Ghost town swells from zero to 3,000 for annual outback rodeo in Quamby

Updated

Despite boasting no more than a picnic table and a white-ant-eaten pub, Quamby had no trouble attracting nearly 3,000 punters to its annual rodeo this weekend.

The ghost town, 60 kilometres north of Cloncurry in Queensland's north-west, was transformed into a site of true outback glory full of cowboy boots, swags and golden buckles.

Committee vice president Drew Hacon said it was a big achievement for a town of zero residents.

"Quamby is a pub, and the pub is no longer — the white ants have gotten into that, so it's just a white-ant-eaten pub on the side of the road," he said.

The event celebrated its 20th anniversary by hosting travellers from across the country.

"It's bloody huge now, and we've got people coming back every year," Mr Hacon said.

"When you pay your gate fee to get in you get an ear tag. We have people coming every year just to collect the ear tag they get at the gate, and people coming from all over Australia."

Events include team roping, station buckjump, bull riding and mutton busting, but the most popular event is the renowned wild donkey ride.

"It's the last event of the day, so it's wild and a bit western," Mr Hacon said.

"They get a poncho and a sombrero, and they come out on the back of a donkey, and it's just a great spectacle."

From small beginnings

Harold McMillan grew up in Quamby and was one of the event's original creators.

He said while the rodeo was now a well-known event on the social calendar, it had not always been that way.

"We had our first meeting in '96, then we formed a committee and then we got a sports club association licence and built it from there," he said.

"The first one was 1997, and since then we've only missed the two — one was insurance and the other one was a drought.

"[The] first one was about 400 people. Once we got over 400 the crowds just seemed to go double, double, double."

As one of the few people who can call themselves a local, Mr McMillan said his Quamby childhood had been a great one.

"It was an exciting sort of a place. There was a pub and a store and a mod of railway fettlers, and that was all that was there," he said.

"There used to be goats to go chasing and everything else. You made your own fun down at the creek."

While chasing goats kept Mr McMillan and his friends busy as kids, it was the pub that became more interesting the older they got.

"It was a great pub in its heyday. We used to have a lot of late nights there, and early mornings," he said.

While the Quamby Rodeo continues to grow, Mr Hacon said it would never lose its true country flavour.

"It's just a rodeo for families, ringers and locals to have a go," he said.

"We're just for people that want to have a crack."

Topics: regional, travel-and-tourism, cloncurry-4824, longreach-4730

First posted