Into the far west
THE SHADOWS of giant 400-year-old gum trees lengthen, backed by a fading burnt-orange sky. A flock of raucous red-tailed black-cockatoos squabble over roosts. And Australia’s second longest river meanders into the distance.
It’s another stunning sunset on the banks of the Darling River. But one essential ingredient is missing. Water.
“I’ve never seen it this low,” says Barb Arnold of Bindara Station, located midway between Menindee and Pooncarie in western New South Wales, her home for the last four decades.
Low is an understatement. Upstream, but for a couple of Murray cod floundering in fast-evaporating shallow pools, the otherwise dusty riverbed is strewn with the desiccated shells of dead mussels. Downstream it’s even more dire. Historic wrecks of paddle-steamers are exposed, their fragile wooden hulls protruding eerily, like giant whale carcasses, out of the mud.
With no feed and no water, Barb, whose husband Bill passed away six years ago, was forced last year to sell her remaining cattle, a herd of Devon-based Shorthorn cross that the couple had been breeding for 39 years. It was heartbreaking.
Unlike many other drought-stricken farmers, Barb has a lifeline – a steady stream of weary travellers bunking down in Bindara’s converted drovers’ and shearers’ quarters.
“Locals initially thought we were a bit strange when we first set up the farmstay and the neighbours were worried some guests might steal a sheep or cow and take it back to the city,” Barb says while busily preparing our camp dinner. “However, without it, I’d be stuffed
