I suppose coming to these old sheds can be considered a practical history lesson for the kids…and us adults.  My first thoughts when seeing the shearing quarters were “why don’t they upgrade it”, but in talking to the farmer Chris, we gained a bit of an insight into the history of the shearing quarters and I learnt to appreciate how authentic it was.

Chris’s grandparents bought Lynray Station back in 1951.  The laundry and shower block was the original homestead.  His grandparents built the shearing quarters around that and later built their homestead a bit further down the track..  As a child Chris’s house was the shearing quarters. When the shearers came to shear they would have to pack up their furniture and belongings, store it in the shed and go and live in the homestead with their grandparents and then move back after the shearing was done. The kitchen as it is now is the very kitchen of his childhood. His grandmother mixed and laid the concrete out the front of the quarters by hand.  Both his grandparents lived well into their 90’s.

The kitchen up the end with the chimney…bedrooms down the side

The showers and laundry

When Chris saw all our kids, he bought over the slide and see-saw that his grandfather made way back in the days.  They might look old but they were still very solid.  Things were built to last back in those days!

Here’s the good old dunny.  This is a flush toilet…but wait until you see the next one?

The real deal…the long drop

Yes they still have them.  The kids had 2 experiments with this toilet.

1. Drop a stone down and wait for the plonk to see how far down it went….but it didn’t actually make a sound???
2. Get a torch and shine it down. Why kids like to be grossed out I don’t know???  And they WERE grossed out.

None of the kids were game enough to try this toilet.

To get to the toilet you have to traverse this narrow path of thistles and thorns…very inviting…hahaha

DOES NOT EXIST!  Where do I start with this one??? I suppose we could start with either no hot water or scolding hot water for one (check the last post for the details of that one).  This old kitchen would probably allow a health and safety officer the opportunity to check off every single health and safety point on their check list.  Take this secret hidden tap…

…no drain underneath it, and yes that is an electrical cord running right underneath it (our fault, but we needed the power point above it to heat up the bain maries.  This secret little tap comes from the rain water tank and provides our drinking water.  You don’t want to drink the bore water that comes out of the sink tap, it’s salty and slightly brownish and tastes gross (I had to learn that from personal experience).  The rain water is clear and very nice to drink by the way.

Back to the health and safety stuff…that old oven is an upgrade from the even older oven that was used last year, but the door doesn’t shut, so in the 40+ degree weather it must have been 50+ in the kitchen with no aircon and the oven (with a slightly ajar door) and stoves going full blast for lunch and dinner.  Last year the old wall oven actually fell on Renarda while she was cooking, and she was pregnant…so it’s nice to see that it was upgraded!???

The gas stove on the left was a no no.  No way would we even attempt to use that. Renarda did use it last year however…and it was scary!

So the hot water in the sink comes out cold and cold water comes out hot, but only if the donkey (see last post) is fired up…and I really could keep going on but I think you get the picture.

As for cleanliness, you just have to get used to red dirt EVERWHERE. There is no way around it.  You live in a big red sand pit…what else can you expect!

No… not the animal kind! It’s the hot water system.  This is what it looks like…

You make a fire in the fire place.  The water is pumped from out of the ground (bore water) into the tank on the right, then comes out through the pipes and through the fireplace, heats up and comes out the pipes to the showers and the kitchen.  Now you don’t want to get the fire going too much or the water will come out boiling and scold you.  When the water is boiling it spits out the long thin pipe sticking up out of the fireplace and squirts all over the place. You don’t want to be near it when it’s spurting out either! A nice gentle fire is preferred…obviously!