Tell the truth – are you playing the theme to Indiana Jones in your head? Photo: James Coleman.
Some people make sourdough. Or kombucha. Or cross-stitch. Callum Bowen makes whips.
He has a whole backpack full of them, from bull whips to stock whips to snake whips to the more showy, colourful “performance hybrid” whips you might have seen in YouTube videos.
We’ve agreed to meet in Commonwealth Park to give them a literal whirl (or crack) – ahead of what Callum will be doing later this month.
The full-time public servant will be showing off his hobby by holding whip-cracking demonstrations at Lanyon Homestead on Saturday, 22 March, for the annual Harvest Day Out festival.
The day is all about “rural type of crafts”, including jam-making, weaving, and bee-“hotel”-making. Callum will be there to talk about whip-making.
“Even though they’re made with quite modern materials, the actual process in these is hundreds of years old,” he says.
“I’ll be talking through the basics: how they work, showing off a few cracks, and giving people the chance to have a go. I’m not an ‘expert’ expert, but I’ve been doing it for a few years.”
As you’d expect, Callum blames Indiana Jones for the obsession.
Callum is a self-confessed nerd. You might have seen him at the Canberra Festival of Speed in January dressed as first Doc Brown and then Marty McFly, posing next to his DeLorean (and yes, he’s also installed a hand-built ‘flux-capacitor’ between the seats).
“I actually got a not particularly good-quality Indiana Jones whip as part of a costume, and then during COVID, I was like, ‘Well, I want to learn how to crack it’.”
Inside Callum Bowen’s DeLorean at the 2025 Canberra Festival of Speed. Photo: James Coleman.
He jumped online, and sure enough, there were “tonnes of instructional videos”.
“I basically found my COVID sourdough.”
The only difference is none of Callum’s are made of leather. He prefers to use paracord, a small but wide form of nylon rope.
“The good thing about that is it comes in all the colours of the rainbow,” he says.
“And it’s really inexpensive. I mean, I get my stuff from a semi-professional website these days, but you can honestly walk into Bunnings with $60 and walk out the other end with all the materials you need to make a whip.”
The downside is that while a leather whip can “more or less last forever if you keep it in good condition”, the paracord wears out faster.
Paracord doubles as a cheap leather alternative for the whips. Photo: James Coleman.
There are subtle differences depending on whether it’s the US-style bullwhip he’s making, or the more Aussie stock whip, but there are basically three main components: a ‘core’, made up of a small steel rod or bamboo stick; a ‘thong’; and the ‘cracker’.
The thong starts out as a small length of paracord plaited around a series of ball bearings.
“And you then build up a series of plaited layers over the top and progressively drop them off as you get close to the tail end.”
Without interruptions, it can take him a day to make a new whip.
“It’s a really interesting kind of paradox, because the making of these things is incredibly contemplative and relaxing – just sitting there and you’re doing plaits while listening to podcasts and music, and at the end of it, you get a whip, which is loud and shouty and everything.”
Most weekends, he’ll be out on the front lawn for an hour or so, practising his moves and trying to keep the noise down.
“I tend not to want to make too many cracking, banging noises in suburbia in case I get the police showing up.”
Speed isn’t necessarily your friend when casting a whip. Photo: James Coleman.
Callum lets me have a go, and probably by blind luck more than anything, there’s a crack as the aptly named cracker at the end breaks the sound barrier. Three times in a row. Followed by a lot of squawking in the nearby trees as all the birds take off in fright.
To be fair, this is the easy bit.
“There’s all sorts of throwing, grabbing, spinning stuff that people do, or one trick where they’ll catch bottles in the air or pull them off shelves,” Callum says.
It’s even possible to slice a tin can clean in two with a well-cast whip.
Callum doesn’t sell his creations per se, except for “the occasional commission here and there for friends”.
“I don’t want to tread on the toes of people who make a living out of making and throwing whips, but I would like to start getting into proper double-handed techniques.”
Register for 2025 Harvest Day Out on 22 March at Humanitix.
Loading ...
