Building in Trentham

We should return to almost three years ago to explain why we now live in rural Victoria. In 2014 we returned on our sixth visit to France. Our good friends Carol and Michael asked if we could house sit and look after the tribe of cats that Carol had adopted. We knew others along with C & M that were escapees to rural France in the Loire. After we house sat, C & M kindly offered their cottage for us to experience life in rural France. It was this experience that gave us the confidence to move from fast moving Melbourne to where we live now in tranquil Trentham. We are only 1 hour from one of our sons in Melbourne. The other is in Belgium so maybe we will visit next year. (another opportunity to pop back to the Loire to renew friendships maybe).

After we sold our house in Mentone, the building process in Trentham started taking place. We rented for 12 months in the larger town of Kyneton (20 kms away from Trentham) and finally moved into our new Trentham home just prior to Christmas. The process of making the house into a home has been amazingly quick as we both love being here - the house, the village, the people and the relaxed lifestyle add to the experience.

So, lets do a little recap on the early building period which in actual building took 6 months. With the administration we had a further 6 months added so in full, it took 12 months from signing contracts to moving in.

The following photos with captions give you an insight to the process.

First of all, we had the block cleared where the trees were in the way of the house footprint however we retained some marvellous trees. We also had this wonderful hedge at the front of the block which was trimmed.

Then the concrete slab was poured - would you believe on the day it snowed!!!

Once the concrete slab cured, the frame went up.

The roof then went on making it more pleasant for the bricklayers and plasterers to weave their magic.

With the plastering coming to completion, Sue's kitchen was starting to take form.

Appliances installed and she started to become excited. 

Stone benches and cabinets created more excitement.

Next after the painters completed their tasks, the flooring went in.
We had both carpet and bamboo floating floorboards fitted.

The open plan kitchen, dining and family area was now finished and we started thinking about decoration.

Rather than documenting the full process in on post, we'll save some for the next few blogs. We must say though after 3 months living in Trentham, it's all and more than we hoped for.

Petanque in Trentham

Thursday is Petanque day in the Trentham Town Square. Our numbers are growing as you can see by the amount of balls we have!!!! I believe we had about 12 Trenthamite Pertanquers with a few onlookers.

A few of us really immersed ourselves into the French flavour today by riding our VeloSolex bikes to the square this morning. 

The town square is just across from the local watering hole - the Cosmopolitan Hotel.

The Cosmo in recent years has been renovated after many years of being out of service due to a fire that started in the kitchen. Today it is very popular with both tourists and locals.

Above are three of our players contemplating  the situation. They look resplendent in their "where's Wally" shirts while "Farmer John" adjudicates the scoring.

Seriously though, we don't take ourselves very seriously and its a chance for us to get together and share a few laughs. With five cafes in town we tend to rotate around them for our after game coffee.

6.30 am in Trentham

It was a mild 19 degree morning in Trentham this morning at 6.30 am.

Not bad for an autumn morning - not sure how I'll cope mid-winter when we get snow and below freezing mornings.

We have a small local group of cyclists in Trentham that I've met up with. We leave from the local Post Office corner. This morning's ride was a quick 35 km circuit that brought us back to our local cafe for coffee. Trentham is an amazing community. At 6.30 am I heard noises from our Post Office. Lizzy who runs the PO was at work sorting the morning mail. At 8.00 am when we were having coffee, she did a delivery to the owner Mel of Chaplin's Cafe - how is that for service?

While enjoying our cuppa, we had Barry, David, Greg, Tony all stopped by for a chat.

Geeez, I love this life here.

BTW, I had to go to the Melbourne CBD for a lunch with friends - so many people - so many contrasts. Suits walk briskly be homeless sitting on the side walk. It was great to meet up with my city mates for lunch but I was relieved to get back on the train to Trentham.

This building was once one of the many hotels in Trentham when gold and timber brought prosperity to Trentham. Today it is an antique shop.
Today there are two hotels - one is only open from Thursday to Sunday.

Tales of Trentham begin

It's been some time that "Our Country Life" has had regular postings. This was partially due to not having internet access since moving to Trentham late December. Now that we are pretty much settled in our new house, its starting to feel like home. The process took a full twelve months with both the administration and building.

We are often asked how we chose Trentham as our place of retirement - the answer was always, "We didn't - it chose us." It must have been 2 or 3 years ago we decided to spruce up our Mentone home to sell and move from "Melbourne - Our Home by the Bay" (remember our past blog title?)
We considered many places for retirement - Launceston, Tasmania was one that attracted us. Then there was Warrnambool on the far west coast of Victoria. Both were too far from family and friends.
Then we started looking at towns no more that 1.5 hours drive from the Melbourne CBD.

Trentham Falls in early winter

During this stage, I had transitioned to a 4 day week and on my Fridays off, we would search out houses within that time frame from Melbourne. Strangely we kept driving through Trentham. We would stop for lunch or for a late afternoon glass of bubbles. We had friends who lived here so we would occasionally pop in to say hello.

One sunny spring afternoon while sitting outside our favourite wine bar in Trentham, a local couple pulled up in their C3 Citroen and being a Citroen tragic I struck up a conversation after which they joined us for a drink. Anyway after they left, we looked at each other and agreed that we both could live here. That's when house hunting became serious. A block of land came on the market and we fell in love with the existing trees, the size of the block (not too big, yet not too small) and the fact that it had crown land behind it which also had a small creek.

Trentham Falls in mid winter when the rains came.

Trent Creek running in mid winter is at the far end of the reserve behind our block. It feeds into the Coliban River which flows over the Trentham Falls.

The thought of building a modern home to suit the climatic conditions of Victoria's Central Highlands seemed an obvious choice. We'll explain more on subsequent posts.

So! Our Country Life now changes to TRENTHAM TALES. It will bring you stories of the local history, the surrounding scenery, eating and drinking establishments, festivals and just the local lifestyle of this small and magical village of Trentham.

Leon and Sue

Still not back yet

We have been without Internet access for the last eight weeks. This post is thru our mobile phone to say - yes, we are still here and living very happily in our new home. If we could get these bloody Internet people to do their job well, we would be bringing you many exciting posts. Ah well, we will be back soon - we hope!!!!!