Mourning, More Memorials and Murder

Our next stop was the little town of Walloon, whose claim to fame is that it was mentioned in a poem by Henry Lawson.  The Babies of Walloon tells the sad story of little sisters Mary Jane and Bridget Kate Broderick who drowned in 1891 when sent on an errand, presumably attracted by the water lilies on the water.  Their dad was a railway worker, like my grandfather.

The memorial is in a lovely little spot called Henry Lawson Bicentennial Park, which even has part of the poem across the toilet block.  You can read it in its entirety here: http://www.ironbarkresources.com/henrylawson/BabiesOfWalloon.html

Another section of this lovely little park is a Garden of Reflection welcoming every family who has lost a child; honouring Hannah's Foundation, a charity for drowning prevention awareness and support.  So Walloon has created a little treasure that is way more than just a toilet stop.  

Mind you, the peace was shattered when a couple of fighters from Amberley RAAF Base buzzed overhead.

Here are Jo and I attempting to replicate the poses of the two little girls.  Jan's idea.

On to Rosewood where there are supposedly two op shops.  We found Vinnies, a big, beautiful shop staffed by cheerful and ever-helpful Bruce, who told us the Blue Care shop was shut. Not sure if he meant just then or forever.  He was happy to take a photo of us in our animal prints displaying more animal prints. We later voted it best shop of the day.

Onwards to Laidley and lunch.  We found three oppies there plus a little gift shop that sold some retro stuff.  The Second Chance Clothing one was first on the list and it was the best.  It had an impressive foreign language section in its book collection, and a surfing selection amongst its DVDs! Next was the Blue Nursing shop and it was the worst (in Laidley and of the day).  Around the corner was the more eccentric Pass It On op shop which fell between the two. Certainly the constant animated conversation that went on between the two young men behind the counter made it interesting.


After a bit of emergency shopping at the IGA, we headed for Gatton via Forest Hill, which has no hill.  What it does have is a beautiful pub - The Lockyer - and an impressive war memorial.  One of the names on it is C (Charles) Neilsen, Dad's mate 'Snowy' who was killed near Messines on 20th December 1917. 

Next it was the op shops of Gatton, which we first visited on Op Shop Road Trip No 2, three years ago.  The Vinnies and the Red Cross were as we remembered, but the Salvos had vanished. The woman in Vinnies told us a car had driven into their shop, so they were in temporary premises in the CWA hall around the corner in North Street.

We walked and walked without any sign of a hall, so I volunteered to go back and pick up the car. On the way, I discovered a completely unmarked little building with a CWA badge in the window. And it was closed. I rang the girls on the mobile and told them to stop walking.

The final stop in Gatton was the cemetery, where I wanted to show the girls the graves of the Gatton Murder victims. 

If you don't know the story of this notorious unsolved crime, you can read all about it here. https://mypolice.qld.gov.au/museum/2013/10/15/from-the-vault-the-gatton-murders-26-december-1898/  The big surprise was the crocuses in bloom all over the cemetery.  Unfortunately, there was a storm headed our way and at this point the rain started.  This meant I couldn't show the girls the astounding Lights on the Hill trucking memorial!

It was time to leave the Lockyer Valley and head up to the Darling Downs. We drove up the lovely Heifer Creek gorge, where there was no water in the creek, but we saw a lot more patches of crocuses.  The rain petered out by the time we reached the top, so not much drought relief there.  We had hoped to make it to Clifton before its op shop there closed but we were too late.  We'll get there another time.


Just up the road is the delightful village of Nobby, where we were booked in for the night at Rudd's Pub, in their lovely family room.

We unpacked our goodies, including my second and last entry in the Interesting Book Competition.  I found this one at Vinnies in Rosewood, but after that I gave up, because Jo kept finding all the good ones.  Once I had seen the author's name, I had to buy it!  If you hop onto Youtube, you can hear Stormie's vocal efforts.