Take a trip on the Clyde

Random shots of Batemans Bay by Random Aussies

 

If this puts you off staying at Batemans Bay, we can always put you up at "Riverbend Cottage"! ☺

 

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger

 

Whether you've read Nietzsche or not, you may still want to join us to walk the road less travelled - Runnyford Road - from Nelligen down to the Princess Highway.

It's an easy 22 km on an unsealed but well maintained road which is very scenic as it winds through forest and open grazing land and across an old wooden bridge that rattles and shakes like an old steam train as it spans the little-known Buckenbowra River which flows into the Clyde.

From there it's just another 10 km to the Highway but if 12 km has been enough for you (remember Nietzsche? ☺), Padma can meet us by the bridge and, after some refreshments, drive us in air-conditioned comfort back to "Riverbend Cottage".

A tale with a sting in the tail

 

Burg Thurston works at Batemans Bay's Innes Boatshed which has been a local landmark since 1955. There he made friends with a giant black stingray called "Nobby".

“Over time, the stingray got more confident”, Burg says. “Now I jump in, he shoos the other stingrays off and comes in and glides up my belly.”

"I loved to surf in the mornings and when I started working the morning shift I was often a bit anxious when I knew I was missing the waves. Then I realised, if my mind was always in the surf while I was working, I was going to miss what is right in front of me, which was the stingrays and how beautiful the boatshed was, and how good my job actually was.”

Did you yell 'Encore'? Well then, here it is:

Wherever you are and whatever you do, this film may inspire you to take your focus off what you haven't got and turn it to what's right in front of you.

Nelligen. Who knows where the name came from?

Nobody seems to know, not even my wife who usually knows everything! ☺

As Stuart Magee explains in his beautiful little volume of local history, The Rivers and the Sea, "the need for the place arose in the 1850s when Braidwood and its satellites such as Majors Creek, Araluen and Mongarlowe were up to their ears in the explosion of people and commerce surrounding the discovery of gold.

The movement of goods, people and information between Braidwood and Sydney was chancy and oh so slow. Depending on the weather, bullock trains might take three weeks or three months. Horse-drawn carriage or dray was usually quicker but limited in capacity and expensive. Down the mountain lay the very navigable Clyde and thence a 24-hour run by steamship to Sydney. There was, as I understand the historian Reynolds, some competition between Currowan and Nelligen as to which would receive Braidwood's blessing, and Nelligen won out.

So, in the 1850s, the town was laid out and the road from Braidwood was opened. And a tough road it was too. There is a number of old photos showing the grim results of teams of horses and bullocks going over the side of the Clyde Mountain road.

Nelligen boomed! Over the next 20 years there arose four pubs, two stores, a blacksmith, a bakery, a police station, a court-house, schools, churches and a post office, Above all was the terminal building of the Illawarra Steam Navigation Company. If today you were to set up your picnic in that nice little park between the general store and the wharf, you would be smack in the middle of the 126 x 45 feet ISNC's jetty and store (oh, very well then, 38 x 14 metres). Twice a week the steamers plied between Nelligen and Sydney, stopping at the far less consequential village of Batemans Bay on the way. The size of some of the paddle-steamers, and later screw-steamers, is astonishing. The Kembla, a paddle-steamer in use on the Clyde from 1861, was 183 feet long. The S.S. Moruya was 150 feet and 530 tons. The S.S. Allowrie was 180 feet. It ran aground on a mudflat in the river on one occasion and had to await the high tide to float it off. The last steamer to call at the Port of Nelligen was in 1952 - 99 years after the first."

But the goldfields centering on Braidwood started to run down, then the timber industry went into decline, and, Stuart continues in his little book, "after such a pivotal role in the development of the southern parts of the state, Nelligen has been deserted even by the highway and left to fend for itself.

All up and down the coast the faces of small towns are being tarted up and titivated by tourist-boards and enthusiastic councils. But Nelligen remains untouched and unimpressed by such progress. Not even the modern marvels of reticulated water and sewerage have imposed themselves upon it.

If I lived there I would hope not to see it change. But you sense it may just be resting after its great exertions and sooner or later some bright spark will again see it as the right place to do heroic things." (reproduced with Stuart's permission)

There is so much more in this delightful book but I won't spoil your anticipation as I am sure your local Angus & Robertson has a copy of this enjoyable read!

A bit of everything

 

You may enjoy watching this short clip because you like fishing or Hobie kayaks or the Clyde River.

 

There is NOTHING - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats at Riverbend Cottage

Click on image for a close-up of Rat and Mole

 

At Riverbend, we live a jolly life by the river. By it and with it and on it and in it. And if you've half-forgotten your "Wind in the Willows", let us quote you some more to get you in the mood:

`This has been a wonderful day!' said the Mole, as the Rat shoved off and took to the sculls again. `Do you know, I`ve never been in a boat before in all my life.'

`What?' cried the Rat, open-mouthed: `Never been in a--you never--well I--what have you been doing, then?'

`Is it so nice as all that?' asked the Mole shyly, though he was quite prepared to believe it as he leant back in his seat and surveyed the cushions, the oars, the rowlocks, and all the fascinating fittings, and felt the boat sway lightly under him.

`Nice? It's the ONLY thing,' said the Water Rat solemnly, as he leant forward for his stroke. `Believe me, my young friend, there is NOTHING--absolute nothing--half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats. Simply messing,' he went on dreamily: `messing--about--in--boats; messing-----about in boats--or WITH boats,' the Rat went on composedly, picking himself up with a pleasant laugh. `In or out of 'em, it doesn't matter. Nothing seems really to matter, that's the charm of it. Whether you get away, or whether you don't; whether you arrive at your destination or whether you reach somewhere else, or whether you never get anywhere at all, you're always busy, and you never do anything in particular; and when you've done it there's always something else to do, and you can do it if you like, but you'd much better not. Look here! If you've really nothing else on hand this morning, supposing we drop down the river together, and have a long day of it?'

At the end of which you may want to read the book again or watch it on DVD. We have them both.   ☺