A PAIR of mates from Sydney have snagged a unique online bargain and this past weekend have been 'packing up' their purchase ready to transport it from the Castlereagh River at Gulargambone around 500 kilometres to its new home on the picturesque Colo River.

The Anglican Church of All Saints is around 111 years old, constructed on Yoolundry Street from locally-milled cypress pine and dedicated as a church in 1911.

According to the Coonamble Shire Community-based Heritage Study (2010) 'the church is a Federation Carpenter style building typical of Anglican Churches constructed in the northwest of NSW in the early 20th century.'

It is thought to have been built to support the work of the Anglican Brotherhood of the Good Shepherd established in 1904, also known as the Bush Brothers, a group of itinerant clergy and laymen who ministered to small rural and remote communities, travelling on horseback in the early years from a base in Dubbo.

With the number of practising Anglican parishioners in Gulargambone reduced to a small handful, it has been some years since the church was last used.

The building is the responsibility of the St Barnabas Parish and was proving both costly and risky.

“The building was a real hazard due to the state it was in,” said Rector’s Warden Lois Cain.

“It had been vandalised and there was broken glass everywhere. Every single window had been smashed. As a Parish we’re responsible for it so we needed to do something to limit our liability,” she said.

"It was about to go on the market," said Lois Cain. "This fellow rang because we'd advertised the St Barnabas Sunday School building in Coonamble but applications had closed. We told him we had another building and they came up and had a look and fell in love with it."

"The Bathurst Diocese thought it would probably be easier to sell the block of land without the building," she said.

The interior of the All Saints Anglican Church in Gulargambone as team members discuss the best methods for removing thick lining boards.

Adam Blaiklock and Jeremy Sparks both work in the arts and entertainment industry but are co-owners of a block of land in the Upper Colo River area, off Putty Road, near the base of the pristine Wollemi National Park.

For the past three decades, they've been building - or rebuilding - huts, cottages and other structures on their land and sharing it with the wider community.

"We've both worked in the film industry all our lives," Mr Blaiklock said. "We've picked up so many old sets - the stables from the final scenes of Charlotte's Web, the prisoner of war water tower from Wolverine, and things from Baz Luhrman's Australia and Moulin Rouge."

"I think we're just addicted to salvaging things, and people love it."

He says their property is not permanently occupied but is "a place to visit and enjoy, not a place to live."

"It is used by a lot of theatrical and community groups," Mr Blaiklock said.

For more than 20 years they have hosted an annual 'father and kids' weekend where, away from the hustle of city life and without phone reception, parents and children can re-group with a bit of "round the fire truth-talking."

A lot of building goes on at their seven acre block and, while they weren't in the market for a church, the beautiful building was too good to resist.

"I went online looking for lining boards and the next thing I was talking to Barb from St Barnabas Anglican Church," Mr Blaiklock said.

Mr Sparks is an engineer, and brings his expertise to the task of pulling down and meticulously putting the church back together once it reaches its new home.

A team of nine people, including two father and son teams and local tradesman Colin Ryan, were working feverishly on the weekend of 7 and 8 August to carefully de-construct, label and stack every sheet of tin, board, window, frame and floorboard of the building.

Work to dismantle the All Saints Anglican Church was underway on Saturday morning.

"The idea was to put it into two shipping containers, cut into big enough panels to flatpack," Mr Blaiklock said. 

"It's not quite going to fit, so we might hire a flat bed truck from up the street here as well."

The building is 16 metres long and 6 metres wide, plus a vestibule, and the new owners were astonished to see the quality and thickness of the timber.

"It's all been put together by hand," Mr Sparks said. "There's not that many cracked boards."

"Usually the boards are 15millimetres thick, but this has 25 millimetre boards on the outside and 20 millimetre boards on the inside as lining."

The sodden ground threw up a few challenges for the group but, with some locally-hired machinery, they were making quick work of the deconstruction and hope to have all the sections packed into their containers by Friday 12 August.

By Monday morning the church was almost ready to pack into containers.

John and Lola King used to attend the church and live nearby. With their neighbours they'd been voluntary caretakers for many years, keeping the grass mown and an eye on the building.

"It's such a beautiful old church," Mrs King said. "When you cleaned it the floor came up so nice."

"Colin Ryan and the Lions Club jacked it up but there were no funds and it was too big a job for the Lions Club to take on."

"My biggest fear was that it was going to get burnt down," she said.

"When Col told me last week it was sold and was going to be put back exactly as it is I thought how lovely."

"It's sad its being pulled down but if its going to be used again its good. Really it's been an important part of the town."

Her husband agrees.

"It's better to go than be left there and burnt down," John King said. "It's a strong old building."

"It's sad to see it go but it looked like it was never going to get going again. Each year it was there it was deteriorating," he said.

Mr Blaiklock says two people have already asked to use the building as a wedding venue and that it should be ready for re-use once it is rebuilt later this year.

"We had a personal dilemma about taking an historical building but a lot of the locals seem to be relieved that it's going to be used" he said.

"We're really happy its going with a blessing and if anyone does want to visit they're more than welcome."

“I love that it’s going from the Castlereagh to the Colo,” he said.