Pomeroy

Pomeroy, Rob's farm takes up 30 acres and is located about 25km inland from the town of Goulburn.

Coming off the highway, we drove along a dirt road for a while before we reached his beautiful 5 bedroom home which is positioned at the top of the hill around a gravel driveway and in the middle sits a circle of rose bushes. The house has grand proportions and was built in 1840, apparently by convict labour. There is also a low roofed, tiny and dark cellar, some might call it a dungeon, underneath the manor where the convicts were housed. There is an incomplete tunnel further below which is rumoured to have been the start of an escape route being dug out by the convicts.

We sat on the veranda drinking wine, looking out over the paddocks and vastness beyond towards the wind turbines in the distance. All along the awning the twisted limbs of an old grapevine were laden with bunches of grapes. The late evening summer sun cast a beautiful glow. Rolling hills, eucalypt trees, sheep were grazing, chickens pecking and 2 alpacas called George and Gilbert hovered near the chicken pen.

Stuart and Rebecca prepared a cheese board. Rob cooked a roast. I took red wine and a box of fairtrade chocolates.

After dinner I went back out to listen to the silence and to look up. It was a night so starry that it seemed as if there were no empty spaces in the glittering indigo sky.