00:02It's been a difficult few years at this Bachelor pub.
00:05Covid went for a lot longer than most people thought and it killed off the tour buses that came here.
00:14An hour south of Darwin with only a couple of hundred residents,
00:19Bachelor has battled through long-running Telstra outages,
00:22financial trouble at one of its primary employers
00:26and the sacking of the entire local council for maladministration.
00:30Then, at the start of last year, the main store and post office also shut down.
00:36It was pretty dead, actually, yeah. We had nothing much to do,
00:40so Janet and myself decided to renovate the Listfield Outback Resort.
00:46A big blow for the mostly older population and this real estate agent
00:51who had struggled to sell homes for the past five years.
00:54It was a disaster, really. The post office, one minute, it was open.
01:00Within two weeks, it was closed.
01:03A year on, though, Bachelor is beginning to claw its way back.
01:07Long-planned remediation works are underway at the old Rum Jungle uranium mine.
01:13Tourists are visiting again, a new council is in place
01:16and this couple has big plans to reopen the store and post office.
01:21Our goal is really simple, just to make it easier for everyone living in Bachelor.
01:28A lot of people are coming in from interstate and buying.
01:31I think the town is starting to feel a bit of a buzz again.
01:37At Bachelor's Abattoir, millions are being spent on renovations
01:41and there are plans to increase staff by 40%, bringing in new families.
01:46If you shift that family orientation into the community, which is Bachelor, it'll grow.
01:51While there are signs Bachelor is back on track, Kerry says there are still obstacles to growth.
01:58He says some families are sending their children away to bigger schools,
02:02there's a lack of accommodation and limited local activities are pushing some people away.
02:09Issues an entirely new council is hoping to address.
02:13All right, we have to wait for this.
02:15There's a lot of people coming.
02:17All right, let's take a look.
02:17We'll see you next time.
02:18So that's how you go.
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