the hill. It must have been Neel- 
kunnung, the nasty, or poisoned 
creek from which Mindie drank. 
One of the main camps of the Jaare 
is on a low rise about three miles west 
of Charlton, a little to the north of 
the present highway to Donald. On 
the eastern flank of this rise there are 
numerous outcrops of granite, one of 
which contains a beautiful example of 
those rockwells, excavated by nature 
and helped by the aborigines, which 
were so precious to them at the time 
of the year when ordinary water- 
holes had dried up. 
The native name of this rockhole 
is "Youanduk", meaning a-basin-in-a- 
rock, from youan, or yowang, "hill", 
and therefore "rock", and duk, "frogs", 
this word having associations imply- 
ing water and rain.t 
Below the granite boulders there is 
a sandy stretch, many hundreds of 
yards in extent; and there is the evi- 
dence to prove that the place was a 
camping site. Thousands of stone 
fragments, chips, flakes and cores, are 
strewn everywhere, and amongst them 
there are still many implements, 
chiefly the pigmy kind cafled by eth- 
nologists microliths. The larger, and 
more obvious stone tools, the axes, 
grinders and hammers have, however, 
t See my book, Aboriginal Place Names. 
long since been collected by local 
farmers and other interested persons. 
In looking at the great extent of this 
campsite, it becomes obvious that the 
water from the rock hole would have 
been insufficient to quench the thirst 
of all. But there are a number of small 
depressions in and around this camp- 
site; and these no doubt mark the 
site of former soaks, from which ad- 
ditional water could be obtained. 
This camp was ideally situated on 
the native track which ran from the 
numerous campsites along the Avoca 
River to the site of the great tribal 
gatherings at Lake Buloke. The first 
day's trek west from Youanduk would 
have been about five miles to Lake 
Wooronook, where there are some 
ovens and now ploughed-out camp- 
site. The next stop was at Mount 
Jeffcott, a distance of about five miles, 
where the are more ovens. The Mount 
served as a direction finder. The next 
stretch was of eight miles to the very 
large campsite on the sand dunes on 
the south-east corner of the old bed 
of Lake Buloke. The Borung Highway 
bisects this camp, and it is interesting 
to see that this modern highway 
roughly follows the old native path. 
The Lake Buloke camp was pro- 
bably known to the aborigines as 
Banyenong (from which both Banye- 
Youanduk Rock Hole, 
3 miles west of 
Charlton. 
(Note scale compared 
with camera bag.) 
photo: Author. 
44 
Vict. Nat.— Vol. 86 
