THE BIG READ
Some promise sunshine, while others suggest bays, mountains or paradise, and then there are the names that make you wonder what on earth was going on at the time. Welcome to Australia’s wonderfully misleading map.
Australia has produced some magnificent place names.
We have towns named after royalty, explorers, Indigenous languages, faraway countries, local landmarks and, as it turns out, at least one much-loved bullock.
Then there are the names that appear to promise something entirely different.
Drive into Sunshine on a miserable Melbourne winter’s morning, for instance, and you may reasonably question the advertising. Head for Bayswater expecting a sparkling bay and you’ll be waiting a while.
And Pakenham Upper?
Well, let’s just say you won’t need an oxygen tank.
So, with apologies in advance to proud locals everywhere, we’ve taken a light-hearted tour of 30 Australian place names that aren’t always quite what they seem.
For somewhere called Bayswater, there’s a noticeable shortage of bays.
The eastern Melbourne suburb sits at the foot of the Dandenong Ranges, well inland from Port Phillip. Nobody is suggesting it isn’t a perfectly nice place to live, but just don’t pack the boat.
There are few braver acts in Australian town planning than putting the word “Sunshine” on a Melbourne suburb.
To be fair, the name wasn’t a long-range weather forecast. Sunshine became closely associated with industrialist H.V. McKay and his Sunshine Harvester Works.
Still, on a grey July morning, the name can feel wonderfully optimistic.
You’d expect white sand, palm trees and perhaps someone arriving with a cocktail. Instead, Paradise is an Adelaide suburb about 10km north-east of the CBD.
Pleasant? Absolutely.
Actual paradise? We’ll let the locals fight that one out.
With a name like Lovely Banks, you imagine green rolling countryside beside a picturesque river, and there are certainly rural views around this northern Geelong suburb. But these days Lovely Banks is also part of a rapidly changing growth corridor.
The name still has a rather delightful Jane Austen ring to it.
Imagine the pressure of living in a place called Happy Valley.
Bad day at work? Sorry. Not permitted.
The Adelaide suburb really does sit in a valley and is home to the Happy Valley Reservoir, so at least half the name is beyond dispute.
This one sounds as though Bendigo’s streets should be paved with precious metal.
And there’s actually a good reason for the golden bit as Golden Square sits in one of the great Victorian goldfields and grew rapidly during the gold rush.
The square itself, however, isn’t gold.
We’ve checked.
A “Mount” creates certain expectations of snow caps, hiking equipment, and maybe even sherpas.
Mount Waverley is certainly undulating in parts, but anyone planning an assault on the summit should probably leave the crampons at home.
Once upon a time, the name Forest Hill conjured visions of trees and rolling bushland.
Today, you’re more likely to encounter houses, traffic and a shopping centre.
There are still leafy pockets, but the forest has had to share.
This may be Australia’s greatest suburb name if judged purely on holiday-brochure appeal.
“Clear Island Waters” sounds like somewhere reached by seaplane where your bungalow comes with its own plunge pool. It’s actually an affluent residential suburb on the Gold Coast.
Admittedly, there is plenty of water.
Don’t arrive with a pickaxe.
Emerald is a beautiful Dandenong Ranges town, famous for greenery, gardens and its connection to the Puffing Billy railway rather than deposits of precious green gemstones.
The name suits the scenery, though.
This one isn’t really misleading at all once you understand it.
The “entrance” is the opening connecting the vast Gippsland Lakes system with Bass Strait, and the permanent man-made entrance dates back to the 19th century.
So we’ll give Lakes Entrance this one.
You don’t need us to explain why this one has been making Australian travellers smile for generations.
Yorkeys Knob is a beautiful coastal community north of Cairns.
The “Knob” refers to the headland and the Yorkey part is associated with a fisherman known as George “Yorkey” Lawson.
Perfectly innocent, so stop giggling.
If ever a place sounded as though it should contain a giant egg sitting on a wall, this is it.
Humpty Doo is a rural community south-east of Darwin, and theories about the unusual name have circulated for years.
Whatever its precise beginnings, it remains one of the great Australian addresses.
This may be our favourite.
Nowhere Else is an actual rural locality west of Sheffield in Tasmania and the name is believed to have come from a road leading to a place that previously had no name.
Which means you can genuinely live in Nowhere Else.
Try explaining that on an online delivery form.
No, you’ve taken neither a wrong turn nor a spectacularly long flight.
Texas sits on Queensland’s southern border beside the Dumaresq River.
The name has historical links to the American Texas, but visitors looking for Dallas skyscrapers may be disappointed.
One minute you’re touring Western Australia’s spectacular south coast, the next you’re apparently in Scandinavia.
Denmark is surrounded by forests, beaches, wineries and some magnificent scenery.
There may even be pastries.
But Copenhagen is roughly 14,000km in the other direction.
Napoleon needn’t worry!
Sydney’s Waterloo takes its name from the famous 1815 Battle of Waterloo, but these days the battles are more likely to involve finding a parking spot.
It’s one of many Australian places carrying names imported from British and European history.
Yes, we know.
But before the comments section gets out of control, Blackbutt is named after a perfectly respectable Australian eucalypt.
The blackbutt tree gets its name from the darkened appearance of the lower trunk.
Botanically sensible. Comedically irresistible. Surely there must be a Whitebutt somewhere in the world?
There is something wonderfully grand about this one.
Pakenham Upper sounds like the point where ordinary Pakenham gives way to an exclusive alpine resort.
In reality, it’s a rural district north of Pakenham extending towards Gembrook. It is hillier country, so “Upper” isn’t completely without merit.
But you won’t suffer altitude sickness.
If Pakenham Upper sounds high, The Basin sounds reassuringly low.
And geographically, this one actually makes sense. The suburb sits among rising land at the western foothills of the Dandenong Ranges, with tributaries of Dandenong Creek running through lower ground.
The only catch is that plenty of roads around there seem determined to make you drive uphill.
Sadly, there isn’t a giant fry-up waiting beside the water.
According to Huon Valley Council, the wonderful name is associated with the red-and-yellow native wildflowers known as eggs-and-bacon flowers that grow around the bay.
Which is arguably an even better story.
Yep, it’s real.
Tittybong is a tiny locality in north-west Victoria.
We’re going to resist making up an elaborate explanation for the name because its precise origin isn’t clear.
Frankly, Tittybong doesn’t need our help.
Say it aloud. Burrum-buttock.
This small Riverina community north-west of Albury has one of those wonderfully Australian names that makes first-time visitors immediately reach for their phone and photograph the road sign.
And yes, locals have probably heard every joke.
It sounds less like a town and more like directions given by an old bloke at a country pub.
Come By Chance is a genuine locality in northern New South Wales.
Even better, it’s the sort of address that makes the sentence “How did you end up in Come By Chance?” almost impossible to answer seriously.
Harsh.
Useless Loop sits in the Shark Bay region of Western Australia, and the unusual name has historical roots stretching back to French exploration of the area.
A nearby harbour was considered “useless” because a sandbar made access difficult.
More than two centuries later, the insult has stuck.
There are place names. Then there are sound effects!
Boing Boing is a locality in northern New South Wales and may be the only Australian destination that sounds as though it should be announced by a cartoon spring.
Try saying it twice without smiling.
Another name requiring considerable maturity from you, our reader, so stop your giggling.
Iron Knob sits on South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula and, unlike some entries on this list, the name makes perfect sense.
The area became famous for its rich iron ore deposits and played an important role in Australia’s steel industry.
So yes, the iron is real.
We’ll leave the rest alone.
One of the great Australian town names, Wee Waa sits in the state’s north-west and is known as the self-proclaimed cotton capital of Australia.
Its name has Aboriginal origins, although interpretations of its precise meaning vary.
The pronunciation is roughly “wee war”, which has saved generations of Australians from making an obvious joke.
Well, some of them.
Bumbunga sits beside the spectacular pink Lake Bumbunga near Lochiel, north of Adelaide.
The name has Indigenous origins and is associated with the lake, so it deserves considerably more respect than the laughing schoolchild inside some of us initially allows.
And the lake itself is extraordinary.
Surely a name invented after several drinks.
Nope. Smiggin Holes is a genuine ski resort village in the Snowy Mountains.
The unusual name is said to relate to Scottish stockmen who used depressions in rocks that collected water, known as smiggin holes.
Which means one of Australia’s strangest place names is actually quite practical.
Before we get too smug about our map, the rest of the world has produced some beauties too.
There’s Greenland, most of which is covered by an ice sheet, and Iceland, which can be surprisingly green. The United States has Boring in Oregon, Accident in Maryland, Intercourse in Pennsylvania and Truth or Consequences in New Mexico.
Scotland has Dull, which famously formed a friendship with Boring, Oregon.
And in the Cayman Islands, you can quite literally go to Hell.
Suddenly, Pakenham Upper doesn’t seem so strange.
Which Australian town, suburb or locality do you think has the funniest, strangest or most misleading name? Tell us in the comments. We suspect there are enough out there for another 30.
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