SWAN Hill and the PS Pyap go hand-in-hand. But, watching it chug along the Murray these days, it’s easy to forget just how much blood, sweat and tears went into bringing and keeping the old girl here. Forty-four years after saving her from certain decay in Mildura, Swan Hill’s Toby Henson told the fascinating story to journalist AVERYLL LOFT.
“We camped at the settlement and worked long hours for six weeks. It was a damn good effort and it looked a million dollars once we had it back on the water…”
IT WAS the incredibly ambitious project that seemed doomed from the very start.
But when a man like Toby Henson wakes up one morning and decides he’s going to buy a decrepit old paddlesteamer and turn it into a gleaming tourist attraction for Swan Hill, you better believe he’s going to see it through to the end.
Recently celebrating his 80th birthday, Toby is the man who, through sheer grit and determination, rescued and restored the PS Pyap — twice — and clawed out a passageway for it along the shallow, log-littered river so it could operate all year round.
It was a gargantuan task that began in 1970 when he decided to get out of wheat farming in the Mallee and into tourism.
“The Pioneer Settlement was operating by this stage,” he said. “I decided to buy a boat — a nice looking old boat with history that I could convert into a passenger boat.”
The fact he had absolutely no experience in boats or tourism was not important and, six months and a few trips up and down the Murray later, he came across the Pyap at Mildura.
Despite her being left to rot for more than a decade, it was love at first sight for Toby and 10 days later she sailed into Swan Hill.
But no sooner had she slipped into her mooring behind the Pioneer Settlement than tragedy struck — water seeped through the rotten old floorboards overnight and the Pyap sank to the bottom of the river.
“It was a big, big job and the conditions weren’t good. It was a wet year and we worked right through the winter in the cold and the mud — it was lucky someone didn’t die…”
It took weeks to get it out of the mud and up on to blocks — a process that was exacerbated by the rising river — to finally begin what was to be more than eight months of around-the-clock restoration work.
“It was a big, big job and the conditions weren’t good,” Toby said wryly.
“It was a wet year and we worked right through the winter in the cold and the mud — it was lucky someone didn’t die.”
Finally, after much blood, sweat and tears, the Pyap was ready to start taking her first passengers.
In the coming years, it appeared Toby’s great big gamble had paid off. Tourists flocked to Swan Hill to ride the historic Pyap and bookings for parties, functions and weddings came from left, right and centre.
Toby was still in the process of getting his masters ticket, but that didn’t stop him — he took two trips a day without fail in the meantime.
But in 1973 Toby hit another major hurdle — the unreliable depth of the river.
“Every Easter the river would drop and we couldn’t operate in some areas.”
The Little Murray was dammed and emptied not once, but twice, to deepen it.
“We didn’t quite have it done and the banks burst. We had dozers and machinery in there and people came running from every where,” Toby said.
“So we had to go back in and do it again.”
In 1976, with river levels still a problem, Toby decided the only solution was to deepen the river further by dredging a channel along the shallow sections of his four mile run.
And so began another 12 months of backbreaking around-the-clock work.
“We had to get government approval — there was a lot of messing around,” Toby said.
“Some places we had to drill and blast with dynamite… these days you wouldn’t be able to take even a bucket of mud from the river.”
The way now clear, the next couple of years rolled by without incident — and quite successfully, with takings of around $1000 a day during the Pyap’s peak.
But on September 28, 1978 came heartbreaking hurdle number three.
“I heard the fire siren go off around 11pm and then someone rang me,” Toby said. “They said ‘the Pyap’s on fire and it looks bad’.”
The Pyap was gutted to the waterline, destroying not only most of the structure but also historic documents Toby had painstakingly collected.
The exact cause of the fire remains a mystery to this day.
It was a yet another blow that would’ve probably seen most call it a day. But Toby vowed to rebuild — again — and wasted no time doing just that.
“We camped at the settlement and worked long hours for six weeks,” he said.
“It was a damn good effort and it looked a million dollars once we had it back on the water.”
It was to be the last incident on Toby’s watch. In 1984 he was approached by the Victorian Government with an offer to buy the Pyap.
“By that point there was no challenge left. I was driving everyday and yawning all the time. There were very few people around to relieve you.”
He handed over the papers, and over the next four years it was leased to the Pioneer Settlement.
In early 1988 it was gifted to the city of Swan Hill to continue operating at the settlement.
Meanwhile, Toby returned to his roots — farming and working on the land — before moving back to Swan Hill and later settling at Castle Donnington.
Despite everything, he laughs and shakes his head as he talks about the trials and tribulations of his beloved Pyap.
At 80 years old, he is showing no signs of slowing down and still works most days, whether caretaking a friend’s boat or helping out son Darren.
Watching the Pyap chug down the Little Murray these days, it’s easy to take for granted just how much effort went into getting it there and effectively putting Swan Hill on the tourist map.
While he doesn’t like to admit it, if it wasn’t for Toby, it’s probable the Pyap would’ve been sunk to the bottom of the Murray at Mildura years ago and the river never dredged.
TODAY, the Pyap is still one of the key features of Swan Hill’s Pioneer Settlement, with daily cruises along the Little Murray and Murray — the very route dredged out by Toby Henson.
It is certified to carry 200 passengers and is often chartered for lunchtime and night cruises as well as weddings and special functions.
Launched at Mannum, South Australia in July 1896, the Pyap was named after one of the 11 village settlements along the banks of the Murray River.
She had a steam engine and paddles fitted in 1898 but the engine was replaced with a GM motor by Toby Henson when he bought it in 1970.
After being gifted to the city of Swan Hill, she was fitted with a six-cylinder Gardiner motor.
