Travelling around grazing country

Last week I took a few days off and headed out west - just wanted some R&R.  It was quite cold and we had three days of moderately heavy rain before I left and a blizzard up in the Snowy Mountains while I was away.

I saw some interesting old grazing properties the remnants of those old homesteads giving us an eye back to days gone by.

This shack, above,would be more of a settlers hut - slab timbers and poles hand hewn from available hardwoods, corrugated iron cladding and a rubble brick chimney. Often these huts had chimneys made with only corrugated iron cladding.

Grazing nearby was this nice size bull who was quite prepared to wander over and give me the 'eye-off'!

A little further up the road were the remnants of a more substantial property. Note the way the central residential structure was originally completed and then 'add-ons' in the form of front and rear verandahs have been constructed that were partially or wholly enclosed made up the whole building. A chimney constructed of locally made bricks indicates that this was  a 'homestead', more so than a 'settlers shack'.

Was this the later homestead built by the family that had sheltered in the settlers hut where the bull was in the paddock?

Nearby can be seen a large shearing shed, I would say about 6 stands in essence and the power connection would indicate electric shearing. This looks like it may have been used until recently and, in fact, may still be in current use. 

This property was in Frogmore and was advertised as 'for sale'.

As I progressed along this country road I came across a church, a lone building stading off the road.

The yard around the church was very unkempt, the gates were rusting but the fencing was good although long grass made the area appear untidy. At first I thought that this church may no longer be in use, however, closer inspection revealed new and well maintained graves. This is quite obviously a local rural church that stood by itself, seemingly in the middle of nowhere.

When you checked the surrounding area there was nothing more than roadway.

Another few kilometres along the road and I came across another old homestead that was even more grand, for its age and structure, than the previous two. This is obviously still a working property. Cattle were grazing in the green pastures and the recent rains had filled the creek at the back and created a billabong amongst a stand of river gums.

Note that the building is constructed from local rock and the fireplace of at least one chimney, the one in view on the righthand end of the building, was also of rock. The upper chimnys were constructed from brick.

I drove a bit further along the road and shortly came across what was the decaying remnants of a small schoolhouse - probably large enough to cater for about 6 children and would have been run by local family supervision with a weekly or bi-weekly visit from a schoolteacher from a larger rural town about 50 kilometres away.

I hope to travel back that way soon and I will seek to find out more about this 'community', which when I made enquiries at a grand homestead further down the road, was known as "Graham".