How fortunate were we that we had not only one but two extremely informative men to tell us about the WW11 bunkers at Mareeba. One was Bob Thomas who actually was stationed here during WW11 as a gunner, and who still lives in Mareeba, the other, Army Historian Steve Fowler from Cairns.

As we went in convey to the site, I laughed to see the astonished look on a driver’s face as he waited patiently for all our cars to make a right into McIver Road. I guess he thought we would never stop. I took last ‘man’ duty to make sure we were all together.

Between Steve’s photos and commentary along with Bob’s reminisces, an interesting and informative couple of hours flew by. Some members braved the depths of a bunker, their voices echoing throughout the complex. Did we by any chance awaken other voices of long ago?

It was disappointing to see one gun emplacement being filled in with rubbish, though according to Ann Wareing, this was a fairly recent happening, as she, being a school teacher has been in the habit of taking classes of children to this site and the children at that time could walk down into site. Maybe a letter to the owners could bring about a desired clean-up result especially if we offer a helping hand. I think I heard Eddie Sheerans mention that this may be a possibility later, on that day.

In all I think we visited six sites including a wooden ‘building’ which was thought to have been once an ablutions block. We were surprised and thrilled to find it still standing. Members were a also little more than surprised to find the site on the Catholic High School grounds, even though completely caged in for protection and safety, the gates were unlocked.

After we had had our fill of the bunker site we adjourned to our Centre for a late morning tea and a look at photos and information held by the Society. Mario had been given a loan of a most interesting journal by Caesarea which contains many names of the wartime personnel stationed at the site, American as well as Australian, all with dates, names, addresses, battalion and Army numbers. We hope to persuade Caesarea to loan us the journal so we can record the information. This is one item that must be saved for prosperity.

In all there were 11 members and 5 visitors attended the field trip. More please Eddie!

Eddie Sheerans, Caesarea (visitor), Les Binnie, Cec Hill (visitor), Helen Kindt, Steve Fowler (visitor), David Foster, Bob Thomas (visitor), Mario Russo, Col Foster (visitor), Dot and Cardie Peters, Lorraine and John Edwards, Jan and Robyn Gourley.