Day 10 - Alice Springs

We started the day at the Old Ghan Legends Museum this morning. The kids played in the attractive, outside shady playground (playing huge dominos, chess, seesaws etc) while Brendan and I strolled around the interesting museum and clambered into the old Ghan carriages for a look. Fellow train buffs (that’s you Rod!) will be interested to note that one of the highlights is the inclusion of a diesel loco NSU58, one of the first to take over from the steam trains. We walked through the galley kitchen on the train, and the bar car, and dining car. The Ghan started taking passengers in 1927, and back then was a vital transport link for the country. The museum had a good range of railway memorabilia and a video on the old Ghan service. There was also an attached National Trucking Museum, which we didn’t visit today.

One of the most fascinating visits of our trip so far was to the School of the Air. This was established way back in 1951, by an inspired lady who recognised children living in remote conditions were lacking social contacts, and believed that radio could be used to provide a community aspect to the education of children living in these areas.

These days the School of the Air provides assistance to teachers, support staff, parents, home tutors and students to help educate isolated students and their families. It is essentially a huge public school, that sends out a team to install a satellite internet service (at a cost of $10,000 per farm/station met by the government) just for the duration of their children’s education years (year prep to year nine). It covers an area of 1,300,000 square kms (10 times the size of England). Some students live just 80kms away, others 1300kms. Most students reside on cattle stations, aboriginal communities, roadhouses, national parks and military bases.

We did a tour of the facility which was fantastic. We were able to watch the live broadcasts of the teachers, from their studios, and could see the 10 or so remote students in each classroom answering the teacher’s questions, or participating in class discussions, via a type of skype on the internet. We could see the kids faces chatting, and watch them writing comments on the screen as the teacher controlled the live camera feeds switching between herself, the individual students, their live chat box, and their schoolwork. (Sam and Lily were fascinated and absorbed every word). The students come into Alice about once a term for sports days, and other days to visit the school if they can, and the teacher tries to make a personal visit to each student’s remote location (usually overnight because of distance). Click on this pic below to enlarge it and have a good look.

 

Many of the remote families employ a school tutor, especially if they have a few kids (often a gap gear student, or retired person, trained up by the School of the Air) to manage the kids school work (especially the little ones who need someone sitting beside them while they do their work). This cost is met by the family and individual salaries are negotiated. The kids have one hour a day online with their teacher, and the rest of the school day they complete their correspondence lessons or work on projects.

Their school day is from 8.00am to 3.00pm, with regular breaks. Each school session is recorded, as often the kids are out helping muster cattle, or doing other farm jobs, so they can come in when they can and catch up on the lesson. We were fascinated to see the map of the huge area the school covers, and to pick out some cattle station names that we are now familiar with (from listening to the audio book “Middle of Nowhere”).

 

Next on the agenda was a visit to the Royal Flying Doctor Service Tourist Facility. Another wonderful place to visit and share with the kids some of the remote services available that we all take for granted. We were able to watch a big live map, showing where all the Flying Doc planes were currently situated, which ones were grounded, or in-flight. There are 63 PC12 single engine turbo prop planes available (and one jet on call funded by Rio Tinto), most staffed by a pilot, and a very highly trained specialist nurse. Only 10% of the planes are staffed by doctors for the real emergencies.  These docs do a specialist  year course in obstetrics , paediatrics and cardio training on top of their normal training.

 

There is also a 24 hour phone help line staffed by doctors that the remote stations can call in for medical help and advice. Each station has a huge comprehensive medical chest (sometimes housed in a special room and fridge set aside for the purpose)with everything numbered, so the doctors can assess and give treatment options over the phone.

 

We watched a very interesting film (complete with a holographic John Flynn) that explained the beginnings of the service, to current day. Very, very clever. We also walked through the museum, viewed the inside of a plane and its equipment, and browsed in the fundraising shop.  As the service is only funded 60% by the government, there is always a lot of fundraising happening to meet their needs.

Next up, just over the road to the National Pioneer Women’s Hall of Fame. This is a dedicated women’s museum to collect, preserve, research, commemorate and display material relating to pioneering Australian women. This is any women who was a first in their chosen field, from early settlers in Australia, first women doctors, lawyers, aviators, sportswomen, etc.  No surprises that Sam was most interested in the sportswomen such as Cathy Freeman, Dawn Fraser, Yvonne Goolagong and Betty Cuthbert. There was also a tribute to the pioneer women and a display of their traditional laundering, cooking, cleaning and craft equipment. (“mum, how does that old typewriter get the letters on the paper?”).

As part of the complex we also toured the Old Alice Springs Gaol, in operation from 1938 to 1996. The kids were not impressed with the tiny, basic cells for men and woman, and were interested to hear about the prisoner’s daily routine, and read the individual stories of some of the inmates. Sam was astonished to read about how some of the aboriginal women in particular deliberately picked fights, or got in to trouble on purpose, so they could be put in prison, perhaps escape from family violence and have a decent bed, clothes and food for a month or so. Volunteers came into the prison to teach them craft, cooking, sewing and laundry duties.

We then wandered down to Todd Mall to stroll in the sun, and check out the souvenir shops and have an all important ice-cream. There are some beautiful birds in the area, these two parrots were finding some tidbits in the mall.

 

Our last stop of the day was at the Olive Pink Botanical Gardens. We were probably here at the wrong time, so not a lot was in flower, but it was interesting to read about the medicinal uses of plants, and see the bush tucker plantings.

Back at the van park tonight we caught up with Brendan’s Melbourne cousin – Amanda Harris. It was great to see her again, as we haven’t seen her for quite a while. She moved up to Alice a few years ago, and is a social worker working in a Woman’s refuge at present. She had some really interesting stories to tell us about her work life (amazing!) and her life in the Alice. She is about to head up to the Kimberley for a month’s leave. It was great to catch up with her again.