Supernatural Australia Trivia Quiz

Answer: The Yowie

Reports of large, hairy anthropoids, and alleged footprints of such beasts, have been received from many areas of the Great Dividing Range for decades. But aside from the "odd eyewitness" account, plaster casts of tracks, old anecdotes, and Aboriginal legends, very little supporting evidence exists to say that the creatures are real. Australia's foremost Yowie "expert", Rex Gilroy, believes the the beast to be a relic form of 'Homo erectus'. Nb: Merv Hughes was a popular, and particularly hairy, Australian cricketer.

Answer: Norfolk Island

Situated about 1600 kilometres off the NSW coast, Norfolk Island supported a penal colony in 1788-1814, and again in 1825-1855 (when it was intended for "the worst description of convicts"). During those times, it would have been appropriate to call the place the Devil's Island of the South Pacific, such was its brutal nature. It has since gained a reputation for being one of Australia's most haunted locations, and even has its own "ghost tour" for stouthearted visitors.

Answer: Frederick Valentich

Hope you picked the real person from the aviation pioneer impostors! A number of witnesses independently reported seeing a strange green light in the area when Frederick Valentich disappeared on October 21, 1978. No trace of Valentich or his Cessna 182L was ever found, and no official explanation was given for the seventeen seconds of strange metallic scraping noises which could be heard on tape after the pilot stopped speaking.

Answer: Hawkesbury River

This is the so-called 'Hawkesbury River monster'. Reports of a creature resembling a plesiosaur have been made in historic times on the Hawkesbury, most notably in the 1940s and in 1979. An ancient Aboriginal rock carving near Wiseman's Ferry (depicting a creature with a long neck, long tail, and four flippers) looks remarkably like a plesiosaur. Is this a sea-going beast that enters the river periodically to feed/breed, or is it just another typical sea serpent myth?

Answer: A saucer-shaped depression in the reeds of horseshoe-shaped lagoon

Unlike the rush of "crop circles" which would later appear, the Tully "saucer nest" could not easily have been faked. Banana farmer George Pedley insisted that he saw a saucer-shaped object rise above a body of water (Horseshoe Lagoon) where he subsequently found and photographed a circular depression with a concave centre in a mass of floating reed grass.

The incident was reported internationally and became an important inspiration for future British crop circle hoaxers, Doug Bower and Dave Chorley.

Answer: The bunyip

The bunyip was described in various ways by Aborigines. Some said it was large and hairy, with a face like a dog and a tail like a horse; others attributed tusks, horns and flippers to it. Many descriptions made it sound very much like a diprotodon - a presumed-extinct giant marsupial, similar in size and build to a rhinoceros. Sightings of such a beast were reported by early settlers, especially around the mid-1800s when frontiers were being pushed back (and when Aboriginal legends became better-known).

It was commonly assumed in those days that the creature was something real but unidentified.

Answer: The Min Min light

Witnesses claim that the Min Min light appears as one or more fuzzy discs, usually hovering or meandering above the horizon, but sometimes following the observer, and typically disappearing when approached or fired upon. Sometimes the light is said to be bright enough to illuminate the ground below. Explanations range from light refraction, bioluminescent fauna, or geophysical electrical phenomena, to ghosts, goblins, and extraterrestrials.

Answer: The Blue Mountains panther

Panther-like creatures have been reported throughout the Great Dividing Range for over a hundred years - from the Gippsland phantom cat in Victoria, to the jungle cats of North Queensland. Most of the sightings have come from the Blue Mountains area, west of Sydney. Explanations given include over-sized feral cats, US military panther mascots released after WWII, escaped circus animals, undiscovered indigenous leopards, and even the presumed-extinct marsupial lion.

The sheer number of sightings made the NSW government concerned that someone may be attacked.

Answer: Fiona Horne

Fiona Horne has worked on television and radio, posed for men's magazines, sung for rock band Def FX, and written a number of books on her passion - witchcraft. She has claimed that witchcraft (or Wicca) can be used for good or evil, and that she is a good witch. Thousands of men claimed to have been "put under a spell" by her after viewing her modelling shoots.

Answer: A bone

Aborigines believe that a Kadaitcha Man, or ritual executioner, is able to curse you to death by pointing a bone in your direction. There are a number of documented cases where such bone-pointing has (eventually) resulted in death. Of course, the extreme stress and abstinence of food on the part of the bone-pointee may have had something to do with their demise.

Answer: Guyra

This is a remarkable story because of the number of witnesses and the violence of the attacks. The bangings and rock-throwing at the Bowen household in Guyra continued for weeks, and seemed to be focused on their strange adolescent daughter, Minnie. The case attracted international attention and aroused the curiosity of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (creator of Sherlock Holmes), who sent a friend to investigate.

The NSW government sent a team of detectives, and the local police sergeant had to take leave due to stress, but the onslaught continued.

When Minnie was moved to her grandparents' home in Glen Innes, 60 kilometres away, the attacks followed her. Only when she moved back home did the strange activity finally cease.

Answer: 1978

A spate of UFO sightings in New Zealand in 1978 prompted an Australian television network (Channel 0-10) to send a news crew to get a story. Flying in a freight plane on the night of December 30-31, the news crew encountered and filmed a strange light (although as many as five lights were witnessed) which performed outlandish manoeuvres as it followed their aircraft.

The object was simultaneously tracked by Wellington air traffic control which was in constant communication with the plane, and the Royal New Zealand Air Force was on standby to intercept the UFO, should it become threatening.

Answer: The drop bear

No one knows how many drop bear-fearing tourists in the Australian bush have plastered themselves with Vegemite (an almost-edible spread, resembling congealed sump oil), but more than a few Aussies must have had some laughs at their expense. On the serious side, some people have claimed that the legend of the drop bear was inspired by actual accounts of a presumed-extinct creature - the marsupial lion ('Thylacaleo' genus) - which is thought to have dropped from trees onto its prey.

Answer: Port Arthur

Port Arthur was a penal colony from 1833 to 1877, during which time it housed some of the hardest criminals that Britain could offload. Its cemetery, known as the Isle of the Dead, holds some 1646 graves, and it is said that some of the convicts buried there committed murder in order to be executed and thus spared the brutality of camp life. Today, Port Arthur is a tourist destination, retaining not only its 19th century buildings, but allegedly its original occupants as well. Ghostly screams are still said to come from cells, rocking chairs reportedly rock by themselves, and sighting records allegedly reveal that different tourists have seen the exact same apparition up to ten years apart. On April 28, 1996, Martin Bryant added another gruesome chapter to the location's history by blithely gunning down 35 people.

Answer: Nullarbor Plain

The Nullarbor (from the Latin for 'no trees') is crossed by one of the longest, straightest, and loneliest roads in the world, spanning the barren landscape which adjoins the Great Australian Bight. The Knowles family claim that around 4 a.m. on January 20, 1988, their car was buzzed and actually uplifted by a glowing object on the Nullarbor's Eyre Highway, near Mundrabilla, WA.

A truck driver and two other witnesses in the vicinity also claimed to have seen the object. Ceduna police confirmed that four indentations had been left in the roof of the Knowles' Ford Telstar, and that a strange black dust was found on and within the vehicle. Mrs Knowles had a burn on her hand which she claimed to have received by reaching above when the car was airborne.