Our Story

Some pubs serve drinks. The Walkabout Creek Hotel serves history.

Built in 1900 and licensed in 1901, this outback pub has been the heart of McKinlay for well over a century. Back then it was called the Federation Hotel — a sturdy bush pub on the edge of Queensland's vast cattle country, 200 kilometres from Mount Isa and a long way from anywhere else. In 1996 it was relocated to its current position on the Landsborough Highway, where it still stands today, watching the road trains roll by.

Then came 1986. And Mick Dundee.

When Crocodile Dundee hit cinema screens that year, it became the highest-grossing film in Australian history. And the pub at the centre of it all? That was here. The Walkabout Creek Hotel lent its name — and its soul — to one of the most beloved Australian films ever made. After filming wrapped, producer John Cornell donated the original bar from the movie set back to the pub. You'll find it out in the beer garden, exactly where it belongs. Tourists have been making the pilgrimage ever since, cold beer in hand, standing where Paul Hogan once stood.

The name Federation Hotel was left behind. The Walkabout Creek Hotel had a new identity — and it's worn it proudly ever since.

For the 160 or so people who call McKinlay home, though, the pub has always been about more than a movie. It's the bottle-o, the meeting place, the living room of the town. It's where locals have gathered for generations — through droughts and good seasons, through the heat of summer and the cool of a rare winter evening.

In 2022 the pub went on the market. For a few years, its future was uncertain.

Then Angus Brodie came home.

A McKinlay-born grazier who grew up running around this pub as a kid, Angus and his wife Jo Cranney purchased the Walkabout Creek Hotel in November 2025. Not as an investment. Not as a tourism venture. But because this pub belongs to this town, and someone needed to make sure it stayed that way.

"I have memories running around with all the other kids, sneaking a packet of chips and a soft drink," Angus has said. The pub is part of who he is — and now he's part of the pub.

Angus and Jo are graziers at heart, running Horizon Grazing and raising their young family in McKinlay. Taking on the pub was never going to be the easy road. But some things are worth fighting for.

The Walkabout Creek Hotel is open, it's alive, and it's ready for its next chapter.

And in September 2026, it turns 40 — well, Mick Dundee does. We think that's worth celebrating.