18 July 2008

Ghost Zoo! The wreckage on Mugga Lane

| johnboy
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Redneck Ninja sent in some curious photos of the old Mugga Lane Zoo with the following message:

    These photos were taken around November last year at the site of the
    Old Mugga Lane Zoo in Symonston. We were there to take photos for a
    school assignment and what we found is probably one of the creepiest
    places in Canberra. There were piles of sheep bones, syringes, porno
    magazines and even a used sex toy. The abandoned cages were bloody
    strange as well. There were also suspicious looking carparts tucked
    away as well (whole bumper bars from Commodores and Hyundais)
    We got chased away by this junkie soon after the last photo was taken.
    Not sure what’s happening to the site, or who owns it, but a google
    search shows a company was thinking of building an aged care nursing
    home on the site a few years back.

    I remember coming here back in the day, and yes it was in a pretty
    sorry state back in the day, but it was still a pretty good way to
    spend a Sunday afternoon. There were those annoying peacocks and
    everything. It’s sad seeing the place now, given how much fun it used
    to be. Dangerous, too.

This morning I went out there with a friend. I’ve kept two of RNN’s photos in the slideshow, the rest we took this morning. We used Google Maps to find it first, it’s actually a bit further south than the markings on this map:


View Larger Map

Then we got to play Time Team guessing at phases of occupation.

It’s a bit of a worry the extent to which it’s becoming an illegal dumping ground. Other items (an old bus stop sign) must have been brought there by someone for some reason at some time.

If there’s anyone living there they made themselves scarce in the presence of two large men with cameras. It could just be that it’s too cold out there right now for dossing in. Last November it might have been much more hospitable.

In many ways there was surprisingly few bottles of booze and drug paraphenalia, one suspects someone has cleaned the site up after a fashion.

But I agree with RNN, it’s a very spooky place, not helped by the currawongs scrabbling around.

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Uncle Fester2:40 pm 28 Apr 09

All, the Environa thing is not new. A failed subdivision from 80 years ago.

http://www.nla.gov.au/pub/nlanews/2005/oct05/article2.html

Fester

Those piles of dirt sound like their looking for trouble. Are the gates big? Some bogan bogan from causeway or bad side of Narrabundah might just break it open to get thier stash of whatever back.

Better watch out young Tristan – they have put up gates now, and wait for it *piles of dirt* between a couple of trees along the (non-existant) fenceline.

No idea how you’ll get in there now 😉

This website is awsome for finding out stuff about Canberra. Doesn’t seem as boring as i once thought. I really want to check out this old zoo. I don’t really think the rangers would like to see a big group of teenagers roaming round there though. Stereotypes; Sigh…

Clown Killer10:06 am 21 Jul 08

I got bitten on the chest by a donkey at Rehwinkles when I was a little fella. I remember my aunt who took me there going off at some board chap who probably worked there as a shit-shoveller. Never liked donkeys after that.

Got a chance to check it out on the weekend, took some photos which i will post tonite. It really is a shame as to what has happened out there. We were soon spotted by a Ranger ( he had red and blue lights on his Hilux) but he left us alone to explore. As we were leaving the “tourist rush” arrived with 2 carloads appearing. Good thing we got in early.

Drove past this morning and a shiny new set of gates have magically appeared at the entrance to the old zoo.

Maybe we should start a new thread called “Interesting places we will be having closed to the public this week” 🙂

I thought i read somewhere that they sold the original property ( i could be wrong)

seekay said :

Thumper! How did you miss the typically whiny social worker CT piece on the Causeway during the week?

Um, because it was in the Canberra Times?!

Rehwinkel is still around and living near Bungendore (might even still be on the original place on Macs Reef), he does environmental things and appears in the Bungendore paper from time to time.

Peterh said:

peterh said :

Probably the best deposit of Jasper in the country now has DFAT on it. (sigh)

They are shortly to begin digging up the DFAT staff carpark to build the new Climate Change Department building, I imagine they’ll have big fences around the site but you never know…

It was on Macs Reef Road

Where was Rehwinkles, for the uninitiated?

oh, right, just like oaks estate…

Thumper! How did you miss the typically whiny social worker CT piece on the Causeway during the week?

What a dump that place is – and the public housing on the other side of the railway lines down by the markets. More genius public planning. Instant slum! Just add poor people!

Hamilton said :

Aren’t these photos of Charnwood?

nah, too clean. no burnt out cars, no feral tribes of kids roaming in the background. They aren’t scared of cameras, they’d probably try to eat them.

Early nineties?

A google search reveals several pages that still advertise the zoo as being open and operational. Now there’s some quality updating.

Aren’t these photos of Charnwood?

Timberwolf658:19 am 18 Jul 08

I get a really weird, eerie feeling when I look at these photo’s. Someone needs to get in there and clean the place up,if they haven’t already. You can see why junkies would go there.
How scary to be chased by some random, that would of freaked the hell out of me.

What was your assignment on?

Shut down in early nineties.

Urban development in Googong and Environa is about to explode thanks to the Canberra Investment Corp. I expect you will be hearing “environa” more and more. =)

Googong pride!

Thanks Lux,

Glad someone liked it.

Man i love this kind of stuff. Can someone tell me a little more about what this pace was before it became what we see in these photos? How long ago did it shut down? In my book, this is ten kinds of awesome.

Hmmmm. Looks like the rest of Canberra.

If anyone is interesting in urban exploration, there are some great sites off here:

http://www.acme.com/jef/photos/archaeology.html

PBO said :

Aaagh those bastards at Geoscience Australia have lied to me! Oh well. Thanks for that PeterH.

You probably already know about the spots on Black mountain near the old quarry.

I have created a new thread for this kind of thing, we could delve deeper into who knows what to find around canberra.

might turn up some interesting stuff…

PBO said :

niftydog said :

Holy-holes-in-the-ground-I-never-knew-existed, Batman! We need a thread that points out all the whacky things you can see in Canberra on Google Earth. Like what the heck is “Environa” just over the border from Hume?! What the fudge?

“Environa”

Lets just hope they dont have some bogan way of pronouncing it over the border.

what so it sounds like jerrabomberra?

niftydog said :

Holy-holes-in-the-ground-I-never-knew-existed, Batman! We need a thread that points out all the whacky things you can see in Canberra on Google Earth. Like what the heck is “Environa” just over the border from Hume?! What the fudge?

“Environa”

Lets just hope they dont have some bogan way of pronouncing it over the border.

Captains flat! Now that has holes and stuff and shit all over the place.

niftydog said :

Holy-holes-in-the-ground-I-never-knew-existed, Batman! We need a thread that points out all the whacky things you can see in Canberra on Google Earth. Like what the heck is “Environa” just over the border from Hume?! What the fudge?

Fascinating stuff – all this talk of ghosts and shenanigans is making me itch for some urban exploration. Anyone know if there’s any organised groups doing stuff like that?

um, it is a new suburb in new south wales….

PBO said :

Aaagh those bastards at Geoscience Australia have lied to me! Oh well. Thanks for that PeterH.

You probably already know about the spots on Black mountain near the old quarry.

I did, but Black mountain and Mt ainslie are a bit of an oddity here, they both have granite and basalt in them, maybe the geology buffs can explain why?

Probably the best deposit of Jasper in the country now has DFAT on it. (sigh)

I have been getting non precious opal from the murrumbidgee corridor, (yellowish milky color) and rubies (very small ones) out of bredbo just under the bridge. (in NSW, you can buy a fossicking license, ask at the police station in Queanbeyan, they used to assist) Abercrombie caves for gold and sapphires, in the stream, not advisable in winter – really, really cold. Wee jasper for quartz crystals & sapphires.

I have mentioned this before, look up ACT Lapidary Club in the white pages, they run the gem shows and are always interested in mew members.

great outings for the kids, big and small. Some of their field trips are up north this time of year, if the members haven’t already packed up and gone north for winter (mostly retirees, damn them)

Holy-holes-in-the-ground-I-never-knew-existed, Batman! We need a thread that points out all the whacky things you can see in Canberra on Google Earth. Like what the heck is “Environa” just over the border from Hume?! What the fudge?

Fascinating stuff – all this talk of ghosts and shenanigans is making me itch for some urban exploration. Anyone know if there’s any organised groups doing stuff like that?

Aaagh those bastards at Geoscience Australia have lied to me! Oh well. Thanks for that PeterH.

You probably already know about the spots on Black mountain near the old quarry.

you know, looking at the photos, the only change that i noticed is the lack of animals. place was pretty bad when it was open. Makes me wonder why mike durrant set up the fossil display there, before moving to the dinosaur museum.

PBO said :

Regrettably Peterh, it is illegal to fossick in the ACT, sux dosent it?

There are some good sites near the Airport though in the creek bed of Morsehead dve. Cephalopods as big as your hands.

not strictly accurate. you cannot stake a mining claim in the act, but you can fossick. you can also purchase a fossicking license, don’t know where, as i never have.

another great site for trilobites is in the dam behind the old pistol club on majura road, next door to the rifle club. Yass river has some good trilobites and ammonites, but you have to abseil down the cliff face to get to them. (near the highway)

Regrettably Peterh, it is illegal to fossick in the ACT, sux dosent it?

There are some good sites near the Airport though in the creek bed of Morsehead dve. Cephalopods as big as your hands.

S4anta said :

is folks are interested, there are some awesome fossil sites round here as well!

ferns and the like.

where would that be?

tylersmayhem3:57 pm 17 Jul 08

To answer the question in the sideshow about skis, it looks like a lot of stolen stuff has been dumped out there! Along with neat piles of wire which have been without dobt left until the smaks or winos who found the stuff figure out a brilliant plan on how to get it out to Fyshwick to cash it in.

I think more to the point, when the zoo was shit down, why the f**k was it left assembled and a target for this kind of mess to heppen. More importantly, why is it still left to fester?! It needs to be reported and the parks & wildlife mob go out and clean the place up!

is folks are interested, there are some awesome fossil sites round here as well!

ferns and the like.

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