Port Macquarie, New South Wales

Port Macquarie is growing at a rapid rate. The big guns, Coles and Woolworths have already moved in and Aldi is in the process of building their first supermarket and want an option to build another. It's so busy, it's a headache just going into town because there are so few car parking spaces. Workers in the central business district have nowhere to park and have to leave their cars and walk long distances to their offices and tourists have virtually no chance at all.

What was once a quiet seaside retirement village is now a hectic, bustling full-on city with 80,000 people swelling to 100,000 in summer and serious traffic chaos.

They opened a new commercial wharf this week which has been in the pipeline for ten years. It's basically to service the ship 'Island Trader' which has the contract to ship freight to Lord Howe Island but it will also open up potential for small commercial vessels such as cruisers, super yachts, government ships and possibly cargo that is not easily transported by road.

Owners of the 'Island Trader' have confirmed they wanted to relocate from Yamba because they were dissatisfied with the operating costs. The Lord Howe Island Sea Freight Pty Ltd was founded in 1992 with majority ownership being Lord Howe Island residents. The aim was to address the rising costs of sea freight to the island and Council says that most of the island's needs will in future be sourced from competitive local businesses in the Port Macquarie area. Nice one.

Port Macquarie really is a beautiful place with pretty beaches and lots of walks. The Council have done a marvelous job with their level walking paths right around their picturesque coastline. A new coastal walk was opened this year, it's 9 kilometres long and stretches from Westport Park in town to Tacking Point Lighthouse and takes in beaches, headlands, historic sites and rainforest.

The Glasshouse has caused bitter division in the town. It's a beautiful-looking building comprising a 606 seat performing arts theatre/concert hall, a 140 seat studio/rehearsal space, 600m2 regional gallery across three levels, 1820's heritage displays, conference areas, meeting rooms, cafe and bar.

It opened on the 3rd of July this year with a well known Sydney Theatre Company performing Taming of the Shrew. But when the arty folk of Port Macquarie were sipping champagne and soaking up the culture, the rest of the town were spitting chips. In fact the town was so angry about the $50 million blowout that it contributed to the dismissal of the council by the New South Wales government on 27th February, 2008.

Council revealed at this week's meeting that they can no longer afford to keep it and are looking for a buyer. It costs $6,000,000 a year just to keep it open. Ratepayers are furious that the Council is in deficit and that other projects planned for the area have to be suspended or abandoned.

Lord Howe Island, New South Wales

Lord Howe Island is a dot in the Tasman Sea, 600 kilometres off Port Macquarie and a 2 hour flight from Sydney or Brisbane. It's World Heritage Listed for its remarkable geology and rare collection of birds, plants and marine life. All marine life and the coral reef are protected by the Lord Howe Island Marine Park. About 350 people live there and only 400 visitors are allowed on the island at any one time. There are few cars, most people get around on bicycle or on foot. It's only 11 kilometres long and 2 kilometres wide.

You can hand feed the fish bread at Ned's Beach any time of the day and you can walk to Mount Gower, rated as one of the best day walks in the world.

Ian Hutton, Lord Howe's resident naturalist and author of 10 books about the island said "People talk about The Galapagos Islands because of Darwin's connection, but there's more diversity on Lord Howe and it's so intact - the island is very much as it was when it was first discovered.

David Attenborough once wrote "It's so extraordinary, it's almost unbelievable....few islands surely can be so accessible, so remarkable, yet so unspoilt".

Lord Howe Island - the last natural paradise.

Coffs Harbour, New South Wales

Forty years ago, close to 80% of Australia's bananas were grown around Coffs Harbour on the mid north coast of New South Wales, today there is less than 5%. The banana industry is now concentrated in North Queensland where the land is flatter, cheaper and growers can harvest two crops a year instead of one in NSW.

Coffs Harbour has a population of around 80,000 that swells to over 100,000 during summer. As the sprawling city continues to grow at a rapid rate, more and more banana farms are being bulldozed for housing development. Some farmers who decided to stay on have changed to blueberries and avacados and are having some success.

Last year the Labor government agreed to allow Filipino bananas into the country. Understandably, everyone went bezerk, how could anyone possibly do such a stupid thing? But Agriculture Minister Tony Burke has defended the move and says it was the National Party and Warren Truss, as the then Agriculture Minister who initiated the proposal in 2000. He says that since they drew up the legislation and had it passed, it was too late to intervene. With the fear of bringing in diseases from the Philippines foremost in everyone's mind, all he can do now is make the requirements so exacting and stringent that they won't want to export bananas to us at all.

Tony Burke explains "First of all you've got to find a plantation that has low pest prevalence and there's a limit to how many of those they've got to start with. Australian inspectors then have to be on the plantation conducting the inspection and the Filipinos have to pay for the Australian inspectors. The feedback from their growers is that if they have to follow all of the rules set down, their bananas would be too expensive to sell in Australia. From all the indications so far, it is highly unlikely that we will see bananas from the Philippines in Australia but if they were to come, they would probably be more expensive than our own locally grown anyway."

If they do ever turn up here one day, I hope that the major supermarkets, Coles, Woolworths and Aldi will only buy the home grown product.

Woolgoolga, New South Wales

In the 1940's, a number of Punjabi migrants, working in the Queensland canefields decided to move down the coast to Woolgoolga. Today, it's a peaceful beachside village, surrounded by banana plantations. They were the ancestors of the town's Sikh community and represent about a quarter of the total population of around 5,000 people today.

Every year in April the Sikhs of Woolgoolga stage a colourful celebration of culture and cuisine - the Woolgoolga Curryfest. Fifty vendors provide a wide variety of curry dishes and there are cooking demonstrations, music and dance.

Curryfest

The Sikhs came over as free settlers before Federation in 1901 when our strict White Australia Policy was put into place and continued until 1973. The men came on their own, leaving their families at home in India, hoping to make their fortune in Australia. After years of hardship and hard work, they now own the majority of the banana plantations around Woolgoolga.

The most noticeable thing about Sikhs is their distinctive appearance, especially because of a turban and long beard. The 5 K's of the religion are five articles of faith that all baptised Sikhs are obliged (but not forced) to wear at all times.

Kesh - uncut hair and beard as given by God to sustain him or her in higher consciousness, and a turban, the crown of spirituality.

Kangha - a wooden comb to properly groom the hair as a symbol of cleanliness.

Katchera - specially made cotton underwear as a reminder of the commitment to purity.

Kara - a steel circle, worn on the wrist, signifying bondage to Truth and freedom from every other entanglement.

Kirpan - the sword with which the Khalsa is commited to righteously defend the fine line of the Truth.

Khalsa also vows to refrain from any sexual relationships outside of marriage and to refrain from taking meat, tobacco or alcohol.

Today, Kesh, the most important of all Sikh traditions, is not popular with the younger generation, about 80% of Sikh youths cut their hair. Obvious reasons include discrimination in employment and the natural desire to 'fit in'.

Sikhs were recruited by the British Army as part of the Sikh Regiment and became the most decorated regiment in the British Empire. They fought side by side with the ANZAC's at Gallipoli and were highly respected by Australian soldiers.

In April 2009

Another interesting thing about Woolgoolga is their old shipwreck. One hundred and sixteen years ago a 310 ton 39m timber ship (Barquentine) called the Buster arrived at Woolgoolga to load timber for shipment to New Zealand. She was built in Nova Scotia, Canada in 1884. She put down 2 anchors and ran a cable to a buoy near the Woolgoolga jetty but when a storm blew up, both anchor cables snapped, leaving the Buster held by one single buoy. After nine hours of huge seas and gale-force winds, the cable snapped and she beached stern-first not far from the jetty.

And today

Normally, you can't see any sign of the Buster but in April this year, after the foods, the sand was flushed away and you could see her quite clearly sticking out of the sand, the first time in 15 years. Today, she is barely visible at all.

Tidal lake

Of all the towns we've visited, and the 102 caravan parks we've stayed at in almost 12 months, Woolgoolga is my pick of them all.

We have a large, grassy beach-front site and there is a peaceful walk along the lake that eventually runs out into the sea.

Looking from Woolgoolga to Coffs Harbour

The muffled sound of waves breaking on the beach is very relaxing and I think I've captured a glimpse of the 'serenity' Michael Caton talked about. The town is too small for a multi-storey mall, so the shopping presinct is small and friendly. No McDonalds or Kentucky Fried Chicken, no Coles or Woolworths and no traffic lights. I think I could stay here forever.

Grafton, New South Wales

Grafton is the commercial hub of the Clarance River Valley, population around 20,000 and is 630 kilometres north of Sydney. Jacaranda trees are a native of the dry, high plains of Brazil and Argentina but are very popular in Australia and grow almost anywhere and can reach a height of over 20 metres.

In 1879, a Grafton seed merchant, Mr H.A Volkers was contracted to plant trees for the Grafton Council and was responsible for the supply and planting of hundreds of jacarandas seen on the streets today, making them well over a century old. Thank you Mr. Volkers.

Grafton's Jacaranda Festival in spring is a sight to behold. With all the trees in full bloom and a carpet of flowers on the ground everywhere you look, the town turns completely blue.

Grafton Bridge over the Clarence River

Alas, I am about 2 weeks too late to capture them at their most spectacular, the leaves have already started to sprout.

Iluka, New South Wale

The Clarence River Mouth

The townshipof Iluka on the

north side and Yamba on the south

Iluka is home to The Clarence River Fishermens Co-op. They had 70 active commercial fishermen in the year 2000, in February this year there were only 35. Reduced access to fishing grounds, rising operational costs and cheap imports are taking their toll. Commercial fishermen have had to face the cruel reality that the job they love and spent all your life doing, is no longer viable.







Chairman of the Clarence Co-operative explains why the men who want to leave the industry are ham-strung. "Because of the cost of just keeping the boats, it's really difficult to walk away and find other employment that will cover the cost of having the boat sitting there, so you've got to keep working them. They really deteriorate fast just sitting there, they rust up or rot. It costs at least $30,000 a year to maintain a boat and then there is work cover insurance, fuel and repair costs.



Skipper Gordon Farrell trained as a fitter and turner and would like to leave the industry and work around Australia. But that's impossible. His boat has been on the market for months, it was once valued at over $1 million. When he put it on the market, for just over $300,000, he had just one offer of $200,000 so he can't leave, he's got to keep working his boat.






Last year Andrew Hayward, after 13 years as skipper of the Rhondae II, realised he couldn't make a living from prawns anymore. His brother's boat El Sombrero used to sit next to his at the Yamba boat harbour but when he saw his brother's for sale sign, he decided to sell too. No price was set but the brothers hoped they could sell both boats at a reduced price. While waiting for a sale, to cut costs, they only worked one boat and stayed close to shore to save on fuel. One week they went away for 3 nights and returned home out of pocket by $130 each.


Clarence Nationals MP Steve Cansdell told parliament in September this year that a well-designed buy-back and a crack down on illegal professional fishing are needed to secure the future of the industry on the Clarence River. Quoting from a letter he received from a local fisherman he read "We have not had a solid income in months. How long before the government of the day starts to take notice or offers us some help. Do they intend to wait until fishermen start to take their own lives before they offer us any assistance? Steve, we are getting very close to that point".




The government has already spent millions on licence buy-backs in the last few years, namely Sydney Harbour, the south coast around Batemans Bay, Port Stephens and Byron Bay. For those who are left in the Clarence, they are waiting and praying that their time will come soon.


Steve Cansdell also said that one of the most insidious problems associated with the fishing industry is the sale of fish on the black market to shops, clubs and restaurants. The state's illicit seafood market is believed to be worth a fortune but the government refuses to reveal its true value, saying it would only lead to more people becoming involved.

Chinese restaurants can't get enough abalone and pay well for it. Abalone, rock lobsters, mud crabs, oysters, blue eyed cod, tuna, kingfish and snapper are the main targets on the black market in NSW. Sea horses are also being caught illegally and exported to Asia for traditional medicines.

But here's the bottom line - there are so few fisheries inspectors remaining today, there is little chance of ever catching the criminals. There are only three officers patrolling the Port Stephens region from Stockton to the Myall Lakes and two cover the Hunter region, including Lake Macquarie, Newcastle and the Hunter, Williams and Paterson rivers. A third inspector position in the hunter region has remained unfilled for three years.

Organised crime including Bikie gangs, Asian triads, and fishermen, both recreational and professional, are all said to be involved in the very lucrative black market seafood trade, not only in the state of NSW, but right across the country.

Casino, New South Wales

Beef Week Champion

Casino is beef country. It's among Australia's largest beef centres and their annual Beef Week Festival, held in May, is one of the leading events on the livestock calendar with exhibitors coming from all over eastern Australia.

The champion led steer of the 2009 Casino Beef Week was a Limousin exhibited by St Johns College Dubbo. Limousins are a breed of beef cattle originally bred in the Limousin and Marche regions of France. Cave drawings 20,000 years old in the Lascaux cave near Montignac have a striking resemblance to today's breed. The team from St Johns College Dubbo won with an 11 month old Kirk family bred Limousin. It was the second year in a row that the students have won the big prize and the fifth time in the nine years they have been coming to Casino to compete.

The Australia Beef Association suggested that Australian consumers were paying between 3 and 4 million dollars too much per year for beef and took a swipe at the two big players Woolworths and Coles. There were also innuendos about the sale of substituted old cow meat.

Woolworths strongly rejected these claims during the ACCC Grocery Price Enquiry Hearing held in April 2008 and made the following statement.

Woolworths only purchase beef from grain fed British bred steers to exacting quality specifications. We do not buy old cattle or cow meat.

There are many steps involved in putting beef on supermarket shelves and costs are incurred at every point in the process. On average, if the customer pay $10 for beef at the checkout, the supply chain costs are:

$4.80 cost of live animal from feedlot or farm

$0.10 transportation to abattoir

$0.90 animal is slaughtered and boned

$0.10 transportation to processing plant

$0.10 ageing, storage and pre-preparation of carcass

$0.10 transportation to stores

$1.40 in-store butchers prepare and pack cuts

$0.70 refrigeration and display

$8.20 costs incurred prior to sale

$1.70 gross margin to Woolworths before payment of store wages, rent, lighting, tax, advertising etc.



I don't have much respect of the ACCC, remember Grocery Watch? They spent $5,135,000 on consultancy fees and then scrapped it.

But the biggest threat to the beef industry has got to be climate change. When Agriculture Minister Tony Burke was presented with figures showing just how much it will cost beef farmers to comply to the ETS, he said they would adapt.

Professor Barry Brook, climate change adviser to the government says that livestock methane emissions are a greater threat to global warming than all the coal powered coal stations in Australia put together and believes Australia can phase out cattle production completely in just a few years. Is he insane? What will happen to our beef and dairy industries?

Al Gore suggests we should all eat less meat, that it's "the responsible thing to do" to fight climate change. That reminds me of the time he called on all Americans to conserve energy by reducing electricity consumption in their homes and his 20 room, 8 bathroom mansion in Nashville consumed more electricity in one month than the average American home used in one whole year. I suspect Al is still enjoying a nice juicy steak, if he's fair dinkum, he'll become a vegie.

No one knows what climate change and the Emissions Trading Scheme will mean to agriculture and our hard working farmers in the years ahead but hopefully commonsense will prevail.

Lismore, New South Wales

Winsome Hotel

Still in the heart of the Northern Rivers country, also known as the Rainbow Region, is the thriving town of Lismore, population 45,000. The surrounding countryside is just so beautiful I want to stay a while longer.

But all this beauty comes at a price. Lismore is surrounded by hills and mountains and when it rains hard, it roars down the hillsides and into the creeks and rivers and makes its way into the town, then it slows down and spreads out across the floodplain before moving out to sea. Lismore was declared a natural disaster in May this year and 500 residents were evacuated.

But the people of Lismore are upbeat about floods, they say they've lived with them for years and wouldn't dream of moving somewhere else.

May 2009

There is a great community spirit in Lismore. The Soup Kitchen is a not-for-profit organisation run by volunteers and also provides accommodation assistance for needy people. They serve breakfast from Monday to Thursday at the United Church from 7am to 8.45 am each morning and hot lunches are available every day at the Soup Kitchen in Norco Lane, South Lismore from 9am to 1pm with sandwiches for people to take away.

The Wilsons River runs through the town

The Lismore Council has just given the Soup Kitchen $100,000 towards the purchase of the Winsome Hotel for crisis accommodation. Funding to buy the hotel is made up from the sale of the Soup Kitchen's existing homeless house in Lismore, $220,000 from the Federal Government, a private loan, a foundation grant, a financial institution and some vendor finance.

Tim Costello

The Soup Kichen's patron Tim Costello said it will give homess people an important sense of belonging. Tomothy Ewen Costello is a Baptist minister and current CEO of World Vision Australia. He is an 'Australian Living Treasure' and brother to former Federal Minister for Higgins, Peter Costello.

Nimbin, New South Wales

Tucked away in the hills 30 kms from Lismore is the tiny village of Nimbin, known as Australia's most famous hippie destination and alternative lifestyle capital. Although the cultivation, selling and possession of marjuana is illegal in Australia, in Nimbin cannabis has been part of everyday life for years.

People buy, sell and consume locally grown cannabis on the streets, in cafes and laneways. If you want to experience something different, come to Nimbin on the first weekend in May when they hold their MardiGrass Festival. From the organisers of the festival comes this proclomation:

Proclomation - all self recognised Knights Hemplar and Dharma Farmers are called on a Religious Crusade to Nimbin, home of the Church of the Holy Smoke, to all meet there on the first weekend in May in the year Seventeen of our MardiGrass to participate in all the Sacred Ceremonies of the Holy Smoke and Smoke the Pipes of Peace.

MardiGrass activities include the Nimbin Cannabis Cup, the Hemp Olympix, the bong Throw and Yell, Joint Rolling, and the Grower's Iron Person Cup where runners must first carry a 20 kilo sack of fertilizer, then a bucket of water and finally "the crop" as a tribute to the difficulties faced by marijuana growers in the hills.

But things are slowly changing. On the 1st April 2008 more than 50 officers from the Richmond, Coffs-Clarence and Tweed Byron commands as well as the dog squad and the riot and public order squad from Sydney, descended on Nimbin with search warrants. Eight people were arrested and police seized 4 kilos of cannabis and cannabis cookies. Lease-holders of the Nimbin Museum and the Hemp Bar were ordered to close. The Museum lease-holders just walked away and were quickly replaced with new ones and re-opened fairly quickly but the Hemp Bar remained closed for eight months and re-opened in January 2009.

This year's MardiGrass Festival attracted huge numbers of tourists and locals to this beautiful area. Sniffer dogs and 4 mounted police made their presence felt and there were 150 drug seizures. Although some visitors came to buy marijuana, the majority came to enjoy the art, music and the uniqueness of the colourful festival. People were handing out petitions calling for the drug laws to be changed and marijuana to be legalised.

The 'New Age' people say police are going over the top with their crusade to clean up the town and continue to harrass them for no reason.

The 'Old School' folk say that the police haven't gone nearly far enough.

The Melbourne Cup - 2009

Brad Rawiller wins the Caulfield cup on Viewed and looking for another win tomorrow

The Melbourne Cup is getting bigger every year. People who couldn't care less about horse racing for the rest of the year find themselves keen to put their names down in the $2, $5, $10 and $20 sweeps at work. And when the TV is wheeled in at race time the phones stop ringing and all work stops. The amazing thing is no one can pick the winner, the so-called experts are nearly always wrong so there's a good chance that the horse no one bothered to talk about could win, and often does. There is only one problem, it's very unfair that Melbourne get a public holiday for the race and Sydney does not.


I remember when that wonderful mare Makybe Diva won the cup three years in a row, a feat previously thought impossible. Owner, Tony Santic was born in Croatia and owns one of the largest tuna fishing operations in Australia and sends the finest quality tuna for sashimi to Japan . He went to the UK and bought Tugels, in foal to Desert King. He shipped the mare and foal home to Australia and had no idea just how famous she would become. The horse needed a name and five girls working in Tony's Tuna in Port Lincoln decided to use the first two letters of their Christian names. Maureen, Kylie, Belinda, Dianne and Vanessa - Makybe Diva.


Internationals Dermot Weld, the Irishman who bought us Vintage Crop and Media Puzzle is a genius and Luca Cumani and Irishman Aiden O'Brien are also brilliant trainers. One of the world's richest men Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid, a Dubai Royal and the biggest owner of bloodstock in the world has vowed to take the Melbourne Cup home but so far has not been successful. His horse Crime Scene and Luca Cumani's Basalatico are not to be discounted.


Getting a horse from Europe to Flemington is an expensive business, it could cost as much as $120,000. To get some of their money back the Europeans need to finish in the top ten but all eyes are on first prize of $3.3 million.


But there is only one master trainer, 81 year old Bart Cummings who has won the cup 12 times. His horse Viewed won last year and is the favourite for this year's cup even though he's carrying big weight. Bart says Viewed can handle the extra 5kg and is on track to win again. Will he make it a baker's dozen tomorrow?