Giants From the Dreamtime the Yowie In Myth And Reality

Tennant Creek 1981

Huge footprints Found

It was from Alice Springs Aborigine, Jack Adams that I learnt the following information in 1991: "The Panklanka People relish the taste of aboriginal flesh, and will kill any aboriginal man, woman or child that happen to cross their path, and they also kill and eat any white people they catch too."

"They carry big wooden clubs with which they kill their victims. If they eat them raw on the spot they will cut them up with big stone knives. These monsters are so big and tall that they are able to tuck the bodies of people they have killed into belts of hair-string around their waist if they want to carry them back to their camps for cooking."

"Before they cook an Aborigine they crush the bones with their big, powerful hands, or pound away at the body with a club. Then they break the back into sections and remove the intestines, and bury the body in an earth trench. A fire is then lit above it just like we cook kangaroos."

"After the body is cooked it is dismembered; first by breaking the spine, and then removing the chest and ribs with a big stone knife. Sometimes those big blokes won't eat the head right away. Instead, they stick it in the fork of a tree high up above the ground to eat later."

A retired jackaroo, Christian Edwards, who claims to have found the huge footprints of one of these man-giants near Tennant Creek in 1981, informed me in 1990: "There was a time long ago when the Pankalankas were so numerous that they lived all over the Northern Territory, chasing off Aboriginal people wherever they found us, catching and eating us at every opportunity."

"You could see them walking across the country in large groups and at night they lit their way with big fire sticks." "But eventually our ancestors increased in numbers and were able to stand up to the Pankalankas. Many Pankalankas were killed in fights, so that today they are not so numerous. They still live in the more remote areas, and some folks have seen bands of Pankalanka men, women and children moving across the country at night in the ranges hereabouts, lighting their way with big fire sticks."

Blackwood 1981

Male-female Doolagarl

The Blackwood area, north-west of Melbourne, is another district where the Doolagarl has made itself known on and off over the years. For example, in August 1981 Mrs Delia Richards, her husband and a group of friends were one day visiting a dense bushland area near a rubbish tip, when they heard a loud groaning sound coming from among trees near the tip.

They spotted a hairy, long-armed, ape-like creature with long pendulous breasts moving on two legs among the trees. The group then saw a male-like beast standing nearby and snarling at the humans. The male and female creatures moved away to disappear into the surrounding bushland.

Cabramurra 1981

Yowie footprints embeded in Snow

Mrs H.L. Drew herself found a number of Yowie footprints, embedded in snow at Kings Cross Road near Cabramurra in the winter of 1981.

Big brown bear Encounter

It was also on the 'Ravine' road late one night in the winter of that year, that a father and his 13 year old son were travelling in their car when it broke down. Leaving his son in the vehicle on the roadside, the father went to get assistance. Much later, when he returned with help, he found his son petrified with fear. The boy told his father that "a big brown bear"had walked near the car as he sat inside.

Bomballa 1981

A large Thing

In 1981 Mr Zack Stuckey was working on a forestry survey team search, the purpose being to construct a new forestry road through the forest covered mountainous country between Bombala and Bega. He was at that time stationed at Bombala. His job was that of a chairman on a survey team.

About 12 noon he and the surveyor, together with another man, were working on the side of a mountain. While the other two went in search of tree markers Zack sat down for a rest. As Zack sat quietly he sighted a "large thing" moving between two large boulders in a gully below him. He decided to climb down to have a closer look at what it was he had caught sight of.

As he got to the point where he had seen the figure, he spotted "a large, brown-haired back" moving into thick bush about 30 m from him. He could hear the creature moving deeper into the bush, breaking foliage as it moved.

The thick scrub prevented him from seeing the legs of the mysterious beast, but it appeared solid in build, with broad hunched shoulders, and was about his height [2 m]. He did not attempt to follow the creature, but instead returned back up the mountainside to rejoin his workmates. However, when he told them what he had just seen they only laughed and accused him of being on drugs.