More Than Mail

Keri Prandolini is a woman to admire. She never backs away from giving anything a try and has had some big adventures in her life. Kez has done everything from living overseas, working on massive properties, running her own side hussles and even birthing her oldest son in the kitchen at Iffley Station. She also trains workdogs, who she likes to name after songs. Keri has driven the mail run and ha...

Julie McAuley came North from Victoria with her husband Peter for a job interview in the early 80s. They never left.  Together they have worked hard to build a property of their own, starting from scratch and mustering during school holidays for the helpers. Julie reminisces about the huge change moving so far from home was. Whether it's the water, the people, the town - who knows - but there is d...

Tim Pratt loves driving and trucks in particular. He can be found loading cattle and getting them to their destination at any time, night or day. Tim's love of driving started early, when he took any opportunity, he could to jump in his parent's mail truck and deliver the mail and freight with his dad on the Normanton mail run as a kid, a measly 21 hour round trip. In a full circle moment, Tim and...

Eliza Callaghan served in the Royal Australian Navy, and took her holidays to coincide with country race meetings. From the middle of the ocean to remote Queensland, because she loves racing. Growing up helping her Pop, Ilfracombe trainer Boy Forster, Eliza knew from a young age she wanted to be involved in the racing industry, and started learning the race day ropes early. Owning and strapping is...

Emma Morton grew up on Pandie Pandie Station, 30kms from Birdsville. The Birdsville races have been a big part of her, and her family's life. Growing up with horses and races Emma always wanted to follow in her grandfather and father's footsteps and become a trainer. Life got in the way for a little while, but Emma has come full circle and took out her trainer's licence 12 months ago. She now cont...

Robbie Katter came on the mail run, meet consitituents at mailboxes, chatted for this podcast episode and opened the gates. Good day all round.  Robbie has been in State Parliament since 2012, representing firstly Mount Isa and now Traeger. And as much as we talked about being a politician (don't panic, there's no policy conversations!) it was great to chat about where we live. We also covered wha...

A teenage Julie Eggerling drove her grandfather to the races one day and that was it, she was hooked.  Julie has owned many horses , bred a lot of her own and bought others in as ready to race horses. She gets joy from all of them.  Working in the stables and being hands on every day sets Julie apart from most owners, and she loves that she still gets to nurture the connection with horses she's al...

Holding a dual jockey and trainer's licence is not for the faint hearted.  Tash Chambers is one of a handful of females doing just that.  Tash struggled with weight through her apprenticeship, wasting to make rides every week.  A two year break followed, before making a come back in the North West.  Tash put in the hard yards when she moved west, including a pretty scary fall at Julia Creek.   Des...

Mackay based John Mazelmann knows how to train a winner in both thoroughbred and harness racing, having racked up well over 1000 wins in each code. Traditionally a harness man, John swapped to the gallopers simply because the harness track numbers disappeared. John now has over 50 thoroughbreds in work, with runners at mutiple tracks every weekend.  Lachie Manzlemann followed in his dad's footstep...

Ray Hermann is an unassuming country racehorse trainer. But in another life, he won seven Australian bronc riding titles, and two world titles. He is a legend of rodeo. Ray, or Cowboy as he is known, started with race horses, took a 30 year detour to the rodeo lifestyle, and is now back training horses.  Cowboy's passion for the sport of rodeo is obvious when you get him talking about it. Even the...

158-54:32:14 Born and bred in Julia Creek, Fab's Cowboy is Australia's most winning race horse of the modern era.  5️⃣4️⃣ WINS! 🏆 Cowboy races one last time on Saturday July 27, before retirement. And not just any retirement, retirement to Living Legends!  Everyone has a Fab's story. Today we relive many of those. Owner Lizzie Currin tells us her story. As does her partner in ownership, cousin Pa...

Duncan Fysh was passionate about many things, with keeping a record of history high on his list. Duncan spent years contributing local history stories to The Prickly Post. Spending his early years at Toolebuc, Duncan's family moved to Answer Downs after WWII. Both in the McKinlay district. From there it was to Proa for 50 odd years. Julia Creek became home and his passion grew to take in the Town...

Isaac Carmona grew up in Barcelona, population 1.6 million. For the last two tourists seasons, Isaac has worked at the Walkabout Creek Hotel in McKinlay, population 10. Despite the obvious differences, Isaac has loved working in such a small town. The tourists have filled his book with suggestions of places to visit in Australia, and he has fine tuned his English. Which has mostly meant learning a...

Luke McNeven worked on properties north of Julia Creek before calling Colwell home for 13 years.  First as a base while working at Eloise Mine, before managing the property. Luke, with wife Mary-Ann and their three daughters, took the opportunity to buy their own place after Colwell was sold.  And started a new life as bee keepers. Actual real life bee keepers!  Luke has had to learn about a compl...

Danielle Wust went to France for a gap year, skyped her parents and discovered they had bought the Walkabout Creek Hotel and upped and moved.  Danielle quickly refreshed her memory of all things Crocodile Dundee, but ironically could not get a job in the namesake hotel in France. A big mail user, Danielle has mail tales from all over the world, including working at Amazon in Scotland (and literall...

Mount Isa School of the Air is the standard way of schooling for the kids on the mail run. And for 19 years, majority of them have had the same teacher at some point - Mrs Mills. Jo Mills has always taught the lower year levels at MISOTA and has been able to visit students in their homes and attend activity days and mini schools all over north Queensland and the NT. Mrs Mills has a lot of special...

Angus Brodie once made his sister lead her horse home after a fall, only to discover she'd broken her arm. Growing up at Redland Park, Angus got up to lots of shenanigans. He was also the last child to speak on the radio at Mount Isa School of the Air before the big switch to the phone system. Angus has returned home recently after some adventures, including starting a paddock to plate meat delive...

Makenzie Mills moved north to work and fell in love with the way of life. Growing up in the Hunter Valley,  Makenzie followed in her sister's footsteps and headed to Queensland. Five years later Makenzie has worked on various properties including Barkly, Millungera and Coolullah.  Makenzie has a great group of friends, loves the long days at work and enjoys the social scene. But it hasn't always b...

The number of TAB country race meetings continues to increase.  Branden Wood and Didier Kay are part of the Panosonic Studio Productions (PSPVideo) team and head to country race tracks, providing video footage to Sky Racing for broadcast. Seems like a simple job, but when you are dealing with heat, wind, flies, cold and an assortment of infrastructure, it can sometimes be a little stressful. More...

Regional Cast supply the footage of non-TAB country race meetings for Racing Queensland. The logistics of covering five, six or seven race meets a weekend across regional Queensland is intricate. General Manager Mark Jones has the job of ensuring Regional Cast find the best solutions for providing the footage from often tricky locations. First hand experience tells us that videoing the races is no...

Roxy Weston is the photographer behind RLR Photography . Roxy has a passion for photography and racing, combining the two to take fantastic racing photos that are about more than just the winning horse.  She also captures the emotions of the jockeys, trainers, strappers and owners. Based in Windorah, Roxy travels thousands of kilometres capturing the horses and the humans of country racing in Quee...

Jaye Hall grew up at Caiwarra, the most western point of the mail run. An accomplished horsewoman, Jaye remembers having to catch the horses with an old piece of bread when growing up, and just hoped she chose the right direction when finding them on foot. Jaye has worked in America and New Zealand, experiencing different horse sports. But campdrafting has always been Jaye's thing. But being at ho...

Ian Batt grew up on Kooroora, pretty close to McKinlay. Nita Batt (nee Banning) grew up on Cannington. Same (ish) vacinty, but quite a bit further away from McKinlay. Ian and Nita have been married for 69 years.  They have six children, and brought their family up on Plainby at Richmond. They remember wars, depressions, the decline of wool prices, losing their house to fire and both rate electrict...

Jockeys Sarah Robbins and Brooke Richardson are also mums.  Sarah's son Dusty is six and daughter Bella is three.  Brooke's son Rylan is also six. Getting back on the horse after becoming a mum is a big decision.  And both Sarah and Brooke travel thousands of kilometres to get to race meetings across Queensland, adding big travel days in to the mix. Sarah and Brooke take us through the decision to...

Liz Hassett, Jenny Felix, Kate Hassett and Joanna Hassett grew up at Glendower near Prairie. Their dad, Gordan Hassett, trained horses and mum Anna Hassett was Secretary of Prairie Jockey Club for around 40 years. The sisters have all remained in the racing industry in different capacities - owner, jockey manager, administation, trainer. The connections to the horse industry are strong. The sister...