Dinky, the Singing and Piano-playing Dingo

We left Kings Canyon heading to Alice Springs. We needed our daily dip in a pool, however, and stopped off at Jim's Place. Jim Cotterill, the son of the entrepreneur who started the Kings Canyon tourist industry, owns a roadhouse at Stuarts Well. He also owns a dingo called Dinky. Dinky has achieved notoriety on several fronts. He sings, ie. howls, in accompaniment to the piano. When sufficiently enthused, he will also 'play' the piano, ie. move his paw while standing on the keys. All this behaviour has gotten him his very own question in Trivial Pursuit. To justify his fame, he performed for us. The legend is true. Dinky is a star.

A little trivia about dingos. Dingos are not actually native to Australia. One pair of dogs were taken to Australia by Asian fisherman thousands of years ago and all dingos have descended from this pair. They cannot bark, but growl and howl. The introduction of European dogs has polluted the pure blood of these canines and soon, outside of isolated packs on Frazer Island etc., the pure blood dingo will be gone from ther Australian mainland. The huge dingo fence that crosses Australia in an attempt to keep dingos from cattle will still be needed though.

Performing dingos only get you so far. We needed our pool and Jim had one. A little lazing and we were on our way once more