Picture this… a leisurely Sunday drive in the Wolseley 24/80 from a modest weatherboard home on a quarter acre block in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs, along Ferntree Gully Road up to the nearby Dandenong Ranges, to spend a lazy afternoon in the bush, and let noisy kids run riot with sticks, with Dad bent over a smoky fire pit pretending to be MasterChef, clacking metal BBQ tongs to sizzle a snag or incinerate a chop, while enjoying a cold frothy straight from the Eski, while Mum buttered the Tip Top, or made a yummy salad, and perhaps sipped a chilled glass of Ben Ean, or maybe drank a mug of hot black tea made in a billy, then sitting in the sunshine on a wobbly deck chair or picnic rug to juggle a plastic plate on your lap, or devour a burnt banger smothered in Rosella tomato sauce wrapped in soggy white bread. These were the memorable family rituals of the 1960s and ‘70s.
The Forests Commission, National Parks Service, Country Roads Board (CRB) and even the Board of Works (MMBW) provided woodfired BBQs at nearly all their picnic sites and campgrounds. And in some cases, they even supplied firewood and hot water at the more popular places.
Local Councils and Lions Clubs tended to provide more substantial public BBQ shelters, often with gas or electric hotplates.
The Forests Commission had a wide variety of wood BBQ designs ranging from small fire pits to large brick and concrete erections.
Or in some cases, there was just a simple circle of river rocks with a hotplate that could be pushed aside so it could also be used as a roaring campfire in the evening to keep warm and toast marshmallows.
Innovation was encouraged and designing a bush BBQ that was attractive, functional and vandal proof was always a worthy challenge.
There was fierce competition, and sometimes outright rivalry, between forest districts over the best BBQ and fire pit design.
The steel components were often fabricated in district workshops, and they were installed and maintained in the bush by local FCV crews.
The Commission produced a Recreation Facility Manual in about 1983 which captured and standardised BBQ designs.
But portable fire pits are now very common, and it seems to me that many of the traditional BBQs have been removed and not replaced over the last few years, so I have started to collect a few photos.
I welcome your photos and stories of forest BBQ and picnic grounds.
Victoria’s Forests & Bushfire Heritage 