Leongatha, Looking East 1906 – image from Wikipedia.
Trapped in the suburbs can be a bit of a nightmare for an individual like myself – rural born-and-bred, love the country, miss the country, don’t enjoy hectic lifestyles… My creativity tends to become starved, too, when I want to paint or draw something beautiful, yet all I see out my window is houses, roads, the “garden” (weeds) of our rented home, and innumerable cables – electricity lines, phone lines, cable tv lines, tv aerials… How much tv do we need, anyway?
For the first 23 years of my life I lived in the little piece of Australia known as Gippsland. A beautiful place, it is marked by clean beaches, mountainous country, and tracts of temperate rainforest.
Map of the Gippsland region, from http://www.gippslandtourism.com.au/Maps/.
My particular hometown is in the South Gippsland region, in Leongatha; though I also spent a few years in Churchill (near Morwell). These days I’m far far away, and how sad it is!
I’m regularly telling people that they should check out South Gippsland.
Conversations have ranged from:
(1)
“We’re thinking of getting out of here and moving to the country. We just don’t know where to go.”
“South Gippsland.”
“You like it there?”
“I love that place! I just didn’t know how much I’d taken it for granted until I moved away.”
(2)
“We want to go on a holiday, but we’re a bit sick of going to the same places. You know anywhere with a nice beach?”
“Ah, you’ll want Inverloch (near Wonthaggi). It’s clean, sunny, and has a variety of beaches. I used to go there all the time when I was young. We were there most weekends during our childhood summers.”
(3)
“You know anywhere we can go for art / craft / gourmet food / food markets?” [Select most appropriate.]
“You want Gippsland. It’s farming country, so they have plenty of homegrown cheeses / foods. There’s a lot of artists down that way…”
You get the idea! I thought I’d share a few links about the Leongatha area, including tourist information, job opportunities, and historical bits and pieces. (All links believed correct at time of posting and accessed 10 April 2008.)
The Amalgamation 