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This article written by Ian
Thompson and appeared in the Daily Examiner on the 23rd July, 2005. ©
Daily Examiner.
After
hanging up the phone one day in November 1993, Sue
lbbott headed straight for the silverware and the
Waterford crystal cabinets in the Wave Hill station
homestead, north-west of Grafton.
Her
caller was the aide-de-camp of the Governor General of
Australia, Bill Hayden. She was asking if the Haydens - Bill, wife
Dallas and son Kirk - could spend a day and a night at Wave
Hill.
The
vice-regal couple had heard about the property while chatting with some
American friends who spoke of the property in glowing terms.
Sue
Ibbott booked in a party of nine that day — the Hayden family and his
entourage of six, including a valet and a federal police officer.
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Sue
and husband Steve, who owns the sprawling 5000-hectare property, had plenty
of visitors before, but it was the first time a gleaming limousine had
graced the homestead’s driveway.
"They
were wonderful guests,” Sue Ibbott told me alongside the swimming pool in
the homestead’s outdoor entertainment area.
“Bill
and his son Kirk rode horses on the property while while his staff either played
tennis or just enjoyed what Wave Hill has to offer.” And
these days, it has plenty to offer.
Wave
Hill station - believed to have been named after a wave-like formation of
hills north of the homestead - was bought by Steve Ibbott’s grandfather,
Esca William Richmond King, in the 1930s.
Wave
Hill was originally part of historic Gordonbrook and Yulgilbar stations.
Esca King ran it with wife Mary. When they died, the property went into the
hands of their two daughters, Jean and Mona — Steve Ibbott’s mother.
The
original cattle herd consisted of trading dairy steers before British-bred
steers were introduced. The herd has slowly evolved through cross-breeding
to Angus, Brahman and a European influence of Charolais, Limousin and
Simmental.
Steve
Ibbott took over Wave Hill in 1977. In 1985, while enjoying a day at the
Grafton races, Steve locked eyes with Sue Kennedy, a former Melbournian and
Sydneysider, then living on a Lower River property and raising four
daughters.
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Both
liked what they saw. Steve carried Sue away to Wave Hill and they were
married on the property eight years later. The mother of four was to become
the mother of six — Sue and Steve produced two sons, Rhys, who’s now 16 and
13-year-old Duncan. Running a big grazing property — and we’re talking
12,000 acres in the case of Wave Hill — has its ups and downs. During one
lean spell, Sue and Steve bit the bullet and decided to diversify, just like
Mona and husband Harry had done in earlier years.
During
her days in Sydney, Sue turned her back on a career in nursing and entered
the tourism industry, working for a shipping company and loving it.
That
background in tourism must have played a big part in the way Wave Hill
station has evolved into a retreat, where even a vice-regal couple has
chosen to rest the weary head.
As you
drive up to Wave Hill, there’s a fork in the bumpy road pointing to Dingo
Dam. At the back of the dam is
a
cottage that sends you back to a time when working the land was far more
back-breaking, dangerous and isolated than it is today.
The cottage is the original
Wave Hill station homestead, built in the 1880s. When the present homestead
replaced it in 1946, the original home was relocated. Today, it not only
stands as a monument to the ghosts of former farmhands, it is the ultimate
in ‘getting away from it all’.
Kerosene lamps, candles, iron-beds, wash stands, a claw-foot bath, pot-belly
stove and timber walls and floors. Rustic?
More than that. History on
stumps. To give you an idea of the pulling power of the Dingo Dam
cottage, consider this:
When
the director of the extremely popular ABC television series, Outback House,
finished shooting the first series she didn’t unwind in luxury. She took her
husband and two kids to Wave Hill and spent nine scorching days over
Christmas in a house built during the same era depicted in the TV show.
“She
wanted her family to experience life as the pioneers knew it,” Sue said.
“And they all loved it.”
Governor General Bill Hayden and wife Dallas didn’t chop wood for the
pot-belly stove in the Dingo Dam cottage. They stayed in the existing
homestead, where other guests can enjoy a dining room meal beside the open
fire or outside in the garden gazebo.
Visitors to Wave Hill can take a four- wheel-drive trip around the property,
throw the leg over a stock horse for a trail ride to remember (L-platers and
experienced riders included), fish for bass, paddle a canoe and visit
arguably the area’s greatest tourist attraction, the Clarence River Gorge.
Parts
of this Mother Nature masterpiece are just eight kilometres away from the
Wave Hill station homestead.
Wave Hill hasn’t been
without its dramas over the years. Because much of the property is steep
(they call them hills, but I see them as mountains), mustering cattle by
motorcycle is pointless. Horseback is the only way.
Steve Ibbott’s mother Mona, who’s now
75 and living closer to Grafton, broke both her legs when a creek bank
collapsed under her horse in her earlier days on Wave Hill.
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In more recent times, Sue
and Steve’s youngest boy Duncan, was airlifted to
hospital by the Lismore-based Westpac rescue helicopter after a stirrup
broke on his mount and he crashed to the ground.
Duncan and his brother Rhys
are at boarding school in Brisbane and remain undecided about continuing the
family tradition at Wave Hill. Time will tell.
Sue Ibbott’s four girls —
Megan, Rebecca, Tamara and Angela - have all done their bit at Wave Hill.
They love the place and visit whenever they can, but they’re all grown up
now and living life far from the farm.
An interesting family twist
in this tale is that Sue Ibbott’s grandfather, George Kennedy, made regular
visits to Wave Hill as a vet employed by the then Pastures Protection Board
based in Grafton.
While riding around the vast
property doing stock inspections all those years ago, George Kennedy must
have thought about a lot of things. But never, I guess, that a
grand-daughter of his would one day marry the owner of the very land he and
his horse were treading. |
