PORTLAND VICTORIA, VIEW OF THE HARBOUR

Portland - Victoria's First Settlement

GOLD RUSH STORIES - PART 2 - WHY HERE? - CHOOSING WHERE TO SETTLE - historical image of Gulgong NSW Gold Rush Town 1870'sGREAT OCEAN ROAD SIGN OVER THE HIGHWAY

Victoria’s Great Ocean Road

It’s always been on the bucket list,

For the past 7 years I have traversed Australia as a touring muso, performing hundreds of shows whilst collecting a swag of stories to share with you all, but I never quite got there.THE 12 APOSTLES, GREAT OCEAN ROAD VICTORIA WONDER OF THE WORLDGOLD RUSH STORIES - PART 2 - WHY HERE? - CHOOSING WHERE TO SETTLE Sydney Harbour sunset, photo taken from ferry on the water Opera House Sun setting through the Sydney Harbour Bridge sydney cityscape from the water

But all that changed in late 2019, as I set in motion long-held plans to circle wider Victoria between recording sessions with my old friend and songwriting partner Luke Price, a fellow former Novocastrian now based out of Melbourne.

Globally iconic, It’s the stuff of many a tourism ad.

It’s on all the postcards

VICTORIA - CAPE BRIDGEWATER NEW ZEALAND FUR SEAL COLONY LOOK OUT LITTLE PLANET PERSPECTIVE GO PRO 360VRLONDON BRIDGE SEA MONUMENT, GREAT OCEAN ROAD VICTORIA

LONDON BRIDGE - GREAT OCEAN ROAD

Sure you can get one or two of the major attractions to yourself for a brief moment, however it’s what is beyond the GOR that offers a true sense of charm with a unique experience and history without the hordes of tourists. 

MICROFLEECE HOODIE - THE APOSTLES III DESIGN FROM LIVING ART LIFESTYLE GIFT IDEAMICROFLEECE HOODIE - THE APOSTLES III DESIGN FROM LIVING ART LIFESTYLE GIFT IDEA

 THE APOSTLES III - MICROFLEECE ZIP HOODIE
Tree of Knowledge Art Installation in centre of Barcaldine Central QLD Australian Labor PartyGREAT OCEAN ROAD VICTORIA, BEACH BETWEEN CLIFFS
GORDON HOTEL PORTLAND VICTORIA

Our opportunity to experience the gems of Southwestern Victoria came when we brought the Roadshow to The Gordon Hotel in the Emerald City that is Portland.

A great example of the rewards you can receive if you just go that extra mile, or in this case the extra

130 miles or 210klms, from the official end of the Great Ocean Road.

 

PORTLAND VICTORIA, VIEW OF THE HARBOURThings Start Speeding Up by Kieran Wicks - Time Lapse Film Clip - Still from film clip  Kieran Wicks in front of camp fire super imposed over road

 

White settlement of Victoria began here, a historical implication whose import is somewhat mired in a contradiction of Socratic irony, given it’s almost incidental significance when paralleled to the tens of thousands of years of indigenous history preserved here.GUNDJITMARRA COUNTRY MAP, SOUTH WEST VICTORIA. TRADITIONAL OWNERS LAND MAP

 

The Gunditjmara people are the traditional owners of much of south-west Victoria.  A region replete with protected World Heritage archeological sites of cultural and environmental significance.BUDJ BIM CULTURAL LANDSCAPE - STONE AND MUD HUTS RECREATION

BUDJ BIM CULTURAL LANDSCAPE - RECREATION OF INDIGINOUS STONE AND MUD HUTS BUILT ON ORIGINAL FOUNDATIONS
DARK EMU BY BRUCE PASCOE BOOK COVER WITH ILLUSTRATION OF TUBER

UNESCO recognised archeological evidence of sedentary civilisations, such as weirs, fish traps and the foundations of hundreds of circular stone huts, are strewn throughout the countryside, and whose existence was vividly documented in the journals of early Australian explorers, historical records brought to prominence by esteemed author and revisionist Bruce Pascoe in his seminal work Dark Emu.

 

 

"The Budj Bim Cultural Landscape is located in the traditional Country of the Gunditjmara Aboriginal people in south-eastern Australia. The three serial components of the property contain one of the world’s most extensive and oldest aquaculture systems. The Budj Bim lava flows, which connect the three components, provides the basis for this complex aquaculture system developed by the Gunditjmara, based on deliberate redirection, modification and management of waterways and wetlands.

Waltzing Matilda Centre in Winton exhibition display about The Golden Fleece and the Squatocracy GOLD RUSH STORIES - PART 7 - WHAT WAS THE THE SQUATOCRACY?Lookout view overlooking Gundagai Riverina NSW

 

Over a period of at least 6,600 years the Gunditjmara created, manipulated and modified these local hydrological regimes and ecological systems. They utilised the abundant local volcanic rock to construct channels, weirs and dams and manage water flows in order to systematically trap, store and harvest kooyang (short-finned eel – Anguilla australis) and support enhancement of other food resources. Wallabies on Magnetic Island QLD - Freedom on the Wallaby by Henry Lawson read by Kieran Wicks

 

The highly productive aquaculture system provided a six millennia-long economic and social base for Gunditjmara society. This deep time interrelationship of Gunditjmara cultural and environmental systems is documented through present-day Gunditjmara cultural knowledge, practices, material culture, scientific research and historical documents. It is evidenced in the aquaculture system itself and in the interrelated geological, hydrological and ecological systems. The Budj Bim Cultural Landscape is the result of a creational process narrated by the Gunditjmara as a deep time story. For the Gunditjmara, deep time refers to the idea that they have always been there. From an archaeological perspective, deep time refers to a period of at least 32,000 years that Aboriginal people have lived in the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape. The ongoing dynamic relationship of Gunditjmara and their land is nowadays carried by knowledge systems retained through oral transmission and continuity of cultural practice". - https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1577/ 

WOMEN SITTING ON THE SAND ON A BEACH TOWEL LOOKING AT THE OCEAN. THE CAPE COLLECTION BEACH BLANKET

PRESENTED BY THE CAPE COLLECTION
Australian Navy ship docked in Portland, South West Victoria
NAVY SHIP DOCKED IN PORTLAND, THE CREW PARTIED WITH US AT THE GORDON HOTEL WHILST ON SHORE LEAVE

 

 

The only deep sea port between Adelaide and Melbourne, Portland was instituted in 1834 as a rogue squatters settlement by the infamous Henty family, predating the founding of Melbourne by at least 12 months.

RED AND WHITE LIGHTHOUSE PORTLAND VICTORIA AUSTRALIA

 

 

The Henty’s presence was "discovered" two years after settling in the area by the explorer Thomas Mitchell in 1836.
The Henty Hermit’s hideout wasn’t sanctioned by the British Colonial Office, who had still been considering how to deal with the rights to the land of indigenous Victorians, and whose policy at the time was to contain colonial settlements in Australia within geographic limits, making the Henty’s isolation illegal. 

CONICAL SEA SHELL SCULPTURE ARTWORK AT PORTLAND FORESHORE PARK, VICTORIA AUSTRALIA

 

 

In 1832 the Henty brothers sailed from Mother England with their father Thomas, a successful sheep breeder. Initially settling at Swan River in Western Australia, after two failed summers the Henty's relocated to Van Diemen’s Land where they hoped to secure a freehold, but they were too late, as when they arrived there was no unoccupied productive land available.

With no options on Van Diemen’s Land, they turned their attention north of Bass Strait to the mainland, to the virtually unexplored Port Phillip district of New South Wales.THE CAPE COLLECTION - VICTORIA - CAPE BRIDGEWATER AUSTRALIAN AND NEW ZEALAND FUR SEAL COLONY LOOK OUT LITTLE PLANET PERSPECTIVE GO PRO 360VR

 

Thomas Henty petitioned the British Government in London three times to settle in the Port Phillip district but was rejected on each occasion, as the British authorities forbade the settling of land that was not easily accessible from Sydney.

The Henty run was known as Merino Downs and is still owned by their descendants to this day.

In a recent article in "The Age," written by "J.M.R.," it is surmised that the Henty family contemplated settling at Portland Bay by means of a treaty with the blacks, because John Helder Wedge wrote from Campbell Town to Governor Arthur in Hobart on September 18, 1834, as follows: - "It has become known to me that a party has it in contemplation to take possession of a tract of country at Portland Bay, independent of His Majesty's Government, by virtue of a treaty with the natives. " Now the first mention of natives by the Hentys occurs in Edward's diary December 2, 1834, at a spot many miles from Portland. It was not until after two months' residence that any natives appear to have been seen near Hentys' settlement; the sealers and whalers of former years had no doubt driven the aborigines back from the locality. The Hentys, finding that the Government was endeavouring to prevent them settling at Portland Bay, may have mentioned that they would make a treaty with the blacks. This would give Wedge the material for his letter, though it does not appear certain that the Hentys were the people referred to in that document, as Wedge writes: - "A party has it in contemplation, &c." It is all rather indefinite, and the main fact remains, viz., no treaty with the natives was made at Portland Bay by Henty or any other person.  Source : "The Portland Bay Settlement" - Noel F. Learmonth, 1934

SOURCES

I AM PORTLAND SIGN - PORTLAND FORESHORE PARK VICTORIA AUSTRALIACAPE BRIDGEWATER VICTORIA AUSTRALIA - PETRIFIED FORREST UNIQUE GEOLOGICAL ROCK FORMATION

Back to blog
1 of 3

Tree of Life Collection

Explore Our Blogs

A polymathic touring musician, film maker, historian and producer, for the past 8 years Kieran Wicks has navigated the Great Southern Land of Australia performing hundreds of shows to ravenous audiences, whilst simultaneously developing a vast catalogue of interviews, images and videos in the production of multiple formative docuseries including 'One Town at a Time', which records his musical journey, immersed in poignant, forgotten Australian history and poetry, in archives such as 'Gold Rush Stories' and 'Poetry of the Pioneers'.

Blogs
1 of 5
1 of 3

T-Shirt Collections

Hoodies Collections