Behind bars at the Corrective Services NSW Museum

It's not every day you embark on a tour where your guide is a serving prisoner. In fact, according to Andrew Weglarz, manager of Cooma's little-known treasure trove of jail memorabilia, "we are the only museum in the world in which prisoners have this kind of contact with the public".

Will my guide resemble one of those hardened crims you see on TV shows; a heavily-tattooed grunting brute with cracked teeth? And what's more, I wonder what he did to be locked up in the first place?

"Hopefully not for pick-pocketing tourists," quips my mate Dave who I've bought along for moral support.

According to Andrew, "the guides are risk-assessed coming to the end of their sentence", but it's human nature to wonder what led to their incarceration, isn't it?

While fumbling a ball and chain (they are heavier than you think) and gawking at other relics from our convict era, suddenly a well-groomed, middle-aged man in green trousers and a fluoro vest approaches us.

"Good afternoon, my name is Scott* and I'm your guide today," he politely announces.

Dave and I glance at each other, and reassuringly nod at each other. Phew, he seems "normal" enough.

It's also soon clear that Scott is well-versed in the content of the tour because before I get a chance to ask him the reason for his imprisonment, he starts his well-rehearsed spiel on all manner of exhibits, from guard batons and bayonets to a bona-fide hangman's noose to.

He knows his material backwards. And why wouldn't you? "If this was part of your rehabilitation, would you rather do this or clean toilets?" he asks us.

Pointing back at the ball and chain, Scott reveals, "most people think they were just to stop convicts from running away, but it was also to ensure if the ship sank they wouldn't be able to escape, they'd drown instead". Lovely.

The extraordinary extent of the museum's collection is just as much a pleasant surprise as Scott's obvious enthusiasm, and just when you think you've seen it all, another door leads you into a room crammed with even more prisoner paraphernalia.

He stops at a couple of death masks of bushrangers including of the notorious Captain Moonlite who was hanged in Darlinghurst Gaol in 1887.

"Up until the 1950s, it was believed that criminals were born bad people and the pseudoscience of phrenology was used to try and 'prove' it by studying the lumps and bumps on their heads, but that so-called science has since been discredited and we now know that criminals have faces just like anyone else," he laughs, rubbing his own face.

Scott also has an uncanny ability to summarise a complex story much more succinctly than professional guides you'll find in many other museums. At the visual exposé on Eugene Falleni, Sydney's infamous cross-dressing murderer of the early 1900s, he states: "Born a woman but dressed as a man, he butchered one of his two wives and killed someone else with rat poison. He got seven years in Long Bay [jail] and after being let out early in 1938, was hit by a car in Sydney and died. RIP Eugene".

His in-depth knowledge of the comprehensive contraband display, which is ironically secured behind bars, is perhaps a bit too impressive for an inmate. If he didn't know all the tricks before being a guide here, he certainly would now.

"These aren't props, these are the real deal," he explains. "All these items were confiscated from prisoners serving time in NSW prisons".

"One guy even kept a knife in his table tennis paddle," he explains pointing to the secret compartment carved in the handle. "He was jail champion for many years, no one would dare beat him". I bet.

However, Scott's familiarity on seized contraband pales into insignificance when compared to his know-how of successful escape techniques, including an ingenious hidey-hole crafted inside a packing container "that a couple of crims used to escape from the maximum security section at Lithgow [jail] in 1994".

This modern-day Trojan Horse is a prime example of the level of sophistication and cunning some inmates resort to in pursuit of freedom.

Without doubt, the pièce de résistance in the escape gallery are the metal bars that Russell 'Mad Dog' Cox squeezed through to make his escape from Long Bay jail's exercise yard in 1977.

"For months he'd do chin-ups and file away at the bars with a smuggled hacksaw, a bit each time," explains Scott. "He realised he had to lose weight to fit through so went on a crash diet and no one knew why until one day after asking a prison guard if he could return to the yard to pick up his shoes, he squeezed through the bars, scaled two barbed-wire fences and remained on the run for 14 years."

Next stop are a number of cells, including a portable 19th century cell, a heavily padded one from Wagga Wagga and a replica cell from the adjoining Cooma Correctional Centre.

"Oh, I've been waiting to do this for ages," quips my mate Dave as with almost too much glee, he slams the cell door in my face.

Thankfully, Dave eventually lets me out to appreciate the rest of Scott's tour, a truly unique one-hour experience which won't only change your perception of inmates, but which is also proving to be a successful step in their rehabilitation. A win for all.

* Not his real name

NSW State Correctional Museum: 1 Vagg St, Cooma. Open Mon - Sat, 8.30am - 3.15pm. Definitely worth the 90-minute drive from most Canberra suburbs. Ph: (02) 6452 5974. Entry by gold coin donation.

Inmate tours: Free after entry. If you want to snare a spot on one of these truly unique experiences, which run on demand rather than to a specific schedule, make sure you arrive before 1.30pm.

The shop: The diverse range of handiwork made by inmates in the jail's craft workshop, is available for sale at the museum shop. A proportion of these sales goes to the inmate's jail bank accounts which, depending on their individual circumstances can be used to purchase prison luxuries like two-minute noodles, Tim Tam biscuits or to hire a TV. According to my guide, "some also save it to put towards rent and car registration for when they are released".

Look out for: A dome-like contraption on an open deck overlooking the sandstone walls of Cooma Correctional Centre. These are the 180-year-old gallows from Bathurst jail which were used to end the lives of 34 prisoners. Somewhat morbidly, visitors to the museum can still pull the lever that opens the trapdoor. If you look closely you can even see the burn marks on the side of the gallows - the result of the fires during the Bathurst jail riots of 1974.

Did You Know? Lithgow jail was purposefully designed in the shape of a coffin. And the jail's postal address? PO Box 666, Lithgow. Talk about a morbid sense of humour.

Don't miss: The framed 1876 referee's report for prospective hangman at Sydney's Darlinghurst Gaol. It chillingly states: "Attention Sheriff, I think this man would make a first-rate executioner - he would hang anybody". Heck.

Museum revamp: Andrew Weglarz, manager of the museum, explains the recent overhaul of the exhibits has really surprised visitors. "Almost everyone leaves impressed with the extent of the collection and the way it's presented. From the macabre to the disturbing, there really is something for everyone."

Clue: Near both Owen and Clarrie

Degree of difficulty: Easy - Medium

Congratulations to Dan Hiew of Weetangera who was the first reader to correctly identify last week's photo sent in by Rose Higgins of Kambah as one of several fairy houses on the slopes of Mount Stromlo Forest Park.

"I first saw them early this year, whilst riding up this trail to the top of Mt Stromlo", reports Dan. "There are several of them all the way up the mountain, all different colours, designs and themes."

Dan just beat several other observant mountain bikers, including Tim Altamore of Macquarie, to the prize.

As to who created the clutch of fairy houses? They are the creative handiwork of Ride Technics, a group of Canberra-based mountain bike skills coaches, "as a way to motivate the kids and make adults smile while pedalling up the mountain".

Going by the number of emails about youngsters stopping to admire the fairy houses, it seems to be working a treat.

On a recent weekend walk in Namadgi National Park from Honeysuckle Creek up towards Booroomba Rocks, Sarah Ryan of Watson photographed this shadow.

"At first glance I thought it was a small bird. But of course, there was no bird there, the shape was actually created by the shadow of a number of leaves," reports Sarah.