FOR the kids skipping ahead of their parents at Friday’s opening of the Newcastle Show, the summits of distant rides with names like “The Avenger” brought a volley of yelps.
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Next to the dormant Avenger, the “Spinning Coaster” – a metal claw twisting pairs of teenagers through the air – gave off a thin, steady squeal punctuated by the odd throaty “oh my god, oh my god!”
The Star Wars theme trumpeted into the grey sky, the ferris wheel juddered through its rotations to James Brown’s I Feel Good and the footpaths of Broadmeadow shook a bit. You could feel it through the barbed wire fence.
It was $40 for a family ticket. The front gates smelt of burnt sugar and the rear gates, later, smelt of manure. It was possible to feel part of a vast digestive system, consumed and expelled, broken down by sideshows and rides.
In the showbag pavillion Kim Wang, a sketch portrait artist from Sydney, had been set up with his pencils and easel since 8.30am.
Behind him hung sketches of Marilyn, Brando, Kurt and Tupac.
“Today is quiet. The first day is always quiet,” Mr Wang said.
“Maybe because the kids are at school, I don’t know.”
Past black polo-shirted men selling perfume and a booth where you could make a toy bear, Dougie Petrisic and his family ran a “Make Your Own Showbag” stand.
For $10 you could choose a “feature toy” – a book on the moon landing, a Sonny Bill Williams figurine in Bulldogs gear, a rubber clown mask with teeth – and complete your showbag with novelty hands or bouncy balls.
“Can you staple that dog?”
Showbag vendor Rick Morris wanted his workers to fix the display Snoopy. The pavillion walls were lined with Star Wars regalia, Transformers, Hello Kitty and Minions.
“Your budget bags – your $10, $15 bags – they’re more for the working guy who can’t afford the brands,” Mr Morris said.
“Then you got your brands, your Shaun the Sheep, and they fly off the shelf for $25.”
Lego versions of the Taj Mahal and Anzac Cove headlined an expo in the Entertainment Centre, where Kevin Evans had built a Lego city with its own light rail network.
Along from ropes of liquorice, deep-fried potato chips on sticks that left fingers shiny, dagwood dogs labelled in the lower case like it’s a food group, was the Maze of Mirrors.
The maze’s owner Scotty Miller, a fifth generation showman, said it was an artefact of the days when a show’s chief attractions was its boxing tent.
“It’s been coming to this show for 60 years,” Mr Miller said.
“It’s popular every year.”
Past sideshow games with tins for targets, plush Ninja Turtles strung up by their ankles, gaping mouths, more clowns, more teeth, reigning Newcastle Showgirl Casey Lee Rebellato was on her way to present ribbons.
Later, she would ride in the hacking event of the show riding on her horse Miss Hot Chilli Pepper.
“Seeing the show from all these different perspectives is amazing,” Ms Rebellato, 18, said.
“I guess I’m more excited than nervous.”
Near the animal enclosures a barrier closed in front of a mum with young kids as a woman in riding gear clopped by on a brown, velvety horse.
“That horse. Is. Amazing!” said Indianna Little, 11, as someone put its size at “16 hands”.
“When they’re up so close, you can’t believe how big they are.”
Indianna’s mum Esme watched quietly as her daughter led her two-year-old brother Kimball through the poultry enclosure. A lady stroked a yellow duckling against Kimball’s hand, and staffy-sized roosters clawed the straw floors of their cages.
Towards the rear gates, school kids in tan riding boots from up the valley and as far off as the southern highlands sat and chewed grass and judges in hats and sports coats looked over blinking steers.
The spark of a dream to farm livestock was lit here for Tim Eyes, 23, the reigning Royal Agricultural Society’s rural achiever of the year.
“When you see the same people here, year after year, you become a sort of family,” Mr Eyes said.
“You get to talk to each other in a way you don’t get to on the phone, when you’re more talking about stock or the price of things. Here you get to fill in the gaps.”
