty groan. The strapper asked the horse “What’s the matter?” Of course, the horse did not reply, but I always interpret groaning as meaning that the horse would rather be somewhere else. Much like a teenager. So, I decided to oppose it for the place at $1.90. During the run Johanski dropped to the rear, as I expected, but ran on quite well for fourth.

And I backed Broken at $2.20 the place because of the positive strapper – with one hand stroking the horse’s withers all the way round the mounting yard. Broken dived through on the rail for a strong win. Bring on more swallows.

2 comments

I’m writing this while I watch the Anzac Day parade on TV.  The ranks are thinning – there’s not many veterans left now.

My grandfather, Nelson Wellington, was a soldier. Well, how could you be anything else with a name like that? He fought in both wars. He was on his way to Gallipoli on 2 September 1915, aboard the Southland with the 21st Battalion, when it was torpedoed by a German submarine. Forty men were lost. Most of the 1400 men on board took to the life boats, but Nelson remained on board with a volunteer crew of stokers and beached the ship at Mudros, a small port on the Greek island of Lemnos. He then served at Gallipoli, both at Lone Pine, and Quinn’s Post, the hairiest place on the peninsula. From Gallipoli he went to the Western Front, where he was wounded at Ypres. He copped a bullet in the lung, which remained there for the rest of his life, because it was too dangerous to remove. He was awarded the Military Cross.

In the second war he was the Commanding Officer of the 2nd/2nd Pioneers, and fought the Vichy French in Syria. Again he was wounded by a piece of shrapnel which shattered his right elbow. The Pioneers took their objective, a small fort at Merdjayoun, and Nelson was awarded the DSO. He was evacuated to the 7th Australian General Hospital where my Father was working. My Mother tells the story in her Memoirs of how bad news arrived by telegram, delivered by the local postmaster. When the postmaster turned up on her doorstep with the dreaded telegram she simply asked: “My husband or my Father?” Nelson had to step down as CO, but fortunately avoided the fate of the Pioneers who were captured by the Japanese in Java and spent the war as POWs, with many ending up on the Burma Railway. 

Nelson Wellington and Douglas Macarthur

After convalescence and return to Australia Nelson was appointed Australian Liaison Officer to General Douglas Macarthur. But his war was still not over. He was sent on a secret mission to investigate the formation of a paratroop unit to be used in the New Guinea campaign. The plane he was in crash landed at Rockhampton airport and burst into flames. The airstrip was next to a convent and some nuns rushed out and dragged him from the burning wreckage. After his recovery he was convinced the nuns had saved his life and he converted to Roman Catholicism. 

Nelson had a stroke and collapsed with a thud on the floor of our bathroom in 1952. He died without regaining consciousness three days later in Dandenong Hospital. He had seen a lot of war. He was just 63. 

It’s hard not to feel emotional on Anzac Day.……….at the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them. 

It’s a corny and hackneyed phrase, but still appropriate. Lest We Forget. 

I’m off to Flemington now.

1 comment