A rainy Easter is no fun for anyone: not for holidaymakers, kids on school vacation, and not for tourist operators who suffer when the last big Summer weekend of the season is a washout – literally.  That’s the fate of many northern New South Wales coastal towns this year.

We’d planned to avoid the big coastal towns over Easter anyway, and count ourselves lucky when a showery Grafton clears up on Easter Saturday and provides a beautiful day for the Highland Gathering down the road at Maclean.

Maclean must surely be the only town the world where all the power poles are painted tartan.  Aside from decorative poles, there’s little else to distinguish Maclean from other small towns on the shores of the magnificent Clarence River.

But the Highland Gathering draws a decent crowd to the Showgrounds.  You know you’re at a country event when the slightly nauseating aroma of stewed onions and barbecued sausages assails you.  Where’s the haggis and mashed swede?

The competition between what seems like many, many pipe bands (actually 20) isn’t as tortuous as I fear. They each have five minutes and play classics such as Me Clotch is Awee! Geese In The Bog, and Last Tango in Harris. It’s fair to say we don’t find anything to sing along to.  

The highland dancing is fun to watch for a while, especially when the littlies come out and show some footwork that is perhaps, not specified in the standards. 

Yet best of all, there’s the highland Sports Events. Ahh, the sports. Putting the Stone, which is shot-put by any other name, and the Farmer’s Walk – this involves being timed over a set distance carrying a couple of logs. Presumably in older times this was a couple of sheep or puny Englishmen.

For us the much anticipated Caber Toss was a treat – I had to look up the origins, for what possible use could this be?  Loggers used the technique to ford streams, so being able to toss the log straight, so it falls at the 12 o’clock position is key. Otherwise the log falls in the stream and all is lost.  

Men and women compete in all events, but one – for men the Hammer throw and for women the Haggis Hurl. Which I think you’ll agree sounds more like what happens after a hard night out. It is a real haggis, strongly wrapped, but I’m told one year it exploded.

Maclean is about 35 kms east of Grafton, and Grafton has one of the few fixed crossings over the vast Clarence River.  Aside from the Murray, the Clarence is the largest river in Australia south of the Tropic of Capricorn. We decide to take the northern side of the river and cross by cable ferry closer to Maclean, just for the hell of it. 

It beggars belief that the only bridge for miles is what the locals call “the bendy bridge”, and snicker into their hands when they hear you are towing a caravan. The bendy bridge is heritage listed was built in 1932, before articulated trucks, caravans and other long vehicles. It is a standard two car width and has sharp angled approaches – the bendy bits – at either end.  It is built above the original rail bridge and the approaches come from roads parallel to the rail lines.  It makes for interesting driving.  When locals see a big vehicle coming towards them on a bend they stop and give plenty of room. When tourists see a big vehicle coming around the corner on their side of the road their eyes widen in terror. 

Aside from the bendy bridge, Grafton is famous for two things: the first town in northern NSW, founded in 1851 and the Jacaranda Festival, held in October/November every year since 1935.  It must be beautiful to be here when the hundreds of jacaranda trees lining the very wide streets are full of their purple blooms. 

In the meantime, it’s mostly purple prose as you drive across the bendy bridge.

And where there’s a river there’s fish. And where’s there’s fishing there’s Scott.