The Black Stump Hotel, Merriwagga in the Riverina, NSW

The Black Stump Hotel at Merriwagga. Don't stress about the parking meter, it's stuck on 25 minutes remaining!

Thirty minutes south from Hillston, on your right as you head down the Kidman Way, you’ll see the turnoff to Black Stump Road just opposite the silos. A bit further south and its namesake pub, Merriwagga’s Black Stump Hotel, complete with parking meter out front is set back from the highway on your left.

When I turn up, inside I’m welcomed by a forehead and a pair of smiling eyes  just about popping over the bar and by locals Kel and John on my side.

It’s the highest bar in Australia. Its top is 4ft 9 inches (145cms) from the floor.  The bar stools look like some weird props from the Flintstones. That’s if Fred ‘n’ Barney had run a pub in Brobdingnag! I climb up one and join Kel and John.

Sharon, who wouldn't exactly tower over a standard bar and who’s owned the pub for 13 years, tells me there’s three theories  about why the bar’s so high and I tell her to give ‘em to me in order of credibility. Cue: laughs all round.

Sharon, the boss can just see over the bar.

 “Well the first is that when the pub was being constructed the railway was also getting built and there was a depot in town. The fettlers were a real rugged bunch so the publican told the bloke building it to make the bar this high to stop the workers jumping the bar to fight him or steal the booze.”

I blow the top of my beer and then John, who owned the pub from 1996 to 2004 hits me with number two:

“Originally the pub didn't have that extension on the side, it was all open there and on that side-road was where they’d hitch their horses. It was us who closed it in. Well the original publican thought it’d be an idea to build the bar high so the locals could ride their horses into the bar and get served without getting off.”

Hmmmm.

Kel chimes in with the third theory:

“Well the first owner was really short and he said to the builder that he wanted the bar about chest height. Problem was the builder was not only very tall but he was also very thick. They reckon he was about six six. So he built it at his own bloody chest height, not the boss’s and that’s why it’s so tall.”

Yeah right!  Who really knows and really, who cares?

We’re all laughing about these theories and some others when a gang of shearers arrives. They’re all staying at the pub, like they’ve done for the past twenty years and are halfway through the first of two local sheds they’re working.

One of ‘em, Fox, joins us and it’s pretty obvious the evening’s about to go down hill on skates. Fox’s been shearing for the best part of 50 years and I’m guessing he has a funny story from each and every day.

His eyes glint with the strength of Alpha Crucis and when he’s laughing, which is most of the time, it’s his lower eyelids which close up not the uppers. His brother’s the boss but is away in Sydney picking up his kids or it might be grandkids from boarding school so Fox is in charge.

Around the corner of the bar I see a bloke I recognise. His face’s got more folds than a poker tournament. It’s bloody Barnsey from Fords Bridge who’s having his usual dinner of a schooner (or three) and a packet of fags.

(One of the other shearers later tells me, “He like a bloody python. He eats a big dinner every four days or so and then he just lives on liquid and smoke!” )

I leave Fox entertaining Kel and head around but Barnsey’s pissed at me.

“You took a million photos of me and never used a single one in that book of yours! What, was I too good looking for ya?”

I don't have a copy with me but I’m 95% sure a shot of him did make the cut but that 5% niggles so I tell him I’m saving him for when I do a book on Australia’s most ineligible bachelors and he heads outside.

(Turns out later that I’m right. That’s him playing with the cattle dog in the chapter about the Warrego Hotel at Fords Bridge.)

Now, it takes a very special skill set to open a pull door whilst coughing your guts up, carrying a packet of fags and not spilling a drop from your full schooner glass but Barnsey’s Got……It……Nailed!

Kel looks a bit dubious at a Fox story as 'Python' Barnsey gets his tea in the background

I head back to Kel and Fox who asks me how I know the python and I tell him about the Warrego Hotel at Fords Bridge where he’s one third of the town’s population.

Fox fires up deluxe!

“Worst fucking meal I ever had was in that fucking pub! We were shearing at a place just to the west of there in the late 70’s it must’ve been and I fronted up to the pub at the end of the first day. The dinner special was fish and chips for four bucks. I thought that was a good deal so I ordered some. Two minutes later the bloke’s back with my meal. ‘Here’s your dinner mate” and plonks it down.

I say to him, ‘are you fucking kidding? This isn’t fish and chips’. And he looks me in the eye and says, yes it is.

And I say its fucking not, “how can you call that fish and chips?” and he leans over and says in my face, “that’s a can of sardines and that’s a packet of chips – says so on the fucking packet! One’s fish and that packet’s chips, so that makes it fish and fucking chips! “

We had ten more days there so I knew he had me. That bastard knew he had me too! Sardines ‘n’ Crisps. It’s that’s fish and chips I’ll be fucked!”

Fox hoes into his dinner, and it aint fish'n'chips!

The incandescent Fox continues to illuminate the room with his stories and for a bit of sanity I pull Sharon aside and ask her about the black stump.  It’s a whole load better story than the other towns’ claims which are all about logs. This stump was a person!

In 1886 Barbara Blain was with her bullocky husband, camped to the west of the pub when, whilst preparing dinner she her dress caught fire and she was burnt to death. Apparently at the inquest, her husband described finding her and saying she looked “just like a black stump”.  She was the first person to be buried in Gunbar cemetery but don't go looking for her, the grave’s not marked.

What is marked is the spot this all supposedly happened on the dirt road from Merriwagga to Gunbar. The small plaque’s on the west of the track about mid-way and you’ll need to enjoy riding the red sand if you plan finding it.

Burnt woman as the black stump makes more sense than a marker in Sydney’s eastern suburbs and it’s a whole lot more interesting than bland old dead logs!

Fox and friends are heading off to their rooms, Kel and John are cutting out and so I take my leave of Sharon and head down the hallway. It’s been a great little detour from the river. I’m in a good pub, have slaked on cold drinks and warm company and damn I’ve sure filled up on good stories.

In the morning the boys are all up early. In his brother’s absence, Fox is making the sangers for their lunches, packing them in ice and eskies. Sharon’s left the kitchen open for them all day’s rations and outside the Python has a breakfast very much resembling his dinner.

I keep out of the way but boil up my brew then sit out back as they get their boots and gear on, then it’s last durries and they’re off in a small bunch of utes and wagons for a day full, no doubt of sweat, of swearing a fleeceful of laughs but no fish ‘n’chips!