Mick’s pub bars mobile phones
MC KI N L A Y ’ S Wa lk a b o u t Creek Hotel publicans Frank and Debbie Wust have declared their pub a mobilephone- free zone.
This is Crocodile Dundee country. Frank and Debbie have decreed that there is to be only one form of communication inside the pub and that is verbal.
“We want people to talk to each other. We don’t want them sitting at the bar texting and talking on their mobiles,” Debbie said.
They said that being “old school”, actor Paul Hogan, who played Mick Dundee, would heartily approve of the mobile phone ban.
The ban is a pre- emptive strike on their part. A Telstra tower is about to be erected in the Landsborough Highway town 107km south of Cloncurry as part of the Federal Government’s mobile phone black spot program.
But, before everyone gets too excited, Frank and Debbie want to put it out there that when it comes to Mick Dundee’s favourite watering hole, it’s a case of “leave your phone at home son, don’t bring your phones to town ( with apologies to Johnny Cash)”.
It’s not as if they are antimobile phones. They think that having a tower in the town will be a giant step forward for McKinlay’s population of 20.
“We are used to people talking in the bar and having a good time. We want that to continue. We talk here, we don’t text. If people want to make a phone call they can go outside. That’s not too much to ask, is it?” Debbie said.
Even though the first Crocodile Dundee movie was made 31 years ago, it still resonates today, even with millennials who see the movie on DVD.
Pilgrims travel enormously long distances to pay homage to Mick Dundee. Last year two European backpackers drove their van out from Townsville, a distance of 863km just so they could have a beer at “Mick’s pub”.
And then there was the man from England who came out in February this year after planning the trip for five years.
“He spent the 12 months before he came out messaging us on Facebook about how he would get here when he and his wife arrived,” Debbie said.
“They loved it. Frank took him for a drive in the Dundee truck and he had a few beers at the bar. His wife told me he’d been talking about it for five years. She was worried that he would be disappointed, but he loved it and so did she.”
The truck in question is the 1972 International 4WD that was Mick Dundee’s Never Never Safari Tours’ battered set of wheels in the movie. It’s got bullet holes in the bonnet.
The radiator that was shot out with three real bullets fired from a .303 in the movie is mounted inside the bar.
John Cornell, Hogan’s friend and the producer of the movie, gave the truck to Frank and Debbie for the film’s 30th anniversary celebrations.