Outback Life

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<strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Outback <strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Life© Malachy Burke

The first thing that hit when I arrived at Kulki was the peace and quiet. Bar the rustling of the wind through the trees the station was silent and I was now certain that I had reached the Australian Outback. Far from the rushed rat race that they call the city, I knew this was an experience that I was going to enjoy.

After arriving in the small, riverside town of Bollon after eleven hours of bus travel from Brisbane I met Tamie and my work colleague Shannon, a Canadian girl who had spent the journey hiding down the back sleeping off a hangover! We started on the last leg of our journey, which was just over an hour’s drive from Bollon down an unsealed road, alive with the threat of a kangaroo jumping out of the cover of darkness onto the bonnet! Once we arrived at the station we met our boss Kelvin, a man of few words who assured me I would pick up the skill of welding within a few days and smirked when he realised I had not driven a two-wheeler before. We were shown our accommodation in the shearers’ quarters and I settled into where I was to call home for the next four months.

The first few days were spent familiarising ourselves with the 30,000 acres of paddocks and lick runs and with me trying to master the art of welding with a Mig welder which is a tedious, frustrating exercise but quite simple once you crack it! So while Shannon took care of the feed runs I started assembling M-Frames for the upcoming fencing work. Once we settled into life on the station and got over the fact that if we needed groceries it was going to be a 400km round trip, it was all about doing the work and enjoying the experience of the Outback life. Work each day could be anything from filling in troughs, circumcising sheep to digging through several feet of mud to fix a burst water connection and everything and anything in-between. The days were long and the work was hard but every minute of it was good fun though because we worked well together and we were not afraid to get stuck in.

Working with Tamie and Kelvin, it was clear to see that they enjoyed this life and were not afraid of a day’s hard work. Kel’s patience and attention to detail was evident from day one as he taught us everything we needed to know about station life, and his frequent, clever tips and tricks made work a lot easier. His attention to detail when it came to anything from welding a gate to constructing 20k of fencing was a trait to be admired. If anything was out by half a millimetre it was taken out, moved and was always perfect when finished. “The eye never lies” according to Kel and in anything I have seen him do it must be true because you can see from the work he has done all around the station that nothing is out of place and had been carefully planned and checked! In all this talk of him being a perfectionist he is still quick to take a shot at you and have a laugh, especially when he claims that a billygoat rearing up on his back legs is “only bluffing go in and hit him” .Last I remember is his laughter when the goat cracked me in the ribs and I scarpered over the fence of the race. Yep Kelvin is a bit of comedian underneath it all. Tamie is a tough lady who is not afraid to get stuck into a days’ hard work when needed which was clear to see during the weeks of mustering in late August and early September. She also has this clever ability to hear every bit of banter and insult passed around the campfire at camp draft or maybe she is just a light sleeper. Either way when you roll off the back of the Ute with a dirty hangover because you have been drinking XXXX for the past fourteen hour and Tamie is sitting at the fire with a coffee and a smirk you know have said something bad to someone, probably Jacko because he has mentioned potato for the umpteenth time!



So I hear you trying to figure out what camp draft is. It is basically a weekend away where everyone from cattle stations near and far gets together and pits their drafting and mustering skills against each other before somebody is a declared the winner and everyone hits the bar for some XXXX or Jim Bean, country music and bad dancing. I still hold a grudge for being kicked off the Bollon dance floor for doing the robot, quite well I may add! I had the opportunity to experience the Hebel and Bollon camp drafts which were a great chance to meet people from other stations and see the social side to the Outback. It was good to see up close how the professionals draft and control a mob of cattle as I would have to do it myself in the coming weeks. After the days’ rivalry and competition it was good to see everyone just sit around numerous campfires and have a beer and a laugh. In Bollon I even managed to be convinced to ride a bull and limp out of the ring. I think that sums up the spirit of camp draft. A competitive and social weekend where if you feel like doing something crazy on the side then go for it!

It was between these camp drafts that we unfortunately had to say adios to Shannon who left to continue her travels and adventures. A great person to work with, very switched on and very hard working. It was a shame to lose her, her compilation of TED talks and her fantastic discussions about her plans for the future. Hope you meet that South American biker with dual citizenship Shannon, I’m sure you will make it happen!

Between the social and pain inducing weekends we managed to fit in a lot of long days of fencing. The exercise was to create a laneway of barb wire fencing connecting the paddocks to the cattle yards which would make the task of mustering in the cattle much easier. Those M-frames I mentioned earlier, we started concreting those in once they had been sighted by Kelvin who would just give a left, right, righto signal once he was happy that the eye had not deceived him. Countless numbers of steel pegs, wire ties and let’s say 40 to 50 km’s of barb wire later we had our shiny new laneway connecting us to the yards and making the upcoming muster a lot easier.

With talk of the plane being booked and the muster commencing in a few days I figured it would be a good time to get back on a horse after a ten year hiatus. With some guidance on the Australian way of riding I took Jack up to the yards to see how we would work together and all I can say is what a horse. All you have to do is point him in the right direction and he knows exactly what to do. So a few days later with the plane overhead and the others on the motorbike we started the muster and I have to admit it does take a bit of time to get used to controlling the mob, keeping them calm and in a straight line but eventually it clicks and with some tips from the bosses gets easier! Once we got the mob calmly down to the yards and grabbed Smoko the rules of engagement of yard work were explained. Calm and quiet and hug the fence line, don’t stand taller than them or they will huddle in the corner, don’t try put them through a small gap and be able to jump over the fence quick if they get aggressive. Fair enough, so listen to the advice, use your common sense and you’ll be fine! So the next few weeks were like that, mustering, weighing, drafting and dehorning. Long tough days but very enjoyable work. When we brought in the last mob of 900 cattle and spent two days putting them through the yards I was pretty happy that we had done a good job and it was good to be involved in an experience such as that.





With the mustering complete for the time being I returned to a routine of feed runs and fencing which was nearly complete at this stage. Work also included ploughing the cultivation paddock which involved a frustrating cycle of burst tyres and puncture repairs but on the plus side it was a great vantage point to watch the skies as the sun set at the end of the day!

I have been able to experience all manner of station life whilst working here from vehicle maintenance to working with animals and I even attempted to learn but am yet to conquer stick welding. On a few occasions I even had a chance to go roo – shooting and pigging. Quite an experience for someone who would not be considered ‘bushie’.

So to sum this experience up it has been great to actually live, work and socialise side by side with true, hard working, honest Aussies in the harsh environment of the bush. To experience the pain of being rammed by goats and trodden by bulls and walking away laughing and with a grin on my face just proves that there is something brutally honest about one of Kelvin’s best expressions. “Pain is fun”. If that is true then bring on the bruises because the last four months and four days of tough love have been a blast!

Get to the Outback people. Live it. Love it. Experience it!

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