Hit the road with Greg Cure for an eclectic examination of the Midland Highway from the perspective of a traveller, reflecting on 50 or so years of travel from the north and north-west of Tasmania on this highway to Hobart. As we move through the landscape the fixed parts are examined, in some cases actual towns; in others the subsets of farms such as fields, plains, rivers, forests and lakes. We started the series with an overview and then Part 2: Towns Starting with ‘W’ (North).
The Midland HighwayPart 3: Towns starting with “W” (Ross Cluster)
Grim Reminders
Along this highway people have perished in a number of ways. A few unlucky souls perish by means of automobile accidents each year. It is chastening to see a temporary floral tribute or makeshift cross on the side of a highway where someone has lost their life, in these instances usually at a young age. Sometimes more than one person dies in an exceedingly horrific car crash. We read too often of the local policeman who is the first to attend a horrific car crash site to see the bodies of several local youth and further saddled with the additional grim task of conveying this macabre news to the parents. There is a spot not too far north of Ross where a friend of mine perished on a cold winter morning around fifty years ago. In this case even though he was young handsome and well educated his life had hit a flat spot. Our circle of friends, even to this day, are unsure if he deliberately drove off the road and took his own life. We will never know. Passing near the spot sometimes one feels a cold hand on one’s shoulder.
Why Chinese Tourists like Ross
The author at Ross.
It might be doubtful if Chinese tourists return to Tasmania in the numbers pre- COVID- 19. The deterioration in relations between China and Australia is looking to worsen in the short to medium term and this will impact future Chinese tourists numbers as well. It must be remembered that not all Chinese tourists come from mainland China: Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong supply many tourists. My expertise comes from the fact I lived and worked in China for several years and learned a little of the language and culture. My current wife is Chinese, I remarried after my former wife died in her early fifties of lung cancer. My late wife, though of European descent, was fluent in Mandarin and studied Mandarin on a post graduate scholarship in Beijing. We travelled China together whilst she was alive. I have an open-minded view on China and have experienced the absolute best and worst of China in my time living there.
My Chinese wife loves all of Tasmania and I have made it my object to ensure she is taken to the major tourist spots in Tasmania as well as some out of the way places too. She is particularly attached to Strahan and Ross- which she calls ‘Ross Town’. We cannot drive past the Ross turn off; she insists we visit on every occasion! I do believe by examining why Chinese tourists like Ross might open a broader conversation about some key issues. These might be over tourism/ tourist fatigue, drawing more tourists to some towns as a way of stimulating local economies and more broadly what is it about some towns (e.g. Ross, Derby, Richmond) that gives them a hype other towns seemingly do not have.
Anzac Day 2019
My wife and I visited Ross on Anzac Day 2019 not long before the mid-morning Anzac Parade. A large contingent of Chinese tourists were enjoying the town’s sights around the northern ‘Bakery‘ area. Large tour groups are preferred by the mainland Chinese government – command and control is never far away, and it is likely the tour leader would very ‘patriotic’. Another reason for the preponderance of group tours is the same reason they are popular all over the world – it brings travel possibilities to those who might otherwise not be able to afford it. As it was early autumn, the leaves were starting to fall from the plentiful deciduous trees that lined the main street. Rather than blowing steadily the wind was still for several minutes than producing a fierce gust of perhaps 2-3 minutes. This sent a shower of leaves cascading down from the trees in an enjoyable intermittent display. The leaves already on the ground scurried along the road and verges. It was an incredible autumn display. I enjoyed the spectacle every bit as much as the Chinese tourists.
Anzac Day at Ross, 2019.
My wife who rarely eats sweet things insists on buying a vanilla slice from the top bakery each visit. This business has somehow promoted well outside of Ross its monster vanilla slices. Chinese are very susceptible to fads and another one far outstripping the vanilla slice are the lavender teddy bears, which Chinese tourists seem to be addicted to. The bakery was packed with dine-in patrons, mostly Chinese, and a lot of vanilla slices were being consumed. I asked myself was this just deft marketing or had there been a long tradition of the bakery producing a world class vanilla slice. The answer to the question is immaterial in a sense. It sets up a problem for me though because the bottom (southern) bakery serves on a going basis lambs fry on toast. I don’t eat lambs fry regularly anymore, but I like it every three or four months and I like not having to cook it too. So each time I am in Ross I want to go to one bakery and my wife to another!
Villages of the incredibly young and the very old.
The hometown, or where are you from concept, is very important in China. More importantly it is most likely a rural village. The Chinese call it lao jia ( literally old home). Prior to the opening up of China it was predominately a rural society. In what was the greatest migration in human history millions of Chinese migrated to the coastal cities to staff the huge factories that were to make China the greatest manufacturing hub on earth. In their wake, back in the rural villages were left their children, their parents, and their grandparents. China operates under a household registration system (hukou) and it works like this. I will explain by reference to Australia. Lets say you were born in Cairns (Queensland) and moved to Ross (Tasmania) as a teenager. Now to get important papers like your birth certificate or a passport you need to travel back to Cairns to get it; you will need to return to Cairns to marry; and should you have children they need to stay in Cairns and be looked after by their grandparents and go to school in Cairns. To send them to school in Ross would incur huge financial payments. A salient reminder of what can happen under this policy was a tragic drowning of several children in a river in a Chinese rural village – all the residents in the village were either too old or young to come to their rescue. There is a message for rural Tasmania in this too – if our small towns lose all their teenagers to the city surely it must skew the social makeup of our towns and rob it of some of the energy and dynamism of youth.
Seasonally attuned
My sojourn in China demonstrated to me how lucky we are to have a plentiful supply of fresh air in Australia. It is noticeable immediately when you return to Hobart after a year or so in China. This too is graduated; I detect the smells of fuels now when I visit a major Australian capital. After a day or so in Melbourne or Sydney I immediately want to wash my hair, but capital city air in Australia is pristine in comparison to China. So a major attraction to country Tasmania is the quality of the air. Naturally, the tranquillity is an additional attraction. For me this raises the dilemma the midland towns need to address. How does a midland town keep the balance between having a tourist attraction, economic activity and maintaining a country lifestyle with its attendant peace and quiet, and friendly atmosphere?
I found a lot of China reminded me of the Australia I grew up in in some senses; it was like stepping back in time. I trapped or shot rabbits, I caught fish at the wharf scaled and gutted them so they could be cooked almost immediately, Dad and many others slaughtered and plucked game to eat, Mum’s plum puddings hung in cloth in the bathroom all December, men manually carted hay and dug spuds, boot makers mended our shoes (or at least the complicated ones Dad couldn’t do). Sometimes these practices linger on longer in country Australia and are part of its charm.
I must add that some Chinese so called ‘wet’ markets are confronting to western people; however my tastes have changed too – I have long deserted tripe with white sauce and black pudding. Chinese people are very seasonally attuned. Major holidays and festivals are based on a seasonal calendar not a numeric one. Chinese New Year starts with the first signs of Spring. Whilst we sometimes curse the worst of winter in Tasmania, I find the change of seasons invigorating. I think this too attracts Chinese visitors. Tasmanian towns like Ross with a distinctive bridge, its gently flowing river, its northern hemisphere trees, and its rural backdrop convey a sense of picture postcard China to the Chinese visitors, but additionally these things are just as refreshing for the Australian visitor. Whilst in China I observed on a Chinese holiday hundreds of people just photographing and admiring the newly emerging blossom – pointing at it, wondering at it, photographing it. My wife loves to drive to New Norfolk in autumn and admire and photograph the yellowing leaves on the many poplars there or collect mountain water from Mount Wellington/kunyani to make tea with. I must confess the fresh spring water off the mountain makes a very good cup of tea.
The lone soldier
Digger statue looks out over Ross.
One thing that connects most Australian towns is the cenotaph or war memorial usually dating from after the great war. Particularly moving is the soldier head bowed in full uniform and rifle – almost timeless. Another feature is often the old field gun. On this Anzac Day in Ross, vehicle traffic queued behind the memorial as the marchers gathered, because traffic had to give way to the march. A former Prime Minister had shamefully politicised Anzac Day and turned it from returned servicemen who just wanted to go to either or both services and mix with their mates and remember the fallen to a bit of a sideshow. The simple dignified march at Ross reminded me of that old-fashioned and dignified sort of commemoration.
The Bridge Towns
Three Tasmanian towns have a convict-built bridge as their centrepiece – Richmond, Tunbridge, and Ross. Perhaps the red brick bridge at Campbell Town constitutes a fourth. The Bridge was designed by John Lee Archer, as far as I can determine his only Midlands project, who was the colonial architect from 1827 to 1838 He was responsible for many fine buildings in and around Hobart, most notably Parliament House. However for the best explanation of the genesis of the bridge and its carvings go no further than the Tasmanian Times article.
‘Midlands’ Aristocracy’ & Wool
Ross is the centre of the fine wool industry in the area. John Leake was a pioneer in this field as were James Reid, Lewis Gilles, and Benjamin Horne . It can be argued that the northern midlands has the best fine merino wool in the world. There is a Wool Centre at the southern end of Ross that is well worth a visit.
There was a group of families who from 1831 through land grants (or more properly the government redistribution of land from the conquered palawa peoples) accumulated large properties in the midlands, who built up wealth and social prestige mainly through wool. Some of these families still retain their original properties. Some have disappeared; there is a maxim about dynasties that is the first generation accumulates the wealth, the second consolidates and builds on that wealth and the third flits it way through gambling, drink, or madness! Many were prominent in government, business, the defence forces, the church, education and philanthropy. Many made a significant contribution to Tasmania. Others were perceived to be ultra-reactionary and many have arguably held back Tasmania. Conspiracy theorists like to argue, rather fancifully, that they formed a secret cabal that ran Tasmania.
At the time I was at University in Hobart, Sir John Cameron – a prominent Ross grazier – was chancellor. Students began to question his credentials; for the first time perhaps the power and prestige of this group was challenged.
Ghosts of travellers past 3 : Prominent Midlands family names Now and Then
Agnew Allison Archer Bethune Bisdee Brock Butler
Cameron Clarke Clerk Dowling Dumaresq Edgell
Field Foster Gatenby Gellibrand Gibson Headlam Horne
Keach Kermode Leake Legge Lord MacKinnon Macleod
Nicholas O’Connor Page Parramore
Parsons Pitt Reid Shoobridge Taylor Youl
Grand Families – Grand Houses
The houses clockwise from top left in the accompanying image are Mona Vale, Rosedale (University of Tas Collection), Clarendon (from their website), Dysart House (my photo), Woolmers (from their website).
Dedication
An under graduate Professor Peter Pearce.
This part is dedicated to the late Professor Peter Pierce (1950–2018). Hobart born and educated, a former editor of Togatus at the University of Tasmania, Tasmanian Rhodes Scholar, and lover of all things Tasmanian.
He married into an old midlands family and had a great love for Ross. He was happy conversing with a wide range of people from a tout at the trots, to a well to do farmer and his labourer and a Tasmanian governor or premier. I miss his wisdom and advice.
However, we can reach those deceased via, what Beatle George Harrison called, the great cosmic telephone. Peter and I have combined to set a little exercise written in ‘Tasmanian’ to be translated into ‘mainland English’.
Tasmanian:
Peter a young nointer was in the mussett hut eating Belgium sandwiches, potato cakes and drinking cordial.
Mainland (Victoria) translation:
Peter an errant young man was in the prefabricated classroom eating beef luncheon sandwiches, Tasmanian scallops and drinking soft drink.
As you would have said PPP – you can tell a Victorian, but not much! RIP
Photo acknowledgements parts 1-3
Tasmanian Archive and Heritage Office (TAHO)
http://www.ourtasmania.com.au/visitorsguide
https://primotipo.com/tag/longford-circuit/
otherwise photos taken by the author
