Happy Hour!

Our concept of 'Happy Hour' is a timeslot set aside at the local pub or club for the availability of a cheap, limited range of drinks. Not so in caravan parks. How things have changed since our early days of caravaning when we were mostly left to entertain ourselves. These days most parks seem to provide entertainment in 'The Shed' by way of country singers and/or
bush poets, most very good, but some not so good. Happy Hour commences somewhere between 4.30 and 6.30 and seems to continue until everyone gets hungry and makes their way back to their camp for dinner. The entertainment for the night is usually advertised on the back of the toilet door in the amenities block - can't miss it really!

We don't always attend Happy Hour but are often within earshot of whatever is going on. In Blackall we were (un)lucky enough to be 'entertained' by a country singer who was quite good for the first hour and half but by the time his dawg had died, his crops failed, his wife left him and he'd lost his job 15 times, and the pillows we had our heads under no longer
sufficed, we were ready to show this guy the front gate!

Thankfully, there are some compensations. In Ilfracombe Tourist Van Park, there is a Mum, Dad and Kids team running the place. The 2 eldest children are away at boarding school, leaving Mum, Dad, a 12-year-old daughter and a 7-year-old son each taking turns to entertain the masses singing, playing musical instruments, telling jokes, stories, poems and recitations to the delight of the crowd. The 7-year-old did a recitation about running away from home that was about 5 minutes in duration which was brilliant. It was no wonder he was placed Third in the Winton Speech and Bush Poetry Competition.

Guests too often do their bit by singing or telling jokes, but the one entertainer who stood out for us at Infracombe, was the 3 times Winner of the Australian Gum Leaf Playing Competition. I kid you not! This lady played a gum leaf that sounded exactly like a flute - it was brilliant, even if we did just about collapse laughing. We've have never, ever before stood to sing the National Anthem accompanied by a gum leaf! The other night in Winton we briefly called in to hear the visiting, famous 'Australian Bush Poets, Yarn Telling and Leg Pulling Champions', who went by the name 'Two Short Sheilas', one of whom kept forgetting her lines so looked to the partner to keep her going! We left before embarrassing ourselves in peals of laughter. Some have got 'it' - some haven't!!!

Happy Hour can also often include a baked dinner for the princely some of $15/20, an offer we've yet to take up!