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Life in the Saddle is the amazing life story of bush legend Alwyn Torenbeek: rodeo champion, stockman and endurance rider. A non-stop adventure and an amazing insight into a bygone era, this is one man's view of life, from the back of a horse. Now in his mid-70s, Alwyn is a triple hall of fame winner as an inductee in the Stockman’s, Equine and Rodeo halls of fame. He is one of the oldest competitors of gruelling endurance equestrian rides in the country. Alywn’s boyhood in outback Queensland in the 1940s was spent chasing wild horses, catching death adders and dreaming of becoming a rodeo champion. At the age of 14, he left Kokotunga, taking with him a bushman's spirit, an uncanny natural riding ability and a determination to succeed. By 21 he was an international rodeo champion. Travelling far and wide, he became great friends with R.M. Williams and Queensland legendary cowboy Wally Mailman (father of actor Deborah Mailman). After a horrific near death accident, Alwyn worked as a drover and eventually established stockman's schools to teach underprivileged teens to become jackaroos and jillaroos. Throughout his life, he has faced personal tragedies and triumphs with stoicism and his own get-on-with-it philosophy. Brisbane based freelance journalist David Gilchrist has teamed up with Alwyn Torenbeek to write his truly inspiring biography. David has written for a variety of publications including The Independent in London, Australian Geographic, Outthere and The Australian, The West Australian and The New Zealand Herald.

Extract:

Forewords

After retiring from gypsy life on the rodeo circuit as a rodeo champion, Alwyn needed a challenge and found it in endurance riding. He had been one of the most athletic riders I'd ever seen among the roughriders of the 1950s, he had the horses and a truck for transport, and he set out to follow the endurance rides in Queensland and interstate.

He found comradeship among the endurance riders, who rode for no prize money, but for the satisfaction of completing the journey with a sound and happy horse. By being part of a truly amateur sport of men and women with a wide range of ages, Alwyn proves one is never too old or young to participate in an endurance ride, or in life for that matter.

– Erica Williams, widow of bushman's outfitter R.M. Williams

Torrie was one of the gentlemen of the Australian rodeo circuit of the 1950s, a true champion whom I was pleased to take under my wing. He was a remarkable athlete and a front-end rider like me. The times we shared rodeoing during the 1950s were among the best times of my life.

– Lindsay Black, former Australian rodeo champion

Rodeo champion, drover, stockman and triple hall of fame inductee Alwyn Torenbeek has mustered a great number of adventures into his lifetime. We met when I travelled to his home near Rockhampton to interview him for R.M. Williams Outback magazine and I was immediately intrigued by his roller-coaster of a life story. I jumped on for the ride, only to find it hasn't stopped yet.

Through fire and flood, hope and happiness, love and loss, Alwyn's is a remarkable story of a legendary horseman who loves the bush and the folk who live within it.

– David Gilchrist, co-author and journalist '''

Prologue

No Time to Die'''

'Get the doctor; quick, get the doctor,' were the few words I spoke in the moments before I died on a beautiful April morning in 1975.

Let me tell you, there is nothing that focuses the mind on living quite as much as dying, especially when you are only 37 when it happens.

My wife Marion and I and our five children – Mike, Jeff, Shayne, Vonda and Aldo – lived in cattle and coalmining country 370 miles northwest of Brisbane on Woolton Station, near Theodore, a jewel in the agricultural eye of Queensland.

On this particular morning, we were all getting organised for a charity race day to raise funds for the local ambulance service. I had agreed to provide five horses for the races, and the truck that was to collect our horses was running late.

My teenage son Mike and I had risen before dawn, cooked our breakfast and started organising the horses we were taking to the races.

Just so you know, these were not trained thoroughbred racehorses that were raised on first-quality grain. They were station-bred horses raised on grass, and local landowners or managers like me provided them for these events so that the town would benefit a little. Today it was my turn to supply some horses.

Now, we'd mustered 30-odd horses to select five for a country race day. It wasn't a big problem and didn't take all that long. In fact, before the morning had grown too old, we had the horses, their saddles and bridles ready. All we needed was the truck and we'd be on our way.

There we were, as the saying goes, all dressed up with nowhere to go – or rather, somewhere to go and no way to get there. What's more, back in those days I was a little less patient than I am now; that's what you are like when you're fit, not quite 40, and still ready to mix it with whatever life sends you.

As it happened, it was ten o'clock before the truck arrived. By that time we just had to load the horses and get into Theodore.

No time to stop and yarn; very little time to stop for anything, and that was despite facing a drive of only about an hour. You see, the way it is with me, as it is with many bush folk, when you give your word to do something, well, you do it; you do it right and on time.

As soon as the truck arrived, I gave the driver a nod and Mike and I got to work. We had just started walking the first couple of horses up the loading ramp when the telephone rang up at the house.

Marion had been inside all morning and took the call. An anxious voice on the other end told her that the caller was from the ambulance service and that the race organisers were starting to wonder about the whereabouts of the horses.

Marion wasn't surprised that they were calling. We were late and there was just no getting around it. What's more, I was down as a steward for the races. Their problem was simple: no horses and no steward meant fewer funds for the service.

Now, country races, particularly charity races, are important to any bush community. That's why, in true bush spirit, the thought that something might stop me or my horses getting to the races never entered my mind. Late or not, we were on our way.

As the truck backed up to the loading ramp, I led the first horse up the ramp. Mike was hurrying along as well and led the second horse up the ramp behind me. All we needed to do was stop the truck, open the gates, walk them on, then gather up the next three and do the same again. Then we would gather our gear and we'd be off.

I don't know how often I had loaded horses onto a truck. Probably more times than I like to remember. After all, loading animals onto a truck is part of the stock and trade of anyone on a property. I had been working horses since I was old enough to ride to school, then mustering cattle, droving and, of course, working the rodeo circuit as a roughrider. Just the same, something was different this day.

On this particular day, I don't know why the driver didn't get the truck square onto the ramp. Perhaps it was because he was running late and in a hurry. It's just one of those things that I'll never know. Anyhow, he backed the truck up to the ramp slightly askew. He had swung down out of the cabin and was taking a look at the gap between the ramp and the truck, trying to decide whether he needed to straighten the truck up to the ramp, when I spotted him.

'It'll be right,' I called.

Perhaps he nodded, perhaps he answered. I don't remember.

'My horses are all broken in. They're used to trucks,' I said, trying to reassure him. Maybe at the same time I was trying to reassure myself that we'd be okay – we'd get to the races.

Whatever I may have been thinking or worried about, there was one thing of which I was sure: my horses wouldn't shy at the sight of that gap between the ramp and the truck. It was no wider than perhaps 6 inches and not so big as to cause my horses any problem. Without further ado, I pulled the right pin on the truck gate and when the gate wouldn't budge, I reached down to lift the left pin.

To this day, I don't know why the driver jumped in the truck again or when. It is not a conversation we ever had, and I don't reckon we ever will. Time has taken its toll on both of our memories. All I know is I didn't see the driver hop in behind the wheel.

Anyway, there I was bent down to pull the bottom pin with my head between the ramp and the truck. At about the same time, the driver had reached to his left and swung the shift into reverse.

I suppose the initial rumble of the truck's engine as the driver slid it into gear probably entered my mind. It would have done. But then I had no time to react because at about that same time, the reversing truck was splitting my head into three parts as a bolt protruding from the truck gate was forcing itself into my skull on one side and a piece of rail was crushing the other. All I knew was at that precise moment blood was bursting from my eyes, ears, mouth and nose with such force that it splashed up off the loading ramp's timber floor and was spattering my knees. All I remember is looking down both sides of my body and thinking 'Wow.'

To say everything let go is an understatement; I reckon the impact was something like a Cassius Clay punch.

I would like to tell you that I remember every detail of what happened, but even now, all these years later, I still can't recall everything.

What I do know is I didn't pass out immediately. Some few seconds after thinking, 'Wow,' my mind started working again.

I had recovered from the standing eight count that followed the impact, and I thought, 'This time, old fella, you're done for.' It was then that I heard myself yell to Mike, 'Get the doctor; get your mother and get the doctor.' And then my mind and body gave in to the reality of the situation and I sank slowly to the floor. It had been a one-punch knockout blow after all.

Pushing aside the shock of seeing blood spurt out of my head, Mike bolted past the horse he had on the ramp and ran back to the house to tell his mum to call the doctor.

Although my voice was normally strong enough to rouse the station dogs or call in the horses over a good distance, it was, like the rest of my body, rapidly losing strength. Just the same, despite there being 328 feet of open space between the house and the loading ramp, the sounds of the accident, the truck, my yelling, Mike yelling, the whole commotion, got Marion's attention.

She'd only just got off the phone to the ambulance service after reassuring them that the horses would soon be on the way to the races, and quickly rang them back, explaining, 'I don't know what is going on, but something bad has happened, come quick.'

With that, she raced down to me with my 12-year-old daughter Shayne bolting after her. Well, Mike saw his mother running towards the ramp and behind her, his sister Shayne. Desperate to keep his sister from seeing her father drenched in blood and unconscious, or semi-conscious at best, Mike roared at her to get back in the house.

Shayne kept running towards the ramp. Mike picked up some rocks, took aim and started pegging them at Shayne, still bellowing at her to turn around.

No doubt Mike's actions had Shayne more confused and worried than before. Her own stubbornness kicked in and she kept coming, calling out, 'What's wrong with Dad?'

Mike answered his sister with a further bombardment of rocks, all the while screaming at her to get back in the house. I'm sure the pallid, strung-out look on her brother's face together with his incessant bombardment and screaming got the better of Shayne, and she gave up and ran back to the house in a flood of worry and tears.

In the middle of screaming at Shayne, Mike had the presence of mind to call to his mother to get the old station wagon. Marion drove the old car over to the ramp. Then, with all the courage and strength they could muster, they loaded me very carefully into the wagon.

Thankfully, Mike was raised in the bush. Many a bush kid knows how to drive from a young age and Mike was no exception. He slipped in behind the steering wheel and Marion crawled into the back with me, placing her hands on each side of my head as Mike slowly and carefully pulled away.

Although it was not a topic Mike, Marion or I spoke about over the years that followed, I'm sure neither Mike nor Marion thought of anything except getting me safely to hospital – Mike worried only about the driving, while his mother concentrated on keeping my skull in one piece.

There she was, the woman who had been part of my life during most of my rodeo days, who had lived rough on numerous stock routes droving cattle, the mother of my children, the woman I loved, sitting in an old shirt and shorts beside me, cradling my crushed head, as our 15-year-old son drove to meet the ambulance 6 miles down the road.

But those 6 miles would not be the end of the trek to hospital. After that, there was still another 12 miles to the Theodore Hospital and a two-hour drive in the ambulance that would blow out to four hours as we made our way to Rockhampton.

Mike drove as carefully as he could on the dusty and rutted track that passed for a road in those days until we met the ambulance.

Blood filled my ears and prevented the sound of the approaching ambulance from entering my mind. Then, as they moved me from the car to the ambulance, the most remarkable thing happened: I was suddenly sitting with my father. He had passed away some years beforehand, yet here we were, sitting somewhere above the ambulance. I felt no pain; I was just quietly enjoying Dad's company again. It was the most remarkable feeling and one that lingers with me still.

Although it was wonderful sitting there, pain-free, with my father, after a while I knew Dad was trying to tell me to go back, not to stay with him.

There was a certain gesture Dad used when he was worried. And without saying a word, he made that gesture. Right there and then, I knew it was time to go back. It wasn't my time to die. Dad wanted me to live and that was exactly what I intended to do. Moreover, I intended to live long and live well.

Getting back into my body was not painless. It was a miserable process; I felt pain and plenty of it.

Nonetheless, taking on the challenge to live and meeting it meant, as far as I was concerned, not letting a single memory escape my mind. I had to fight to remember everything and to keep those memories, because each of them made me who I was, and who I would become. To live, I needed to remember.

'A non-stop adventure and an amazing insight into a by-gone era.' Queensland Times

David is currently working on his next book and a rural novel as well as a screenplay.