|
|
Post by ozneil on May 20, 2014 20:57:18 GMT -1
On a serious thread I mentioned the town of Hillend in NSW Hillend was a gold mining town in late 1800s . The area around the town is riddled with abandoned mine shafts so you have to be careful when bush walking there. The last mine was closed around WW1 . The town became more or less a ghost town with only a pub and a handful of residents. In late 1970s price of gold rocketted!! and how. One of my neigbours, an Insurance Broker, family owned one of the mines. The bold lad decided he had enough of city life and wearing a suit so he sold everything including house and dragged family out to Hillenrd where he re-opened the family gold mine wig=th him and wife working it with kids helping in school holidays. First he went through the mullock heaps looking for gold the old miners had missed to finance the reopening of the mine proper He comes back here from time to time to see us he reckons he is "Making a crust" and life is good. I reckon he come back just to sneer at his former life   The Holterman nugget found in Hillend  Old store Hillend. It had displayed in window for years an "instant Millionaires kit" a shovel and a gold pan  Royal Hotel Some great pics on Hillend NSW pics |
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on May 24, 2014 1:46:47 GMT -1
|
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 3, 2014 20:10:36 GMT -1
|
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 7, 2014 3:45:48 GMT -1
|
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 7, 2014 21:35:49 GMT -1
You Brits have "Henley on Thames" boating regatta where the Toffs show off their boating skills and fashions, definitely a place to be seen!! We too have the same type of regatta "Henley on Todd" very much the same but for one minor difference. The Todd River seldom has any water in it. www.henleyontodd.com.au/index.php/eventsYou fashionista will have noticed the high fashions in the photos see also a myriad of pics www.henleyontodd.com.au/index.php/the-fun/photo-gallery/2013It is THE place to be seen PS you dont have to be mad to compete but it does give you an advantage |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jun 11, 2014 23:21:05 GMT -1
Scots have as much in common with Henley on Thames as our friends at Henley on Todd do.  |
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 11, 2014 23:52:16 GMT -1
Scots have as much in common with Henley on Thames as our friends at Henley on Todd do. Oh do you? I never realised you Scots were as sophisticated  just like the the Centralians. Talking of Upper Crust Coober Pedy Golf Club is the ONLY golf club in World to have reciprical rights with St Andrews ... now that is sophistication ...They swapped it for an Opal Mine First Tee  Golfers are issues with a 450mm x450mm square of artificial grass for fairway shots On the "green"  www.southaustralia.com/info.aspx?id=9008178 |
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 21, 2014 5:45:22 GMT -1
|
|
|
|
Post by celyn on Jun 22, 2014 20:35:01 GMT -1
... Talking of Upper Crust Coober Pedy Golf Club is the ONLY golf club in World to have reciprical rights with St Andrews ... now that is sophistication ...They swapped it for an Opal Mine I'm not sure I understand that. If you mean the Old Course at St. Andrews, it's not as though it is a private members-only sort of thing. You just book a time, and go and play. Obviously you'd want to be planning far advance in the summer touristy months, but it's open to any person to trot along and chase a ball with a stick. Very democratic. (I think it might be compulsory to wear crazy mad trousers and silly hats, but perhaps that is the personal choices of the golfing lunatics.) Mind you, I do think an opal mine sounds good. Is Coober Pedy the place where a lot of it is underground? That sounds weird but sort of fun. When I win the lottery, I will visit Australia. Oh shit, I don't play the lottery - oh well, poor old Australia will just have to manage without me.  I'm sure it will. Are you a golfer, Ozneil? If so, would it drive you mad to know that I spent several happy years in St. Andrews but never once played golf? I think I did play a game of chess on the Old Course once, just because we thought it would be funny, if ever forced to chat with the more boring examples of golfing types, to be able to say "Ah, yes, I have such happy memories of the time I played on the Old Course..."  |
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 22, 2014 21:30:46 GMT -1
First Im not a golfer. I played a bit as a youngster then I found girls were much more fun and I had to study anyway. Now my golf is limited to the odd and I mean odd round on holidays. I understand the Royal and ancient has several courses . Here is the story as reported Coober Pedy is largely built underground and is still an active Opal mining centre. Its on "highway" from Adelaide to Alice Springs in South Australia. The best motel in or under town in the Dugout which is of course underground. The temps there reach over 40C in summer www.radekadownunder.com.au/outback_accommodation_coober_pedy.htmWas it hard moving chess pieces with a golf club? Did you tee up the queen with a bishop? Not coming to Australia is our loss  |
|
|
|
Post by celyn on Jun 22, 2014 22:19:00 GMT -1
Nah, I can quite see that it is a cute story, and it genuinely is a nice story, but the R. & A. doesn't own the Old Course (that being the most famous and historical), and it does not, in fact, own any at all. Well, not in St. Andrews, anyway: I am willing to believe it might own a golf links on Alpha Centauri or somewhere but it does not own any of the courses in St. Andrews. I think my excuse for rambling on about this is that I have often perceived a certain snobbishness about golfy people. Sometimes there seems to be a need to belong to the poshest, snobbiest club around, so I do enjoy being able to tell people that the Old Course, and all other courses owned by the St. Andrews Links Trust, are open to all. However, I really do like your story, (apart from the fact that the reporter felt the need to throw in an apostrophe where none belongs), but if all this did happen, it was certainly a bit snooty and nasty only to let Coober Pedy have a small and not highly-rated course. Very bad of the St. Andrews people. ALSO, if Coober Pedy has a great deal of trouble finding grass, it would have been a reasonable and fun gesture for their partners to send them some, preferably from the Old Course, because that might be a friendly sort of present. Naughty bad St. Andrews. Nah, we had a perfectly civilised game on the 18th green, with no golf bats involved. However, now that you bring it to mind, if a good thumping with a golf bat would get rid of queen and many bishops, I might have to bear this in mind for future plans. And I now realise that the name of the thread is to do with trivia and emphatically not for the serious. So I'm sorry for derailing it a bit. |
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 22, 2014 22:48:17 GMT -1
I think my excuse for rambling on about this is that I have often perceived a certain snobbishness about golfy people. Sometimes there seems to be a need to belong to the poshest, snobbiest club around, so I do enjoy being able to tell people that the Old Course, and all other courses owned by the St. Andrews Links Trust, are open to all. However, I really do like your story, (apart from the fact that the reporter felt the need to throw in an apostrophe where none belongs), but if all this did happen, it was certainly a bit snooty and nasty only to let Coober Pedy have a small and not highly-rated course. Very bad of the St. Andrews people. ALSO, if Coober Pedy has a great deal of trouble finding grass, it would have been a reasonable and fun gesture for their partners to send them some, preferably from the Old Course, because that might be a friendly sort of present. Naughty bad St. Andrews. Nah, we had a perfectly civilised game on the 18th green, with no golf bats involved. However, now that you bring it to mind, if a good thumping with a golf bat would get rid of queen and many bishops, I might have to bear this in mind for future plans. And I now realise that the name of the thread is to do with trivia and emphatically not for the serious. So I'm sorry for derailing it a bit. Yes that snobbishness and toffiness in UK golf was obviously appreciated by the Coober Pedy golfers who started the whole thing as a gentle mock at the UK "up themselves" attitude. You would be hard put to find a "snob" there, they are all ordinary, perhaps extraordinary people, trying to make a living in a hostile environment. They were really surprised at the St Andrews response. They expected at best a "put down". Australian sense of humour is sometimes very hard for other people to understand Now as I understand it St Andrews Members have first dibs on certain days of the week and at certain times on all the courses. They dont have to book yonks ahead to get a round (thats the tech name for a game)like the hoi-poloi. The Coober Pedy members have that right on the 9 hole course Grass just wouldnt survive there. The "greens" are sprayed with oil to stop them blowing away We dont mind Queen & bishops provided they know their place and dont interfere. |
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jun 23, 2014 1:50:09 GMT -1
Golf. A good walk spoiled. Said someone.
|
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 23, 2014 2:53:47 GMT -1
Mark Twain (if it wasnt him it should have been)
|
|
|
|
Post by ozneil on Jun 28, 2014 22:23:38 GMT -1
More from the recesses of my memory. For my job I travelled around by air quite a lot mostly Intrastate and mostly on regional airlines usually REX who usaully fly SAAB340s  30 seater turbo prop. Logan air used to fly them too. Sydney airport is rather busy and as a result REX planes are usually parked away from the terminals (not allowed to mix with the big important jets) si we either hike across the tarmac or are taken by bus. On this particular day we got on the bus and headed for the back blocks of the airport to find out plane. A rather elderly lady askec loudly is we were going all the way to Dubbo by bus as her daughter had paid for air travel. I thought she had a point. The hostie re assured her |
|
I'm sure it will. 