DAY 6. Sunday, 13th October 2019
The town’s name was changed from Thurk to Kingston O.M. (on Murray)on 19 September 1940. The name was derived from the Kingston Village Settlement Area, a settlement which was established in 1896 and whose name is derived from Charles Kingston, the then Premier of South Australia. (Ed: Thurk?)
A quick and easy pack up in the morning and in to town for a closer look at Barmera proper. As a coincidence, we had been for some time seeing notices of the pending annual Renmark flower show, which in fact had evolved over the years to include the whole Riverland.
This I mention because the first thing that struck us was the very neat appearance of town and the proliferation of rose bushes down the main street.
(N.B. ‘proliferation’ /prəlɪfəˈreɪʃn/ noun- rapid increase in the number or amount of something. a large number of something.) I should have just said ‘a lot of.’
We headed for a cosy looking coffee shop in the main street to get the caffeine fix in, then crossed the road for something to eat, so supporting two local businesses as is our habit.
Brunch of champions, fish and chips then meandered around driving through towns we had never heard of or would ever see again for the simple reason that we could do so with all the time in the world, or what was left of it. Then a though occurred, in my youth I had been to Loxton to visit buddy Rick and hurtled past the turn off to Kingston on Murray, umpteen times but never stopped. (‘Hurtle’ speed undeclared as I don’t know if there is a statute of limitations for that sort of thing but these days I would be scared to do it.)
N.B. Is ‘umpteen’ a real word? (It was probably created by analogy to actual numbers. “Umpteen” usually describes an indefinite and large number or amount, while the related “umpteenth” is used for the latest or last in an indefinitely numerous series.)
So we doubled back to finally inspect what turned out to be little Kingston. The main building in town was a general store opposite a boat landing with mainly house boats moored.
Again, this tiny town had immaculately manicured lawn sweeping down to the river bank with clean public toilets and real friendly home town atmosphere.
The caravan park was a show piece with even a free vegetable patch for the guests and had a recently used levee bank on three sides from the river side to the high ground. ‘Recently used’ because in 2016 the river flooded and this astute park owner had prepared well in advance a six foot high levee bank which had saved the day. after the threat he just bulldozed a twelve foot gap to get to the river. The gap will be easily filled next time. Sure, there will be a next time. It’s the Murray. N.B. Is it levy or levee? As verbs the difference between levee and levy is that levee is (us|transitive) to keep within a channel by means of levees or levee can be to attend the levee or levees of while levy is to impose (a tax or fine) to collect monies due, or to confiscate property. N.B. Deserving a plug. Kingston-on-Murray caravan park. Privately owned by pleasant Geoff and Barb. (Ask them what they did before. It’s interesting) 461 Holmes Road, ph: (08)8583 0209, em: info@komcaravanpark.com.au, website www.komcaravanpark.com.au Geoff, never short to promote their little oasis of Kingston, put us onto Carl and the general store attributes, both of which we utilised the very next morning. But for now it was time to settle into the comfy box with a tasty treat and a generous glass and think of the past, present and future , not necessarily in that order.