Olive
Hill Farm
Health Retreat
Margaret
River, Western Australia
Drawn back to Australia for the optimistic yet laid back approach to life, Benji and Helen embraced the opportunity to emigrate to Australia from Scotland. It was during their trip in November 2006 that they found and fell in love with Olive Hill Farm in Margaret River.
Benji and Helen both grew up on farms in the Scottish Borders of the U. K.. They met through the Pony Club and went on to raise money for the MacMillan Nurse Cancer Research fund, as members of the “trick ride”. This led on to them both being selected for the British Vaulting Team, when they competed at the World Equestrian Games in Sweden, 1990.
Benji pursued his love of farming by studying Agriculture. During this time, he also sailed across the Atlantic as a crew member for a yacht delivery, before returning to farming and shearing sheep. Benji is very enthusiastic and loves team sports and any opportunity to chase after a ball. He is also musically talented with his bagpipes, which accompany him on the majority of his travels.
Helen travelled to Idaho, U.S.A. as an exchange student for a year and returned to Edinburgh University, where she graduated as a vet in 1998. She has loved working (and travelling) in mixed practice for over 10 years and has experienced numerous “character building” situations, with people and their 4 legged friends! Having spent many years riding, swimming and playing the piano, she has more recently developed her photography interests.
Benji and Helen have travelled and worked extensively throughout the U. K., N.Z., Australia, U.S.A. and Africa both individually and since 2002, as a couple. They also share a love for a wide variety of sports including skiing, sailing and more recently polocrosse, as well as relaxing at home with a passion for cooking, good company and an appreciation of the simple things in life.
Following their marriage in February 2006 they then purchased Olive Hill Farm in April 2007, which opened up many new avenues. As well as the health retreat and olive oil production at Olive Hill, Benji and Helen have also learned and developed an extensive knowledge in the field of life coaching. Like most people, they have had plenty of ups and downs in their own lives. Having been shown the skills to identify and clear their “blockages”, their self esteem, marriage and lives have soared to a whole new level!
Benji and Helen share the view with Confident Future Success Strategies that the best investment you can make is in personal development. When you have clarity about what you want AND a positive, persistent and proactive attitude, then you can create the lifestyle you want.
History of the cottage and farm since 1920
(all images courtesy of the Battye Library)
Images clockwise:1- promotional poster for group settlement; 2 - house proud settlers 1920s;3 early tractor; 4 - neat as a pin, 1920s; 5- cleared by ringbark and fire; 6 - auguring timber to insert explosives.Built in 1922 as part of the ill-fated Group Settlement Scheme (see link for a fascinating insight) the first owner was one William Sharpe, and his family from Settlement Group 84, on Sussex Location 2275, Airdale.
The original title encompassed both sides of the road (non-existent then), and the farm operated as a dairy/piggery/orchard (as time went on even supplying the Cottees factory with passionfruit for the famous Western Australian “Passiona” soft drink).
The settlers cottages provided for group and soldier settlers were designed in England, and modelled on the basic "workers cottage". They were made locally, constructed from rough pit sawn jarrah and many were provided by the Adelaide Timber Co, whose mill site and village still stands at Witchcliffe.
They consisted of four basic rooms, much like the plan below, with external walls of rough sawn "green" (unseasoned) jarrah, unlined inside, with an iron roof, front verandah and two pre-made iron chimneys for the kitchen and front room. (see images)
The floorboards were the greatest glory, being of fine wide jarrah boards taken from the forest giants that we see no more.
Electric power didn’t become available to the area until the 1960s, and when it did the owners moved the cottage from its original site on the southeast paddock where the cypresses can be seen, to its present location. Cheaper to shift the cottage on a jinker, than take the power the 2 km down the paddock. With the much higher rainfall of those days, apparently it was also advantageous to be on this side of the creek as the children frequently had to miss school when the creek was in flood.
In the 1970s, many changes came to the property; to take advantage of the generous government incentives of the day most of the land was cleared, it had been 60% bush until then, and the house was extended to approximately twice its original size by the device of adding a second settlement house onto the back. It also had the luxury of its first indoor bathroom and walls were lined, with any materials available.
The dairy was closed and demolished (it was on the property opposite), the sheep shearing shed next door to the house was built, and the garden immediately behind, where the mulberry tree flourishes, was converted to sheep yards.The garden shrank to a pocket-handkerchief plot at the front, and the whole property became sheep grazing with potatoes and other vegetables on the river paddocks.
By 1994 when the previous owners bought the property (minus the land on the road opposite) the farm was owned by absentee investors, the land leased for dairy run-off, (raising steers) and the cottage rented and semi-derelict after a number of house fires, and a tree falling on the roof.
In spite of the neglect the little house had suffered, they could see the integrity of the wonderful original jarrah and the essential comfort and great spirit it conveyed, so they re-wired, re-plumbed, re-lined, re-doored, re-painted and installed rainwater tanks and connected water. Then they fenced, planted, gardened, and planted some more.
In 1996 they planted the first of the olive trees, which now occupy 15 acres of the farm. These are grown without the use of fertilizers or pesticides. The first crop was handpicked in April 2000, and the annual harvest is in April or May. The olives are pressed locally, and bottled and labelled here.
