Today....Saturday April 17th 2010....I am following in my fathers footsteps and arrived in Townsville. I can guarantee my traveling to get here was shorter in time and more pleasant than his long train journey in 1928.

I am uncertain how much Inernet access I will have while on Bellfield Station for the next 6 weeks but will endeavour to do as much as possible over that time. It is very special to be visiting yet again those places where my father worked so many years ago and also parts that I remember my mother talking to me about.

A Love Story (cont)

I have spent hours scanning through my fathers diaries in an attempt to locate the time when he first visited Macarthur River Station where he would have met my mother. No luck in that direction so far. All I found was a mention of a baptism my father conducted where he was asked to supply a girl's name. He wrote that he gave the baby his favourite girl's name........Eileen. That is my mother's name.

Love Story (cont)

The passages in italics are excerpts taken directly from my fathers diaries. His writing is sometimes difficult to read, hence I made an error in giving the commencement date as 1929, as it should be 1928.

While my father was making his way up from Victoria to Townsville and then across to Cloncurry...all by rail....my mother was living with her parents and siblings in Charters Towers. I have only sketchy information regarding my mother and her family from those early days but she did occasionally share small bits of information. I know she was born in Mary St Charters Towers but do not know if it was a home birth or a small home hospital. She and her family attended the Anglican Church which at my last visit was an Arts Centre. At school my mother excelled at swimming and she won several local and possibly state championships. She was able to tell her family in later years the reason for the family moving from Charters Towers to Borooloola, on Macarthur River Station. Evidently it had been thriving cattle property but the owner died and his two sons allowed the place to decline rapidly. So my grandfather was offered the task of rescuing the property which he accepted. The exact date of the family's move is unknown but it was possibly around 1929 / 30. A photo of my mother at 18 was taken at Macarthur River Station. In future diary entries by my father he vividly describes his experiences traveling around Queensland and into Northern Territory. However most of those experiences will be left for another story.

To continue my fathers travels............

Saturday April 27^th:

Another early rise, 4.30 am, no good at all but had to catch the train for Charters Towers at 5.30 am. Rode Mr Hall’sbike into the train and left it there for him to collect. An awfully slow uninteresting journey to the Towers.

A great place for pubs here. I counted about 15 in two blocks, must be a thirsty population. After service at night .............. was taken to the station where at 10.30 pm I boarded the Great Western Mail which on arrival at Cloncurry will end just on 3000 miles of train journey. Turned into my bunk as soon as the train left and remained there until 8 am Monday morning.

Rail journey to Cloncurry from Charters Towers.

Rather warm and nothing to see but the same rolling plains, occasionally a few trees, now and then some sheep or horses and every hour or two pulling up at a siding. Always a fair crowd at the sidings but no sign anywhere of where they came from. The train journey was frightfully slow , for what reason I know not, as there was no grade at all. Eventually at 9 pm arrived Cloncurry. Rather a difference in size to the other stations along the line and quite a crowd present to see the Great Mail roar in to the termination of its long journey.

Love Story...continued.

Sunday April 21^st:

Brisbane has given me a very moist reception as it has rained steadily all day and heavily too.

Monday April 22^nd:

Rain appears to have completely disappeared and the day is bright and warm. .........arranged then to stay in Brisbane until Wednesday then go on to Townsville put a day in there and go to Charters Towers on Saturday and on Sunday night pick up the Cloncurry train there.

In 1914 my mother was born in Charters Towers. Her father worked for Borthwick Meats, but he was offered the position of manager on MacArthur River Station in Borooloola, NT. He moved his family there and so my mother left Charters Towers. This would have been about the time my father was traveling to Charters Towers en route to Camooweal. So I do not have definite information as to whether she and her family were still residing in Charters at the time my father briefly stayed there. At that time he would have been 28 years old and she a 15 year old teenager. He was a Methodist clergyman and she attended the local Anglican Church. At least they were both heading in the same direction so the chance of meeting was now more likely.