Peripatetic Pancakes

[tasadam]

Some of you have probably heard of it, indeed some may have been lucky enough to have encountered it.
What is it?

Well, if you have a look at a write-up of a book called Cork Boat by John Pollack, you will see

Reality wasn't all that different. Back on the river, we muscled our way slowly westward, day by day. Although Curtis and Jennifer had to leave us in Regua, we were joined, at the same time, by a college buddy of Garth's, an environmental engineer named Garvin Heath. Garvin was a big, ebullient guy, well over six feet, and he could pull his weight and then some. Better yet, he was full of good stories.
One tale in particular really captured my imagination, a project he called "Peripatetic Pancakes." A few years earlier, to celebrate his thirtieth birthday, he had hired a mule train to haul four hundred pounds of pancake mix, syrup, jam, skillets, fuel, and other supplies a dozen miles into the Sierras of California. There, he set up camp and for the next two weeks cooked free, all-you-can-eat pancakes for any and all passing backpackers.
At first, people were flabbergasted at this unlikely IHOP-in-the-wilderness. Then word started spreading along the trail. One hungry man, a dot-corn refugee, stumbled into camp with only a few raisins left. When Garvin welcomed him warmly with unlimited silver-dollar pancakes and a choice of eight toppings, he was practically speechless with gratitude.

But all is not as it seems - after digging around (Google is my friend), I came across an interesting discovery.
This pancake site makes reference to Tasmania -

I just read about "Peripatetic Pancakes." It's a wonderful thing. There are some scattered mentions of it on the web. Maybe it started in Tasmania? I am not sure. I found out about it from the book "Cork Boat", which is generally not about pancakes but which I still recommend very much to those of you who like to read. I will now quote the pancake part of that book: ...

And on it goes with the same information I have pasted in the first quote.

Well, reading on, I found a very enlightening post on that site -

Peripatetic Pancakes: The Origin in Tasmania!Regarding Larry Hosken's comments about Peripatetic Pancakes, he is quite correct; it originated in Tasmania. For the record: Having spent numerous summers bushwaling in Tasmania's maginicent wilderness area, Steve Bennett and Adam Croser spent two weeks camped at the remote Cox Bight Beach in the South West Tasmania World Heritage wilderness Area over New Year 1995 -96. We made free lemon and sugar pancakes and fresh brewed coffee or tea for nearly 200 hardy bushwalkers. We repeated the project in 1996-97, 1997-98 and 2004-05. I'm pretty sure that Garvin Heath enjoyed our hospitality at Cox Bight and took the idea home with him. I'm also pretty sure that he contacted Steve prior to his project to gain our blessing. I'd be relly happy to hear from anyone else who has heard of Peripatetic Pancakes.

Following this lead, I have indeed verified that Peripatetic Pancakes originated in Tasmania.

I also found an interesting write-up in a PDF file on the net - http://www.nicolaloder.com.au/d_loads/conc.pdf
An extract -

Steve and Adam set up their cafe in the middle of the Track. They provided walkers with fresh coffee and pancakes served at tables lined up along a picturesque lagoon. They served about three hundred people over a two-week period each year, accumulating about nine hundred stories. It cost them each $500, their only motivations to forge some kind of community in the middle of nowhere and stay in the one beautiful spot for a long time. All they asked for in return was a story.

I'll bet they have some stories to tell!

I have heard about it many times before - walkers in the south west of Tassie coming across a couple of cool dudes making pancakes in the middle of nowhere. Like, how awesome!
There has been mention of it on this forum in this thread -

There's a couple of guys who regularly set up a pancake kitchen at Cox's Bight on the South Coast Track. We met them in Jan 2007, after walking 5 days from Cockle creek. They set up for about two weeks each time, and cook pancakes for all the passing walkers (all free mind you).
When we arrived after 5 hard days walking, the kindness we received was amazing. Pancakes a plenty, freshly brewed coffee, a chair to sit in, a day old newspaper and test cricket scores, and dinner on the beach with red wine and classical music.
So why do they do it? Something about khama and giving something back to bushwalking that has given them so much pleasure over the years.
Now that's a random act of kindness.
Wello

Yes, so this explains this picture taken by Annette , I think in December last year. Could not work out what the heck they were doing http://members.tassie.net.au/~ahack/x_S ... 02021.html

Yeah I also had the good fortune to be walking past when these 2 guys were cooking. Although we had just flown in that day, so the pancakes probably didn't taste as nice as if if was your 5th day on the track.. Supposedly they have done the same thing multiple times, and they get their flour and eggs etc. flown in by the same planes that fly people in/out.
Sure, there would be a reward in seeing people devour their pancakes, but I think they enjoyed finding out people's stories and where they were from. My walking partner was from overseas so they were quite interested in what he was up to

I also found it mentioned in this thread -

Well, we're back from the SCT - what a fantastic trip, despite 5 days of rain! The Peripatetic Pancake boys were in residence at Cox Bight. Freshly made pancake and real coffee was absolute bliss after 7 days on the track!

Hunting around, I found some more photos and I post them here with permission - thanks very much Annette and thanks to Andreas for your assistance.

So I looked up the definition of Peripatetic - Moving or travelling about on foot, or some such.
Very random and quite mysterious... And I am sure very, very welcome to anyone who is lucky enough to discover them set up along your path.

I am sure many walkers out there have some fantastic stories to tell of their encounters with Peripatetic Pancakes and I invite you all to share those stories here.

[tasadam]

Annette just emailed me some more pictures (thanks). One of which I will include here -

4.jpg (83.57 KiB) Viewed 26616 times

[DonQx]

ahhh ... ok ... can't resist ... December 1996 ...

... fancy running into one of your GPs serving top notch coffee & very nice pancakes in a somewhat unlikely place ...

... every now & then Steve would jump up, shout 'surfs up', grab his wetsuit & board ... only to return disappointed after a short while for more coffee & spirited philosophising ...

Peripatetic Pancakes December 1996 - Susanne & Adam, Steve's wetsuit front right

1996-12 Xmas Walk Sth Coast - Steve & Adams Peripatetic Pancakes @ Cox Bight 1.jpg (73.9 KiB) Viewed 26589 times

Peripatetic Pancakes December 1996 - Andreas, Susanne, Steve & Adam

1996-12 Xmas Walk Sth Coast - Steve & Adams Peripatetic Pancakes @ Cox Bight 2.jpg (64.83 KiB) Viewed 26589 times

Susanne's disbelief is due to 8 or 9 days of deprivation, we were doing a 'walk in, fly out' (the spritually correct way to do the South Coast Track )

Peripatetic Pancakes December 1996 - Susanne couldn't believe it, after 8 days or so without too many yummies

1996-12 Xmas Walk Sth Coast - Steve & Adams Peripatetic Pancakes @ Cox Bight 3.jpg (59.71 KiB) Viewed 26589 times

[DonQx]

... a day or 2 later we 'hitched' a ride out with a plane

Peripatetic Pancakes December 1996 - Susanne can't believe how small & light the planes are

[Pelence]

Hi forum folks,

Does anyone know if Steve and Adam still set up Peripatetic Pancakes each summer and/or how to get in contact with either of them?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Ben

[DonQx]

No they don't.

Adam unexpectedly passed away last year, much too young.

Steve can often be found on the SCT, one of his fav haunts I think.

dq.

[rcaffin]

Well, I am sure they had fun, but they were NOT the first to provide pancakes in SW Tassie.

In the late 60s we were on the shores of Cox's Bight and we hailed a passing abelone fishing boat to take us across to Denny King's place. We were young Uni students and did not plan this ahead: it just seemed like a good idea at the time ...

Well, Denny and his wife made us welcome, and then enquired how we were going to get back to our packs on the N side of the bay. Um ..... Oh Dear! Yeah, we had left our packs behind! No food, no gear, nothing! Embarrassing.

So Denny took us wooding on his yacht: he sailed, we collected lots of dead wood for him. When we got back we were fed with pancakes and jam, and allowed to sleep in the bunkhouse Denny had. Fortunately there were some blankets there. In the morning Denny sailed us back to our packs. I think he was a bit amused. Good pancakes though!

Lots of stories from those days ...

Cheers
Roger

[Pelence]

No they don't.

Adam unexpectedly passed away last year, much too young.

Steve can often be found on the SCT, one of his fav haunts I think.

dq.

Thanks for the reply and info DonQx - sorry to hear that Adam has passed.

[johnct]

Great story Roger! One of many about Denny King's legendary hospitality, of which I know Steve (at least) was a beneficiary. I'm sure one of the reasons Steve and Adam set up Peripatetic Pancakes was to try to recreate that sense of community which was such a part of walking the SCT

[rcaffin]

Whole mass of stories about Denny and his father.
Did you know he was Lord Warden of the whole area? Which may be why no-one else ever got to start mining in the area!

Cheers
Roger

[slparker]

There was another mine adjacent to Deny King's, the Wilson's from memory.

[tastrax]

..and I think at one stage the old Ludbrookes mine which was under the Qintex Holdings group was owned by Christopher Skase! I will bet he never went down there!

[Mark F]

There was another mine adjacent to Deny King's, the Wilson's from memory.

I think the Wilsons still have their house down there. The mining operations at Melaleuca were open cut sluice mining - basically blasting a semi-vertical face with water into a separating unit to collect the tin from the quartz sand and mud. I was quite surprised when I flew in a couple of years ago to see how much of the area had revegetated.

Tastrax - Skase wouldn't have wanted to get his white shoes dirty.