At His Grace's Pleasure

Sydney Morning Herald

Saturday October 14, 2006

Jacqui Taffel

Jacqui Taffel reaps the benefits of a bishop's good taste.

According to the Australian Dictionary of Biography, the Reverend Samuel Marsden, first bishop of Bathurst, was seen by some as a kind and conscientious man. Others labelled him a gossip "too much given to flattery". He was, apparently, an "irresolute administrator" but could stand his ground in an argument. He died back in England in 1912.

Judging by Bishop's Court, the house he built in about 1870, one thing is clear - he had taste. Perched on a hill overlooking Bathurst, the two-storey Victorian residence has its original floor-to-ceiling windows, Australian cedar joinery and gracious central staircase. Grand yet homey, it sheltered a string of Anglican bishops until 1961, when it narrowly escaped demolition. It is now a classy bed and breakfast open to the unordained.

The neighbours' fences are closer than they used to be, smoke alarms adorn the high ceilings and the kitchen is being remodelled for a new cookery school, yet even before you enter the house there's a sense of going back in time. The brass bellpull produces a faint, decorous chime inside and in the vestibule, originally a chapel, a round table is decked with old Bibles, crosses, candles and cherubs.

Hotel designer Christine Le Fevre bought the property in 1991 and, after years of renovations, started taking guests three years ago. She describes Bishop's Court as boutique accommodation; it's certainly a generous cut above the average B&B.

One of six individually decorated rooms, ours is painted scarlet with a custom-made, king-sized, cedar sleigh bed, luxurious bed linen and tasteful antique furniture. The 17th-century French armoire holds black cotton-velour bathrobes.

Just down the hall, our private bathroom has a dark marble floor, big white towels on a heated rail, twin handbasins and a well-stocked vanity unit. Body scrub? Emery boards? Dental floss? All here.

From our room we step onto the wide balcony with comfy cane chairs, furry throw rugs for chilly knees, stacks of magazines and an attractive naked woman reclining stomach-down on the coffee table. It could be tempting to use her curved, bronze bottom for olive pips, so just as well cashews are served with our welcome drinks. As evening falls, birds twitter and the lights of Bathurst start to glimmer. The feeling of well-being, almost instant on arrival, washes over us. This is living, as Roy and HG might say.

Le Fevre also cooks for her guests. Dinner here is not cheap ($100 a head, including wine) but it is memorable, seated at the long walnut dining table under an elegant bronze chandelier. Six of us sit at one end and conversation is polite at first. After three simple but excellent courses, including one of the best steaks I've had - a local cut of eye fillet - and some fine local wine, the chatter is relaxed and continues as we retire to the sitting room for tea, coffee and aperitifs. Sadly, it's too warm to use the impressive fireplace.

Breakfast is at the same table, with cereal, fruit salad, fresh orange juice, yoghurt, stewed fruit and whatever you fancy hot from the kitchen.

On a previous visit to Bathurst we hooned around the Mount Panorama race course in our Formula None car. Once is enough, so we wander the town centre, which has some lovely old buildings (and some ugly modern ones), wide streets and shady gardens. Cultural and historical items include the small but friendly regional art gallery, the Bathurst Historical Society and the Australian Fossil and Mineral Museum (displaying the impressive hoard of a local collector, Warren Somerville, with Australia's only complete Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton).

The weather is too pleasant to be indoors, so we take a country drive. In Sofala, the small gold-mining town on the Turon River, we arrive just as a re-enactment group in colonial military gear fire a cannon and haul a man off for flogging. We leave the enthusiastic crowd counting the lashes and take the dirt road to another former gold-rush town, Hill End (population 120), now a National Parks and Wildlife historic site.

After lunch at the Royal Hotel (the only pub left in a town that once had 27), we stroll the streets that jostled with 8000 residents in the 1870s. It's so quiet; the racket of battery stampers crushing rock all day and night is hard to imagine. Along the Bald Hill walking track, we pass old tailing piles and chalk-white ghost gums, peer down mineshafts (covered by metal gratings) and into Bald Hill mine, where tours take visitors down the dark tunnel. Just the dank smell is enough for us.

Back at Bishop's Court, we wash off the dust and have another drink on the balcony with the naked lady before seeing the comedian Rod Quantock's stand-up lecture at the Bathurst Memorial Entertainment Centre. Quantock is a guest at Bishop's Court that night, but we sleep in and miss the chance to discuss his Tim Tam conspiracy theory over breakfast.

It's time to leave. We linger in the garden and toast Bishop Marsden with one last plunger of coffee. Whatever anyone said when he was alive, in our books, he was a top bloke.

visitors' book

Bishop's Court

226 Seymour Street Bathurst

Bookings

Phone 6332 4447,

www.bishopscourtbathurst.com.au.

Prices

Weekend rates from $250 a night for a couple, including breakfast.

How far is it

200 kilometres west of Sydney.

Children

Not usually.

Wheelchair access

Yes.

Smoking

In the garden.

Pluses

Friendly, attentive hosts - Christine Le Fevre and her partner, David Swan - and the chance to stay in a historic house with more than the usual home comforts. Not having to go out for dinner.

Minuses

Not having an ensuite bathroom didn't worry us but some guests might expect it for the price (two bedrooms have ensuites).

Rating 18/20

Next week

A hideaway on the Central Coast.

© 2006 Sydney Morning Herald

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