The Big Thongs

Calen, Queensland, Australia

Roadside giants

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Current

Recently confirmed · Aug 2026

This Big Thing is recorded as still being here.

A 2.5-metre-high pair of giant thongs created to draw Bruce Highway travellers into Calen.

Private to your Passport.

PLAN YOUR VISIT

No recommended arrival yet

We have not checked a recommended place to arrive or stop here yet.

This takes you to the Big Thing itself. If stopping, choose a safe and legal place nearby.

The Big Thongs

This pin marks the Big Thing itself. If stopping, choose a safe and legal place nearby.

Site-level location · 20.8985° S, 148.7717° E

FIELD GUIDE

The story

Lionel Knott made Calen's thongs out of conveyor belt rubber, which is exactly the right material and probably the only sensible one.

The pair stands two and a half metres high outside the Calen Hotel, north of Mackay, and they were built and unveiled at an Australia Day celebration in 2021 – four months from idea to installation, which is brisk for a Big Thing. The rubber was locally sourced. This is sugar and mining country, and conveyor belting is the everyday industrial material of the district, hard-wearing, thick and already the right texture.

As the ABC reported at the time, the intention was that they would be built to last, like a good old pair of Aussie thongs.

The subject is well judged. Thongs are close to a national uniform, they are comically ordinary, and enlarging something that cheap is inherently funnier than enlarging something impressive. There is no attempt to make Calen sound important. The joke is the whole proposition.

The siting is honest too. They are at the pub rather than out on the Bruce Highway itself, which means the object gives travellers a reason to turn off and somewhere to go when they do. A great many roadside sculptures stand in a layby with nothing attached, and the visitor takes a photograph and drives on. Putting them at the hotel converts attention into custom.

That is the whole business case for a small-town Big Thing, executed with unusual clarity.

Conveyor belt rubber also gives them the right visual weight. Thongs are floppy, and a rigid fibreglass pair would read as plastic; heavy rubber sheet holds a curve that looks like the real thing has been worn in.

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PRACTICAL

Plan your stop

WHAT TO EXPECT

Located at the Calen Hotel rather than on the highway itself, making this a straightforward stop with a clear business destination.

ACCESS

Navigate to Calen Hotel at 16 McIntyre Street and use lawful hotel/customer parking; do not stop on the Bruce Highway.

COMMUNITY

Visitor Log

WHAT'S NEXT

Find another Big Thing nearby

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Current

The Big Platypus – Broken River

Broken River / Eungella, Queensland

A larger-than-life platypus sculpture at Broken River in Eungella National Park, created as a community-funded visitor landmark celebrating the area’s famous wild platypus population.

Roadside giants

41 km away

✓ Recommended arrival recorded

TRANSPARENCY

Sources & research

ABC Tropical North – Big Thongs unveiled

ABC News · recorded 2026-08-22

Primary reporting from the 2021 unveiling; records 2.5 m height, four-month build, creator Lionel Knott and conveyor-belt rubber construction.

News

Calen Hotel current listing

Calen Hotel / FindGlocal · recorded 2026-08-22

Current June 2026 business material explicitly says visitors should take a selfie with the Big Thongs.

Community

What we're still checking

The exact sculpture pin has not yet been field/map verified.

Open-licence image search completed 24 August 2026. No defensible reusable image with file-level commercial-use provenance was verified in the completed Commons, government/open-licence and archival/open-collection sweep.

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