Dung beetles, snot blocks, and the holiday llama: Our visit to the Gingin Christmas fair
Letter #42 - Gingin, Western Australia
G’day!
Welcome to Letters From the Road, and letter number 42. This one comes to you from a small country town in Western Australia called Gingin. There’s not actually gin there, to my disappointment, but it did put on a decent country Christmas fair.
Good on ya for reading, and for those of you for whom this is your first letter, Letters From the Road is the story of a family road trip in Australia, told one weekly installment at a time featuring my journal entries written during the trip. The journal entries are word-for-word, and you’ll see them highlighted in the letter.
If you missed any letters and would like to catch up, you can find the other 41 letters here, stuffed in a handmade tote bag.
Hooroo!
Luke
Multiple Australians have told me a similar story about traveling, one that goes something like this:
They took a trip to the U.S., which for Australians means that they went to Los Angeles, New York City - or both - and possibly Las Vegas. Then on a whim they decided to visit the middle bits for some reason, a place like Illinois or Kansas, or my fair home state of Iowa.
And they were fascinated by the midwest, how rural it is, and how quiet, and how it was filled with the mundanity of regular life. It was undoubtedly referred to as the ‘real’ America.
I’ve never subscribed to this theory, that there’s a “real” version of a country and one that’s something different, something on display like when you are having guests over and you bring out the nice dinner plates and not the crappy beat up ones that you use for family dinner on a Tuesday.
To me, what makes the U.S. what it is requires that there’s both New York City and Iowa, the city that never sleeps and the state that always does, unless there’s a football game or a caucus. And Australia is no different.
Australia is equal parts the most gorgeous harbour in the world at Sydney, and towns like Broken Hill, which takes pride in the giant pile of leftover mining spoils called a mullock heap that sits unceremoniously in the middle of town.
This country is every bit of Melbourne, which was voted most liveable city in the world by the Economist for seven straight years between 2010 and 2017, and little country towns like Gingin, which didn’t rate on the Economist’s index, but is home to a lovely brook and a replica water wheel.
The thing is, there’s lots to love about Australia’s country towns.
You can count on them having a bakery that proudly won an award in the early 2000’s for their meat pie or vanilla slice, a treat that’s affectionately nicknamed a ‘snot block’.
Small towns are also often the home to Australia’s ‘Big Things’, gigantic replicas of whatever someone can think of to get tourists to stop by and have a look. So far on our road trip we’d stopped to see the Big Prawn in Exmouth, WA, and a pretty ordinary not-very-big banana in Carnarvon.
And the best, most redeeming quality of Australian country towns is that there’s always a public toilet located in the middle of town, and several signs pointing you in the right direction to get there.
Not too long ago, Katie and the boys and I drove to the Flinders Ranges and Wilpena Pound. I wrote to you about them way back in letter #5, and we love it so much that we decided to go back again for a third visit.
On the way there, we passed through the wonderfully named town of Orroroo in South Australia. It had a broad main street divided by a peaceful green median, and what looked like a normally prosperous and bustling city centre. On this day, however, it was dead empty. It was odd.
We hit up the excellent and well marked public toilets and headed out of town. On the way, we just so happened to pass the town church. As we did, it became clear why things were quiet in town. There was a huge crowd outside the church.
We weren’t sure whether it was a wedding or a funeral - we guessed funeral, as the people there looked pretty solemn - but surely most of the town was there standing outside of church and paying their respects.
That’s Australian country towns for you. They’re wonderful.
The calendar had just ticked over to December, so the run up to Christmas had begun. On the notice board at Willowbrook Farm where we were staying was a flier for a Christmas fair in a small town nearby called Gingin.
We mentioned the idea of a Christmas fair to Henry and Oscar, and they whinged in protest. Any form of market, fair, or festival is viewed with wariness and suspicion by teenagers. These types of events, which in their view consist solely of old people walking around and looking at boring stuff, are to be avoided at all costs.
The boys had already decided that they were happy spending their hours trying to steal WiFi from the farmhouse, but even beyond that, they would have just as well done anything else - cleaned out the tent, fought with the farm ducks, or played with angry stinging bull ants - than go to a Christmas fair.
And so they took it upon themselves to conveniently disappear after breakfast, a typical strategy that has been known to succeed when Katie and I lose interest. They’ll fade into the woods or, in Henry’s case, sit for long stretches on the can in the toilet block.
In this case, we waited them out. Oscar was small enough to catch and throw over your shoulder, and Henry spent so long sitting on the toilet that his legs fell asleep, thereby hampering his ability to run away. Both boys were deposited in the back of the car and we headed for the little town of Gingin.
1 December 2019 - Gingin, Western Australia
Went to the Gingin Christmas Fair this morning. It was held at the old railway station in Gingin. There was none of the signature spirit there, which is a shame.
While not being known for spirits, Gingin apparently has lots of people who make unappealing tote bags, weird feathery things called dreamcatchers, and who grow plants. There was also a man and lady selling about half a dozen tea towels.
When we arrived, a Christmas choir sang from the porch of the railway station. There were also a couple obligatory vans: coffee, ice cream, and kebabs. A girl had two llamas dressed up in Christmas attire.
Up until this point, the boys were unimpressed, and who can blame them? A market selling tea towels and tote bags is doing no one any favours. But enter a llama in fancy dress, and everyone’s happy. I’m normally opposed to animals wearing clothes, but in this case I was willing to make an exception.
We spent most of our time talking to the nice lady at the olive oil stand. There was one ‘very hot’ chili oil on offer.
‘Usually when I make it, I have to throw the chillies in the grinder and run away because of the odour when they are being ground up,’ she said.
Henry, Oscar and I all tried it, to her delight and surprise. It was a bit spicy on the throat, but nothing killer.
We spent the rest of our time talking with the wine man. He was a graying dude of 80, I’d guess, and wore a gentleman’s wine hat - white, curved brim, wide brown band. He told us stories about the dung beetles on his property and how it was also home to a rookery of a scarce type of ibis. We bought a bottle of his smooth cab-merlot blend.
Inside the old station was a junkshop-cum-Gingin history museum-cum-tourist information stand. The man there piled me with maps of the area and one of the Swan Valley region.
While I wasn’t exactly sure where the Swan Valley was, I was intimidated by the map. It carefully laid out wineries, artisan cheese shops, olive oil boutiques, and cideries in great numbers and detail. Bakeries and breweries and beekeepers.
I imagine that the Margaret River region, which is where we head after Perth, will be similar but with an even tighter density of artisan this and boutique that and handmade whatever.
Thing is, I like boutique this and that. We enjoy supporting the small local producers. Southern WA, however, might destroy my will and our dwindling budget at the same time.
Importantly, what do I do about beer? We’ve sampled local brews with great success and enjoyment throughout our trip thus far. I don't think there’s been a craft brewery we’ve missed: Mildura, Alice, Exmouth (both of them), then the Burnt Barrel (not necessarily a brewery, but brewed its own beer).
But beer’s expensive, not something you can experience with too much enthusiasm or your wallet will empty as quickly as a pint glass on a warm afternoon.
We are getting close to temptation country now, an area of Australia legendary for its beer, known to locals and those travellers lucky enough to make the trek to this remote corner of the world.
I’ve been off beer for two days, trying to detox from a long drawn out extended calendar of drinking every night. Probably been weeks now. Not to mention the five Coronas that Wayne was nice enough to throw my way over the two nights we stayed at his house in Geraldton. Those make me shudder just thinking about them.
It is hard when you’re camping, when you’re in the heat, overlooking the beach, to not feel like cracking open a can of something cold as the afternoon wanes. Just like it is hard not treating our road trip like one long camping outing, which it is, kinda, it’s also hard to not treat it like one long vacation. Theme parks, attractions, ‘when you’re in Freo you have to see X’ mentions. Similar seductions that one must consciously address.
What I’m really wondering is, can my mind, body and budget handle the temptation?
I know that’s a pretty intoxicating teaser, ‘find out next time if Luke has a beer!’, however I’m happy leaving you there…
But I will add that in your next letter, I’ve got a snake story for you. See you then!