Cressy

The centrepiece of the town is a large fish symbol, on the corner of Main Street and Church Street. Significant to locals, perhaps a bit strange to the visitor. I like the fact that it is proud of its fishing heritage. 

The main street in the town also reminds me of a loyalist heartland in Northern Ireland. Why the comparison? Wooden lamposts with red and blue stripes line either side of the street. 

Of course the link is merely incidental and accidental. The lamposts of Cressy set it off from the rest. The town is proud and artistic.

It’s a farming community that live here though. The kids rush to school having got off a bus that has travelled for miles through barren lands picking up each individual pupil from their farm or country house. Or so it appeared to me. There is a playground next to the only school in Cressy.

There we see a large signboard with information on Cressy. Named after an English phrase syndicate who were breeding horses. You get wisdom here. The billboard mentions the word “Troutification.”

And on this board we read that, yes, Cressy, is actually a town. Not a village. “The town is backdropped by the splendid Western Tiers” reads the print. And they’d be right, Cressy is on a flat landscape but in behind it lies the mountains, where I live at Poatina.

My local pub is here as well – The Ringwood Hotel. Just 26 miles from my current base. I’m sleeping in my tent up in the mountains. Strange then, that I haven’t been in. Actually it’s been 4 weeks without alcohol for me. Broccoli farming takes priority, I hardly feel like a drink these days. 

But at least I know the local pub is there if I need it. Locals sit on lonely benches out the front of a night smoking and drinking. It’s seems to have an ambiance. I’m not sure how many Northern Irish folk have ventured in there in days gone by. Perhaps I’ll go in sometime.

Cressy has a petrol station, actually two petrol stops. One is actually a forecourt of a petrol station, at the north side of the main street. On the south side of the main street a blue painted shop bears the name “Bite Me: Takeaway.” This triples up as a local shop, a petrol point and a hot food takeaway joint. The guy that owns it gave me 3 free fridge magnets. Advertising the shop.

I couldn’t find any postcards of Cressy itself, so these fridge magnets and my photos will serve as my Cressy souvenir for old time’s sake. Back to the “Bite Me” takeaway. Now you’d think in a local town like this that a wee shop such as “Bite Me” might actually have nice friendly staff and fantastic customer service. That’s what I’d have thought. But the old guy, who I’ve assumed to be the owner, showed quite the opposite!

It was a quiet Friday evening, it was getting dark and I had had a hard day’s work at the nearby Lakehouse Farm. I needed petrol and I drove their with Jenny, my travel and work buddy for 5 weeks. The petrol pumps are basically on the main road and there is a canopy over the shop front and a parking space there, next to the petrol pump. The petrol cap filling up part of my car is on the driver’s side. So driving north into Cressy, the petrol cap is on the wrong side. 

So I wouldn’t have been able to fill up from that side – the petrol leads won’t stretch. So I did a three point turn and pulled up outside the shop, right next to the petrol pump. The pump was locked, but there was a light on inside, so I popped inside. The old gentleman was there. I had expected a “Hello, how are you? How was your day?” (as many places in Tasmania ask you on being a customer), but instead he went mad at me, his customer. Just because I had parked between the pump and the door of the shop!

Well how else was I meant to fill up with petrol, face the wrong way down the main road in Cressy?? He should have been grateful that I was giving him my money and not traveling to the next garage up (if the other Cressy one had been shut, this would have meant a 20 kilometre drive to Longford). I should have left there and then but I needed petrol so I paid him and got the petrol. Don’t shop at Bite Me. The owner himself, might “Bite You”

There is a proud War Memorial garden in Cressy. Even remote towns such as this have their memorial to the local fallen who fought for our freedom in days of yore. 

The Cressy War Memorial has a clock above it, and is pretty. It sits on the corner in front of the local swimming pool. And that in a nutshell is Cressy. It’s my local town, it won’t be forever. But I’ll remember it. Hopefully for the big trout and the farming life.