While me and the cheeze was away for the last munf we came across a couple of place names that caught the eye.
Fristance "DRINKASTUBBIE DOWNS" a station on the road on the way out to the weir at Charters Towers.
Have you seen any strange ones and if so post them here. Included GPS info for all you gizmo gurus (S 19-59.204 E 146-16.963) or for all the others just take the road out to the weir and look to your right. Also on this road is a concrete pad that was used by the allied air forces during WW2 that was used to sight in the aircraft guns. A/C was tethered down so an accurate setting could be made....
see below:
Bradmans of the Bush
Ken Piesse
Alf
Wilson
Drinkastubbie Downs
It gets so hot in and around the delightfully named Drinkastubbie Downs at Charters Towers in northern Queensland that the locals consume the equivalent of two cold-rooms full of beer at the annual Goldfield Ashes. An Isuzu ice truck, all the way from
Townsville, is integral to the festivities. It is driven from venue to venue, ensuring the frosties are always nice and cold.
Drinkastubbie is a private station near the town's weir and is owned by the Hutchings family whose team, Chad's Champs, contest for the Ashes over the Australia Day long weekend each January.
The competition, which started between just six teams in 1948, and now boasts 150, is renowned as the largest cricket carnival in the southern hemisphere, if not the world.
Teams and players come from everywhere north of the Fitzroy, from the Gulf of Carpentaria to
Cape York and even out as far as
Camooweal, the last Queensland town before the Northern Territory border.
Regulars among the teams are the Alpine
Simpson Desert Ski XI,the Dreaded Creeping Bumrash, Guatemala Hog Herders, the Squashed Frogs, McAubo's Inebriated XI, Bloody Huge XI, the Zarsoff Brothers and the Mongrel Mob.
It's the old goldmining town's three biggest days of the year, the town's
population swelling by a third with up to 5000 visitors. Hotel and motel accommodation is booked out a year in advance, forcing some to sleep under the stars.
Every available concrete pitch in and around town is requisitioned, from parks and schools through to golf and gun clubs and even the local airport and racecourse, where the sandy surrounds stop even the most delicious daisy-cutter before it can reach the fence.
Most unusual of the original cricket venues was the old Charters Towers velodrome. It was dug up recently when the cyanide heaps from the gold rush days in the late 1800s were removed. Old-timers say the bike track was on low land and was prone to flooding. At one Ashes carnival in the 1980s, it rained cats and dogs the night before the commencement of play on the opening day. All the rain did around most of the Towers, which had been in a drought, was to green the place up a tad. But not so the velodrome, which had a metre of
water in it, forcing the two teams to shift their match to nearby
Mingela.
Such is the enthusiasm to play that private grounds are used, too, like Balfe's
Creek (home of the Boozers' XI) and Drinkastubbie Downs, where the much-publicised appearance of a
well-proportioned
young streaker guaranteed a huge crowd two years back.
Despite the carnival atmosphere, disciplinary action has been threatened against the odd team. One side was warned off after arriving for a match dressed only in protectors fixed around their torsos by string.
A couple of blokes fielded in the slips on horseback for Balfe's one year, before cantering off to the local hotel to pick up some
first aid supplies . . . and a couple of extra slabs.
In 2002, the year of record registrations, the Laid Back lads forgot to nominate in time and were told no grounds were available. Unabashed, they brought their own stumps and cut their own field on a property owned by one of their team members.
Drinkastubbie has its own pitch and
camping ground, rows of Chinee Apple trees having been cleared just for the cricketers. Chad's Champs are an assortment of family members, roustabouts and miners from nearby Dysart. They even have their own mechanical dog, 'Stay', to pull the drinks trolley, a 64-can Esky mounted on billycart
wheels. Often the cart comes on at an end of an over, or even in-between balls. 'It gets pretty hot out here,' said Allan Hutchings, the team's patron. 'Stay comes out whenever she's called, which is most of the time.'
Six teams enter the elite 'A1' division of the Ashes, with defending champions Charters Towers taking the honours in 2002. Twenty contest 'A2' and 30 at 'Bl' level. The games in the top three grades are played under international one-day rules: 50 overs a side, with a maximum of 10 overs per bowler, if you're good enough.
At the 2002 carnival, a total of 49 fields of varying standard were employed, 450 balls used, 700 12 runs scored and 3891 wickets taken. So many sixes were hit in one match that they ran out of balls and could complete the match only with greenish oranges!
The only year the carnival wasn't played was in 1974 when monsoonal rains struck, washing out the entire weekend. Everyone came anyway, the beer sales booming and card games replacing the cricket.
The unluckiest cricketer at a recent carnival was the bloke from the Dreaded Creeping boys who fell over while fielding and gashed himself, was sconed by an Esky lid masquerading as a frisbee at the caravan
park and, to cap it all off, was hit flush on the jaw when thrown a cold can to drown his sorrows!
Innisfail cane farmer Paul McAvoy will never forget his run spree in 1990. Playing for the Gum Flats XI in 'B1' grade, McAvoy had scores of 106, 145 not out and 162 for a total of 413 runs at an average of 206.50! He hails from a tiny place called Garradunga, which is a hop, step and a jump from
Innisfail.
In the same year, Mt Isa electrician Glen Dixon amassed scores of 167, 67 and 196 representing Mick Downey's XI in 'A2'. Highest individual score of the carnival that year was Mark McKay's whirlwind 203 for Parks Hockey XI in 'B1' grade against
Cairns Westpac at
Mossman Park. He hit 30 fours and four sixes.
The legendary Doug Walters made a guest appearance in 2000 as the star ring-in for
Coen's Heroes. Like everyone else, he had to retire at 50 and was glad, too! That day it was at least 40 degrees in the shade. Another ex-Testman,
Ross Duncan, also played a few games in the 80s, with a team from Mackay. One year it was thought that Ian Botham had also snuck into town for a game, but it turned out to be a Botham 'lookalike', an all-rounder from NSW named Ken Snaddon who represented the
Nimbin Emus.
Former Australian Rugby Union hero Peter Griggs was a regular participant with the Mountain Men, renowned for the inscription on their T-shirts: MOUNTAIN MEN LOVE MOUNTAIN WOMEN. Pete bowled at good pace and, as a mollydooker, could hit them around too.
Charters Towers Cricket Association secretary Rohan Dixon says the top-level cricket is 'fair dinkum' and the socialising even more serious, given the searing New Year temperatures and holiday atmosphere. An average of 4000 cartons of beer are consumed each carnival. Non-drinkers can be counted on the fingers of one hand.
Most teams enter the 'B2' and social grades, these half day games being played as 35-overs-a-side fixtures.
To prevent 'A' graders dominating in the social grades, batsmen have to retire at the end of the over in which they reach 50, and bowlers can send down a maximum of seven overs.
There is also a six-team women's division consisting of the Black Breams, the Hormoans, Tit's Chicks, the Travelbugs, Indecision and the Rocksoff Sisters, winners for the last three years.
The Rocksoff Sisters stay together all year round. When they're not playing cricket, they play vigoro and other sports.
In 2001, the Hormoans were sponsored by a bra company and at the start of matches, just as Steve Waugh insists on players wearing the baggy green for the first session of Tests, the girls warmed up in just their bras – plus other assorted cricket gear. Their games are always among the best supported.
The emphasis is on fun at the Ashes. In several of the social grades, fieldsmen who drop a catch or batsmen who make a duck must wear a woman's dress until the start of play the next day. Those from the Herb Eva XI who happen to go out first ball are asked to strap a rubber ducky around their forehead!
Those who happen to make a duck or drop a catch for the Alpine
Simpson Desert Ski team must ski around a field on the red soil and have their photo taken by a team-mate.
Scottish kilts form part of the Inebriated Xl's dress. Their long-time captain, Chris Round, said his side rarely wins. 'We are a team of drinkers with a cricketing problem,' he says.
His lager-loving boys have encyclopedic memories and can name every champion Scottish cricketer. They claim Mike Denness and even Douglas
Jardine, from the shock-horror Bodyline summer.
The fame of the Inebriated lads spread worldwide in 1999 when the Glasgow-based mass circulation Sunday Mail gave the guzzlers a full page under the headline of 'Howzat?' and a secondary line of 'The Tartan Terrors who couldn't give a XXXX!'
In 2003, with the drought hitting home, most of the fields used for the carnival resembled the middle of a desert, until some welcome rains on the opening afternoon's play. So heavy was the downpour that six matches were abandoned, the boys happy to head indoors for an early round or two.
Copied the info for you all and will probably be in strife I s'pose but at 60 who cares....
Grrr!!!