OUTBACK IN AUSTRALIA.

Shannon News, 31 July 1923, Page 3

OUTBACK IN AUSTRALIA.

.MR R. E. LUCAS’S EXPERIENCES. In a letter to a member of the “Chronicle’’ staff, Mr R. E. Lucas writes interestingly of life in the back country Qf New South Wales where 1 (he went from Levin to take up a sheep run. Mrs Lucas and her son have had to return to New Zealand owing to the effects of the climate on their health, and are now In Wanganui, and Mr Lucas expects to come back later. New Zealand, ( he says, takes a lot of beating. He writes: — “The trip in the train from Sydney to Tridg station, which is due west about 460 miles, is a. very dreary ride. Then we had 45 miles by car from there, and practically no road to follow .so you may be sure we were glad to get to our journey's end. Everything was dried up here—not a blade of grass, and very little water for the stock. There had been no. rain since last November, so you may guess what the country looked like. Some of tthe stations lost hundreds of sheep. Then came thei dust storms, which were terrible. The worst one came in I May and lasted all day. You could not see a chain in front of yourself, and the house was inches, deep in sand and dust; we gathered over three' kerosene tins of sand 1 out of four rooms. What do you think of that. Well in June we got the extreme which was six inches of rain, and then the, place was that soft and boggy stock could not get about. We lost about 200 sheep bogged, but some stations lost a grelat many more than that. The country is looking splendid now, 'green grass everywhere, and plenty of lambs about. I have) been doing a bit of trapping for foxes, and so far caught several. We are having lovely weather now, in fact the days are too warm sometimes. Our nearest town, Hay. which is about the size of T.evin, is 120 miles away, so jwe don’t go there! every day. We get I our tnails twice a week and have to 1 travel five miles to get it. After all, 1 New Zealand takes a lot of beating, , and I think not long in the future, T 5 will make my way back there, to settle down.”