Koolunga is a quiet mid-north town where the pace of life is slow and easy. Out the front of the local you're likely to bump into one of the locals like "Pedro" Fenwick, He's a world weary kind of guy who's seen almost everything - everything that is except the famous local Koolunga Bunyip!
"I can't tell you too much about him because I wasn't here in 1883," laughed Pedro. "That's when they sighted him and I don't think he's really been sighted since."
"He tends to come out after the pub shuts. If you go past the river it's been reported to me that the bunyip has jumped out in front of cars and run em into trees and done funny things like that."
"His hours are very closely connected to the pub's hours - I think he sleeps while the pub is open and when the pub's shut, that's when he comes out."
The pub was shut when we first arrived in Koolunga, a little town tucked away between Redhill and Yacka. So we went in search of the beast first mentioned in dispatches by the early settlers in the 1880s. There's the occasional sign pointing to its alleged presence. There are also early depictions of bunyips as seen in publications like Robert Holden's book, 'Bunyips - Australia's Folklore of Fear'. They point to a fearsome mix of scales, teeth and snarling menace.
At Koolunga they say something similar lived in the murky waterholes of the Broughton River.
That's where we found local farmers Shane Weckert and Fred Whitehorn. They are bunyip devotees who also enjoy a spot of trout fishing. The trout were a bit scarce when we arrived but Shane, who's been fishing here since he was 10, reckons Fritters Forest is a great place to get away from it all ? even if occasionally you get the feeling that something is out there!
In our continuing search for the Koolunga Bunyip we move from Fritters Forest to Peddlers waterhole - the scene of mass chaos when the townsfolk gathered here more than a century ago.
In January 1883 a report in the Northern Argus newspaper said a bunyip and two young were sighted here. The creature was described as being the size of sheep and scaly and it was usually seen on a moonlit night. After that, the Koolunga locals came prepared.
"After the sightings of the bunyip with several young they developed a plan to dynamite the river," said Fred. "Unfortunately, after some twenty odd charges nothing come to the surface so the theory was the bunyip was hiding in one of the caves or holes deep in the banks of the river."
It's a peaceful spot now and a favourite for campers who venture along the town's River Walk. Perhaps the ripples in Peddler's waterhole point to a more peaceful time for the Koolunga Bunyip's descendants. But according to Pedro, the locals are still looking in all the wrong places.
"The description sounds a bit like some of the locals around here," he laughed. "They might be related to bunyip!"