Short history of Musa gigantum

It's not every night you get to camp next door to a giant banana.

As I write, The Banana is enjoying the burning love of Elvis (which is playing over the motel's pool area), and is settling in to keep its nightly vigil over the passing roadtrains.

But the banana was not always here. It wasn't here when Captain John Korff sat out a storm in this area back in 1847. It was also completely unknown to the local Bundjalung people as well.

None of this is surprising, as The Banana first appeared in 1964. It was the brainchild of John Landy, a local Coffs Harbour banana seller, and not the 26th governor of Victoria.

Landy was inspired to make The Banana based on a real banana. Though it is like a real banana in colour and shape, its sheer size and the presence of signwriting will surely tip off the passing observer to the fact that it is not actually a real banana.

The Banana consumed 750kgs of concrete, and a fair bit of engineer Alan Chapman's time. It took 3 months to construct, and celebrated its 10th anniversary in 1974 - though this was almost certainly lost on the Germans who were rejoicing in the launch of the first Volkswagen Golf.

Here ends another lesson in the history of design. I think I spent a little too much time alone in the car today ...