NSW - Bundanoon is Brigadoon

By David Ellis

Just  as in the Lerner and Loewe musical in which the mysterious little village of Brigadoon emerges from the Scottish mist for just one day every 100 years, so too does NSW’s little village of Bundanoon emerge onto centre stage from the Southern Highlands mist on just one day every year to host one of the world’s biggest gatherings of all things Scottish.

And so Scottish and Brigadoon-ish is it in fact, that even the local railway station has visitors fooled: it’s re-signed for the day as Brigadoon.

Bundanoon is Brigadoon had its roots in the village’s annual October Boronia Festival that fifty years ago celebrated the Springtime flowering of these wildflowers in the next-door Morton National Park.

With a growing Scottish community in the Southern Highlands (particularly as a substantial shale mine at nearby Joadja was worked mainly by Scottish miners,) some locals decided to celebrate their Scottish heritage as part of the 1978 Boronia Festival with all-things they could think up Scottish.

So successful was it that a committee was established to consider a stand-alone Highland Gathering every April.

The first such in 1979 attracted a modest crowd bemused by “men in skirts” tossing logs, lifting massive rocks, performing reels and jigs and generally have a good time – all  to a background of the skirl of bagpipes and the thump of drums.

For others the intrigue was more the culinary skills of their Scottish-descended female neighbours and the surprises they arrived with out of their kitchens, with food stalls quickly emptying of everything from cakes to pies, shortbreads to confections…

(One visitor to that first event who was a schoolgirl at the time, still recalls the tastes and aromas of delights such as fresh home-baked Abernethy Biscuits, Butterscotch, Chocolate Fudge, Drop Scones, Gingerbreads, Shortbreads, a delightfully named Tipsy Cake…)  

Within years Bundanoon is Brigadoon was attracting over 10,000 visitors a year, with the all-time high close to 16,000 for the one day – outnumbering the locals eight-to-one.

Organisers of this year’s Gathering are hopeful of over 12,000 visitors, and no longer just from the local area but from around Australia and overseas as well.

And those visitors won’t be disappointed as their blood is stirred and spines tingled with the skirl of bagpipes and the crescendo of visiting massed pipe bands backgrounding the diversity of the day’s activities.

And interestingly there’ll be a performance by Australia’s unique Highlander, a Celtic rock band hailing from Newcastle and which will perform several times  with their unusual combination of bagpipes accompanied by fiddle, electric and acoustic guitars, percussion and vocals...  something that has already got local tongues wagging.

The 33rd Bundanoon Highland Gathering will be held on Saturday April 17, beginning with a street parade of 25 pipe bands, together with marching Scottish Clans and Societies, and a flotilla of decorated floats.

This year’s Chieftan of the Day, Susan Cooke of Canberra is High Commissioner of Clan Lindsay in Australia and President of Clan Lindsay and will officially open festivities at 10.45; for the next six hours there’ll be something for all.

Traditional – and not so traditional – sporting events and games will include the Shot Putt, the Caber Toss, Kilted Dash running races, a raw Egg Throwing Competition, a Water Toss with water-filled balloons, Haggis Hurling… and the lifting of the 100- to 165kg Bundanoon Stones of Manhood by the Tartan Warriors.

Other events will range from Highland and Scottish country dancing to exhibitions by the Southern Highlands Kennel & Obedience Club, a Bonnie Bairns Highland Dress Competition for “babies, lads and lasses,” and a display by the Swordplay School of Theatrical Fencing and Stage Combat.

And if you’re feeling peckish, over 100 stalls will be selling everything from tea and scones to shortbread, Scots pies, barbecued sausages and steaks, hot potatoes, pancakes, confectionery, ice-creams, drinks, jams, preserves… and if you’ve the stomach for it, blood pudding and haggis.

There’ll also be souvenir stalls – and a Clan Information tent to trace your Scottish heritage.

To wind up the day a traditional Highland knees-up (the Ceilidh) will be held in the local hall.

Admission to the daytime Gathering is adults $18, children (5-16) $5, Family $40 (2 adults 2 children,) concession $15. Details and pre-purchase tickets 1300 657 559 or www.highlandsnsw.com.au/brigadoon. The evening Ceilidh is additional.