Some blokes were at the pub, some with their partners at the local dances, but for a few truck drivers it was ‘Saturday night at the trucking yards’.
The clanging of the rail line points and the roar of the locomotive’s engines, signaled the arrival of the first train for the night.
It’s Saturday night in early 1992 and the double header train, with around 40 wagons of bullocks onboard, has arrived from somewhere in Western Queensland.
Saturday nights were generally full on, with three trains arriving from various far off locations.
The fat bullocks had endured their journey to the Beaudesert trucking yards in Helen street.
Stockmen were on hand to unload the 20 odd beasts from each wagon into the holding yards.
5 semi-trailers, their drivers waiting somewhat impatiently, lined up ready to ferry the animals to their destination, the AMH Abattoir at Bromelton.
Each truck, owned by Jim Salisbury carrying around 24 head, on the roughly 30 kilometre round trip, with the next few hours, busy to clear the stock, before the next train arrived later in the evening.
With roughly 800 head on the train, the second not too far away, and the third on is its way, time was of the essence.
It’s was a frantic time, the drivers loading their own trucks, often dealing with some cranky buggers, no time to dawdle, as the next truck arrives to take its place at the ramp.
This procession of ant like activity takes place until around midnight, when the first trains cattle have been transported.
Time for a short break, pull a dirty old BBQ plate from the grass, and cook up a quick feed, all the while belly laughing at each other’s yarns, some true, some more likely fictional, but funny just the same.
The second train arrives and the trucks start rolling again.
At least half of this trainload must be moved before the next one arrives in the early hours of Sunday Morning.
With room in the yards sufficient to fit the final trainload, the trucks fall silent, the drivers crawling into the bunks of the trucks beside the cattle ramp, for a few hours’ sleep, before starting again at daybreak.
The early morning quiet of Beaudesert broken, with sounds of gates clanging, engines roaring, weary men whistling, yelling, herding the cattle onto the trucks.
The process starting again where it finished, in the earlier hours.
Finally, late Sunday morning the job is finished, cattle delivered, drivers tired, but content that their job is done, until the next train.
Footnote – the Beaudesert Trucking Yards where situated in Helen Street on the Northern side of the pig and calf sale yards and were dismantled after the Abattoir closed down in the mid 1990’s.
