Dreamtime and Sugar Cane

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The Dreamtime Aboriginal Cultural Centre is just north of Rockhampton. As soon as we entered the centre, we saw some aboriginal artifacts. A hooked boomerang, a heating stone for heating resin, and a hammer tool.

The guide showed us stencil art. It is made it by grinding ochre, mixing it with water and blowing it from their mouths around an item to be stenciled. They used 3 colours: Red, white and yellow. This type of painting was used because it lasts much longer than brush painting on the sandstone rock.

One group of Aborigines that were explained at the centre were the Tores Strait Aborigines. They lived on the islands between Australia and Papau New Guinea (PNG). They traded with the mainland tribes of Australia and PNG. One of the things that they traded were shells. The conch shell was like trading gold.

We had been travelling through many fields of sugar cane over the last week. So, at the next stop in Bundaberg, we went to the Fairymeade Sugar Museum and Botanical Garden. The gardens were very nice and there were many birds and turtles around the rivers and ponds. Sugar cane is a very important crop for Australia and they export 5 million tonnes of sugar every year. Sugar has had a role in the development of many Australian towns and cities.

We learned how sugar cane is harvested, milled and refined to make table sugar.

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Photos

Hooked Boomerang
Used to disarm opponents in close combat

George Muthers
One of the last Aboriginal Kings