Vic-Views - The Life & Times of Sheila & Norm

If you click on the arrows, you will be taken to different maps to show more details of where Quindalup is. 

For those who have been to Western Australia, you will be familiar with names ending in "up" - they are everywhere e.g. Yallingup, Kojinup, Dwellingup,  Nannup. The suffix "up" in the local Noongar language means meeting place - and the Noongar had lots of meeting places! We are house sitting in the small community of Quindalup which is a suburb of Dunsborough, perhaps Western Australia's most important holiday town. The name Quindalup has Aboriginal roots meaning "place of the quenda"; quenda being the Noongar word for bandicoot. During the summer school holidays, there are lots of people around, but it is not crowded in the way that Surfer's Paradise and the Gold Coast in Queensland are. There are few overseas tourists in this part of the world, compared to Queensland and other parts of the east coast. Which is fine with us, and most Sand Gropers - the name given to West Australians by other Aussies.

If you ask people, including Aussies from the Eastern States to name a city in WA other than Perth, they would struggle to name one. In some ways Sand Gropers like it this way - they don't want to have a Surfer's Paradise in their State. We have the Ningaloo Reef which is better than the Great Barrier Reef - even the New York Times thinks so. There are many other hidden treasures further north in the State - e.g. Karajini National Park, Broome, The Kimberleys, The Bungle Bungles - I could go on, but Won't.

Here in the SouthWest of WA is a little bit of paradise - the summers are endless days of sunshine, clear blue skies, turquoise ocean and some great surfing breaks. On the land, the natural vegetation is determined to be one of the world's greatest bio-diversity treasures, as well as being home to any number of plants unique to this part of the world. The south west corner of the State produces some of the best red wines and cool climate whites in all the world, The area produces a wide range of fruit, vegetables, nuts, as well as truffles deemed to be the best in the world. Add to that, the bounty from the ocean - prawns, squid, and several species of snapper. Just because there are bountiful supplies of top quality produce available locally, it doesn't mean that it is cheap! For example mangos, bananas, cherries and avocados are cheaper in Victoria BC, than they are here in the South West, although grown locally.

Based where we are in Quindalup, we are within easy reach of a fabulous coastline, hiking tracks, more vineyards than we can handle, olive farms, galleries selling some wonderful art work in a wide range of media including wood and glass, jewelry, furniture etc etc.  

Why Quindalup you ask? Friends of friends were planning a major trip to the Eastern States. They have an elderly dog that they would rather have stay in familiar surroundings than in a kennel. At a social gathering that both they and our friends attended, the subject of a house sit came up. Our good friends Barry and Daphne said  they knew of two Canadians with experience of living in Australia and house sitting in Australia, might be interested. When contacted by Daphne to see if we were interested, we took all of 30 seconds to say "Yes". The rest is history. We take Missy to the beach for about an hour every day - the highlight of her day. We have the pleasure of staying in one location for about 6 weeks. The home owners, Kate and Bill made us feel very welcome from the outset - we had one transition day where they went through all the details before they headed south to Esperance where they used to live, and then drive across the Nullarbor. We feel very fortunate to have a house sit again this year, affording us the opportunity to escape the overcast and rainy winter in Victoria while enjoying this part of Australia which was home for us from 2001 to 2010. And we get to catch up with our Aussie friends several times during our time here.