I don’t think I was fully prepared for what lay ahead when I married a bloke who grew up on a sheep station south east of Carnarvon. I was from the ‘country’, Geraldton is 5 hours from Perth by car. We had a Boans, Woolworths and Hungry Jacks up near Northgate Shopping Centre. We travelled to Perth for sporting competitions…we were the ‘country kids’.
I visited Ella Valla station on a few occasions with Derek in our ‘courting days’, with our first born and then again when pregnant with our second. Our first dog ‘Mack’ is buried on the station and Derek has a glass jar full of red dirt in prime position in his shed. The trip up to grab the dirt was a special trip for him, a sad farewell, the Station had been sold.
Growing up on Ella Valla, Derek and his family only had one radio station – ABC AM radio. When that radio station came calling to talk about Victoria Park, he was more than happy to combine his passion for AM radio and his passion for Vic Park in one go.
Here’s Derek’s interview for ‘Afternoons with Gillian O’Shaughnessy’ on 720 ABC.
