One Old Man And His Town.

We went to Milang and did shed stuff: putting things in and taking things out of our storage shed.  The sun shone in Milang, but the wind was cold and fat little clouds lurked out beyond Lake Alexandrina.

"There's a loud on the horizon over there, it's going to rain!"

 We drove along the lake to Wellington and caught the little vehicle ferry over the river.  The ferries were all free, provided by the State government as a sop for there being less bridges than would be convenient should you live in this part of the world and not have ferries.

Wellington Pub had a sunny deck on which we could have lunched overlooking the river. Following our long tradition of always choosing the worst picnic spot possible, we carried on to Tailem Bend for a sad, dehydrated pie from the the about-to-close and out-of-stock Tailem Bend bakery, and then off we went for a visit to Old Tailem Town.

Let me tell you about Old Tailem Town.

Once upon a time Mr Peter Squires inherited the property that Old Tailem Town now stands on from his Grandfather.   Having recently visited the pioneer village at Swan Hill, he decided that he wanted a pioneer village of his own and off he went to buy anything and everything that could possibly fit in a pioneer village. Determined to achieve authenticity, he bought old buildings in which to house his old things, and built himself a town to the tune of 115 buildings on 15 streets. 

The old Peake railway station was one of the first buildings he brought to Old Tailem Town,

and then he added one or two more.

The friendly lady at the entry told us that Peter, now in his 80s, was still intent on expanding his kingdom with his heart most recently set on obtaining a cinema.

He already has the movie projectors to inhabit it.

We spent nearly three hours in Old Tailem Town, wandering through exhibits that didn't appear to have been touched since they were set up 40 years ago.  A rich patina of dust lay over everything, cobwebs created delicate festoons in the corners, and slightly creepy mannequins added non-human interest to the displays.

I have no words.

Trucks, farm implements, wagons, fire engines, and train carriages jumbled and tumbled and rusted quietly at their stations. 

Old car restorers would weep.

There was a bushfire.  Were it not for a big bang that woke everyone up and a fortuitously placed RFS vehicle the whole of Old Tailem Town could have gone up in flames.  But it didn't.

This is a meat shed.  Back in the dark ages, when  I was a little girl, I and my siblings had to go out to the meat shed every day and turn the meat that sat in big buckets of brine, turning into corned meat.  It was a truly disgusting job.

 Floorboards creaked and sagged dangerously underfoot as we wandered past old film projectors, cash registers, butcher's scales, shelves sagging with bottles and tins of preserves and potions from long ago.    

Old Tailem Bend had a school,

and several cottages just waiting for someone to move in.

I've prescribed many a wheelchair in my working life, but never one like this.

Skeletal wagons, and a house of tin.

Peter Squires discovered that burial plots whose tenure had finished were re-used, and should no-one come forward to claim them the tombstones were sold or destroyed.  So, being Peter Squires, he bought himself a small cemetery's worth of unclaimed tombstones and furnished himself a cemetery beside Old Tailem Town's church.

Easy Peasy.

Walking through Old Tailem Town I was surprised to see so much old stuff looking so... well, old.  Peter, it appeared, was more interested in the purchase than the preservation of his vast collection.

Old Tailem Town doors,

and signs,

and windows.

At the end of the day we exited past stands of souvenir tea towels reminiscent of the '80s, past an honour guard of old trucks, still not sure whether we had been through a museum or a fine example of hoarding on a pioneer village scale.  Which wasn't to say that I didn't have a good time, but a succession plan was sorely needed for Old Tailem town and the sooner the better.

We went in search of afternoon coffee in Tailem Bend, where the cafe situation was even more dire than it had been at lunch time and the wind was colder, so we gave up, caught the ferry back across the river and went home to the dog.