So Australian Traveller magazine thinks Zeehan and Queenstown are the ugliest towns in Australia?
Call me biased, I know I am, but I think Zeehan is quaint little town with some outstanding architecture.
Having been there I’ve also found the people to be welcoming and friendly, in fact, there was no ugliness there at all.
God knows what the Australian Traveller journo was thinking when she drove through this beautiful (nyah-nyah!) town, but I’d guess that it was raining and she didn’t get out of the car.
Queenstown on the other hand, is ugly. There. I’ve said it. I think the town is an ugly dump surrounded by the legacy of decades of poisoning. I am so sick of hearing Queenstown locals or refugees tell me how “unique” the “moonscape” is — I think I’ll spew if I hear that toxic legacy described in fond and loving terms one more time.
It’s toxic and its ugly, pure and simple.
Since the identification of Queenstown and Zeehan as national ugly icons, the point has been made repeatedly that it is the people and not the town’s infrastructure that truly determine its beauty … or ugliness.
I don’t know about Queenstown’s locals but I’ve found the people of Zeehan to be
very nice, so I was a bit shocked to hear West Coast Mayor and Jack-the-Lad Darryl Gerrity proving the journalist’s point somewhat by responding to her findings with an attack.
I find it personally amusing to allege the journalist assessed Zeehan from a moving car, but Gerrity’s comment is in another league altogther:
Darryl Gerrity: We’ve suffered setbacks on the West Coast over many, many years Tim, mine closures etcetera, disasters, fires, um, and the word of a journo, an incorrect journo who was having a bad hair day, is not going to ruin our parade.
Tim Cox: How was she having a bad hair day exactly?
DG: Well I think she must have got up on the wrong side of the bed, you know, I think she’s probably a Sydney journo who was used to having lattes served by people with names like Angelina, Julio and Mercedes and she’s been served a cup of tea in the morning by someone called Fred or Doris.
TC: You can get a fine latte in Queenstown or Zeehan!
DG: Of course you can, of course you can.
[Darryl Gerrity, 7ZR, 24/5/05]
It seems one ugly turn deserves another.
Yours,
Jason Lovell
