Stanton

July is midwinter at Stanton and with it comes not snow and some sort of damp purgatory, but enticing crisp clear mornings brought about after the sun has finished burning off the fog.

The trees tell you it is winter though and the fires are going day and night, the tell tale spirals of smoke from chimneys, and the art work that goes into stacking firewood.

Firewood is never just stacked, it is sculpted, particularly in Maydena.

Winter has the most blissful pasttime to be enjoyed by all. Sleeping. The uninterrupted, sound sleeping to be done in a warm doona-laden bed is just magic, particularly if it is windy and raining outside. If sleep does not come easy then try an old house in winter.

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It is cold. Snow is on the hills down to the 600 metre level and fog wraps itself around hollow and contour alike.

Sometimes the cold fog just gives it to you, nature in the face, take it or leave it. This is winter doing what it does best.

Winter in Tasmania is about looks. The look tells you what you may be in for and what you will get if it does become real. The night, before it snows seems warmer than the day before, mist swirling close to the ground telling all what is going to happen on the morrow.

Weather in Tasmania is different than that on the North Island. It is a constantly changing entity season by season, day by day, guiding a way of life and such a life is spent observing weather that changes hour by hour.

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Curiously May arrives at Stanton’s door looking a lot like spring, only drier. Many of Spring’s jobs can be attempted now and two of these on the Stanton work calendar have been done on time. The chicken shed is still a construction site but developing slowly.

The orchard has been pruned the stems now bare and prickly like a school boys haircut. The resultant prunings collected, heaped and burnt in a larger field fire adding to a simple yet exhilirating country pleasure, that of the open air, cold night bonfire under the stars.

May at Stanton starts always with an illumination of the pine trees on the first day of May. Each year a bonfire worthy into a Lord of the Rings script is constructed and lit to highlight a certain person’s pagan birthday inclinations and to bring friends together with a red wine in a rural atmosphere.
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Autumn at Stanton seems to start when the clocks go back to their right time and then the light changes again to more sombre shades. It is still dark when shift workers start the 7am shift.

Stanton does not have to do the early starts anymore, it can wait for another hour. The clouds now try and do the grey linen look but Autumn is a magic time of the year at Stanton … things are changing.

There is a discreet tussle between wanting to stay indoors a little longer or choosing to venture forth to the golden hues outside. Mind and body are active now.
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March at Stanton is quiet, warm and moving slowly along a known path. the weeks between the hot month of February and the cooling Autumn of April go quickly without much to report.

Grass is growing prolifically everywhere and most things around the house have a green tinge it seems. Sam’s bones do as well, the one or two he remembers and thus finds while on a tour of the garden go down a treat.

Growing new grass, dead heading roses, and planting bulbs are the jobs to do but the main activity at Stanton is doing nothing at all for the time being as winter has been thought about already.
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February at Stanton is hot with drying winds coming from the North West. The ground is dry and brown though the black faced sheep standing in the field on every early morn appreciate the dewey coolness. later they seem to sit and talk under the low Macrocarpa boughs blending in with the shadows- Stantons silent sentinels.

Sam is under the potato vine doing the same thing. he lost his eye to sun cancer and he is not a silly pooch. Pete must be having a day off but I seem to hear him telling me to go to the orchard and pick up the fallen fruit so the orchard is hygenic. he would probably tell me to water the trees deeply, if he were here so I will do the right thing. The apple trees flourish as a green belt in an ocean of khaki and it is easy to be drawn towards the trees as a sort of curious fruit squeezer(nectarines beware)

Stanton has a goodly variety of apples by the way. the problem is no one here knows much about the subject so a bucket of assorteds went to the coffee shop for some local opinions. We at Stanton have been Baristas at the local coffee shop for years now and do we know our beans… but not our apples it seems.
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It is mid-January at Stanton and a pleasant 25 degrees . at 11:30am. A slight breeze is rustling the trees and nothing much is moving apart from dozens of butterflies zipping around the post and rail fence a few metres from the house. Occasionally a duck splashes on the bottom dam but it is only hal way interested in swimming today.

Sam is asleep under his potato vine bush while his former life interest — black-faced sheep hunker down under a huge Macrocarpa tree, but this is not Footrot Flats. Even the local tiger snake is not interested in playing. It is not preciously hot and curiously the sun does beckon one to venture forth from the shade, fronds from the willow slapping at face and ears urging a quicker departure.

The only sounds heard are a tractor cutting grass in a nearby paddock and birdsong coming from the Macrocarpa line not in opposition to each other, just there. The roses are out and so are the dandelions.
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We’ve planned and we’ve plotted, we’ve dusted and swept,
We’ve weeded and painted until we’ve all wept.

May your Christmas be joyful with large laden reindeer,
And hopefully Stanton might see you all next year.

The very best wishes for Christmas and the New Year from all at Stanton

Okay, so this year we’re going to both give up our jobs, sell our house in Brisbane, move to Tasmania, buy a big house in the country, spend a lot of money renovating it to become a B&B, and then we’ll think about next year. And so we came to Stanton.

We are not strangers to Tasmania, indeed we moved here directly after marrying in December 1980, and spent five happy years in Hobart, with Mark attending the University of Tasmania.

The mid 80s saw us having to reluctantly leave for employment, like so many young Tasmanians, but with a quiet vow in my heart to return. I didn’t forget that vow, but it’s strange how fate creeps up on one, and says, “Alright, you asked for it, here it is.” Kapow!

City life and its attendant stresses had wreaked havoc on our sanity and health, so a move was certainly on the cards. It wasn’t until I visited my very first psychic, Jenny Roach, in Brisbane in early 2003, that it became clear the way it might be.

“So when are you moving to Tasmania?” “I’m not really sure we’re going.” “Of course you are. Here, let me show you on a map.” And with that, she drew a quick map, pointed out where New Norfolk lay, then proceeded to draw a rough sketch of Stanton.

I recognised the house from an internet picture I had seen, but discarded since wonderful pictures plus “Price on Application” usually translate as unaffordable in my book.

Jenny insisted that the house would be ours if I came down, made an offer, and proceeded to tell me the circumstances around which the previous owners were selling, and further, the ease with which we would sell our home in Brisbane and for how much.

I still don’t know if the psychic fraternity/sorority is usually as uncannily accurate as Jenny, or whether I was led to her, but her foresight has been exact in every way. Probably the best thing she said was, “It’s going to make a great B&B!”

At which my mouth dropped open , since I hadn’t mentioned that possibility, or indeed Tasmania, to her at all. After expressing some reservations as to whether the whole idea would work. having worked with people and in hospitality, but never to this extent, she simply smiled and said, “Build it, and they will come. People will be drawn to Stanton and to you, to the point where it will become a special place to many people, who will return time and again. The house will enjoy the company and the energy, and you will both be the happiest you will ever be.”

That’s enough for me. She has been right on every count.

Stanton bed and breakfast library (pic to come)

Little did we realise that we would tap into such a common vein of desire as when we decided to turn what had been a little bedroom into our library!

Without exception, this room inspires strong responses, ranging from a bemused “Where do I start?” to “That chair is mine!” to “You mean you trust people with your babies?!” to “That’s it! I’m never leaving!”

Without fail, when guests are in the house, the single glass next to the port decanter in this room is used, and I smile when returning books from their bedside sojourn to their usual home.

Thirty years of collecting is reflected in the wide variety of topics represented on the shelves, and we are comfortable in guaranteeing that everyone will find something of interest here.