Bogan Bingo, the Earthquake and the Golden Pipeline

For the last two days we have had an intermittent companion on the road.  Sometimes on the right side and sometimes on the left a great pipe runs alongside us. Now and then it vanishes for a bit.  “Where’s the pipe gone?” we say but it always comes back, sometimes rusty and dark and sometimes bright white.  It is the water pipe that runs up hill from Perth to the dry gold fields at the other end.  Before its arrival water cost a shilling a bucket and was produced by evaporating and distilling salt water.  It was begun in 1896 and completed in 1903. Its inventor, C Y. O’Connor however never saw his water run because he rode into the sea and shot himself after being harassed and accused of corruption by his contemporaries the year before the pipe was put into commission.  It is a lovely pipe but looks so vulnerable.  We wonder what happens when bits need replacing.  There must be some kind of open heart surgery arrangement with bypasses I suppose.

It’s nice to have the pipe with us because for the first time in our long journey the drive is a bit boring.  There are huge flat wheatfields to be got through.  They look so sterile compared to the grand bush and it is easy to imagine how the aboriginal population must have hated the stripping of the land to plant the wheat.  There are a couple of interesting stops though.  One is the little town of  Merredin with a row of thriving shops including a bakers.  I am intrigued by a notice in many shops advertising Bogan Bingo in June for $33.  It seems a lot for a bit of Bingo. I pop into the pub to find out what it is and the barmaid gestures to a poster which explains “Half party, half parlour game and Australian as a Bali Prison” I think they must have a lot of fun in Merredin.

The second stop is at the site of Australia’s biggest ever earthquake,6.9 on the Richter scale.  The little town of Meckering was totally destroyed on 14^th October 1968 but nobody died. A broken collarbone was apparently the worst injury. The Meckeringians have preserved the ruin of the Snooke family’s house which is like other ruins except for a sign stuck in the middle of the rubble “Baby’s cot here”  Apparently Mrs Snooke was hanging out the washing when the quake occurred and rushed in to rescue her baby girl.  Luckily the wall beside her cot had collapsed outwards and she was unharmed.  I wondered if her miraculous escape had influenced her life.  One would surely feel a bit special.  In the information centre I was shown a photo of her on her wedding day – tall and beautiful with her smaller parents. 

We are rather uplifted by this unusual good news story and chug on more cheerfully to Perth.