G'day Bill D & Rita F,

Thanks very much for your assistance in tracing all the threads. I'm sure that Phyl will enjoy the full story.

I first met Phyl when she was Phyl Vinnicombe, a school teacher in Melbourne, 800 kilometres or so south of Sydney. We met on the special train coming back from the 1971 National Folk Festival in Adelaide (another 800 km west of Melbourne). Phyl later married Geri Lobl and came to Sydney.

The song uses an old goldfields tune The Cry Look Out Below and the wood-turning experience of Neil Bollingmore, a friend from my teenage years (1960s) - who I will also see in Canberra over Easter. I have always loved the song because it seems so close to describing my father, another wood craftsman with a love for wood and a quiet way with words.

BTW: I notice that at the end of one of these threads I mentioned 'bones' made from hard desert mulgas (acacias). Last weekend I came across small slab of another such wood from the Margaret River region, 3500 kilometres away in Western Australia. This is not quite so hard or heavy (although it is still 1.1 relative density, about 50% heavier than American Oak) but I love the official name: Raspberry Jam (scientific name ). Apparently the freshly cut, rich red-brown wood has a distinct sweet smell like raspberry jam!

My rough working of a side piece with sapwood stillin place suggests quite nice properties and I look forward to working on the select pieces marked out from the heartwood. This is a small, limited timber found only in what is now the wine-growing area of WA.

Regards,

Bob Bolton