A House on a Truck...

A long time between posts! I can't believe that the last time I was here was June and now tomorrow is September. But something tells me that the frequency of posts is about to increase...rapidly!

On Friday we were up early and on our way to Toowoomba for a meeting at Transtate Homes. How did this come about? A few weeks ago we met with Dad to discuss our newly developed house plan. However, he let us know that it really wasn't feasible for him to build the house. This was unfortunate, but led us to thinking back to our original idea. Transtate Homes build completed homes on their site in Toowoomba and then ship them out to your site on the back of a truck, crane them onto footings they arrange and you are ready to move in!

We contacted the company about two weeks ago and started talking to Mark, the friendly Transtate representative. He priced our first (and somewhat grandiose) plan at a somewhat grandiose price. Still cheaper than the average McMansion, but not what we needed to reach our goal of less cost than our current lifestyle. So we downscaled the plan, reduced our expectations on finishes and emailed off plan number two. This one came in at a much more respectable (and workable) figure...but this got us thinking. How low can we go?

When we first began we had the idea to build small so we went back to those thought patterns, back to our Small Houses web links and started drafting again. And the result was plan number three, emailed off to Mark and returned at a markedly reduced cost! Excellent! We thought.

At the meeting however, Mark explained that a good portion of the cost of our home (almost 10%) was due to the necessity for a police escort and associated costs. He explained that if we could manipulate our needs into a footprint of 5 metres wide and up to 17 metres long that he could use that 10% percent on a full length deck rather than handing it over to the authorities. As part of our downsizing and rethinking we had all but abandoned the possibility of a large deck. However, this reminded us that our original dreamings had indeed been that of indoor / outdoor living. Mark showed us some new plans they are working on that fit the footprint and took us for a tour of the construction yard for some more ideas.

What an excellent concept. They had about six houses on the go at different stages of finishing, all built up high on platforms ready for the trucks to come in and take them away. Mark proudly described the process which at the moment is taking approximately 8 weeks, including council approvals. Can't complain about that!

We went back to the office to discuss the nitty gritty and then left promising to get a final, that's it, yep final, plan to him soon.

We headed off to Crows Nest to meet Irene and Peter who were enjoying a day off work by coming to check out our crazy plan! We headed to the block and wandered about a bit with a measuring tape, ramming small innocent sticks into the ground as corner markers.




And a good time was had by all!

As you can see the land appears dry, however the night before there had been quite a downpour and the earth itself was very moist. More rain this week in the area, so maybe some green will come to visit soon. We popped back into town for cafe burgers and talk of houses and jobs and life as we know it, or soon will know it. Then back to the rat race for all of us.

At home again and there we were furiously clicking away manipulating walls and furniture and fixtures trying to fit what we want (on top of what we need) into the required space. And by george, I think we've got it. Click on the plan below for a larger version:
It's simple, it's tidy, it has plenty of space for Dom to whip up his culinary delights and fits to a number of principles of sustainable design, so we are happy. We have to come to a decision soon, so will send this off to Mark tomorrow for the verdict. He is keen to add a full length carport to the southern side also, to provide a parking area and increased roof area for water collection. I am in two minds about that, with a covered deck on the front and covered carport on the back, I am concerned about the house becoming dark. But we will talk to him about the use of clear roofing and / or sky lights.

So the plan? Have Mark generate a quote for us on supply of the house. Get quotes for earthworks, grey water and storage tank supply and install, composting toilet supply, grid-connect solar supply and install and connection to the grid and a fencing quote. Then to take these all to the friendly bankers and wait for them to smile and say yes!

Then the real fun will begin!

St Hilda, I presume?

So, after the joyful week of family togetherness that was our wedding celebration, we headed to the place that is ours for some time with the wilderness.

We arrived to find proof that there is in existence a wonderful rural spirit of neighbourliness, not that we would have doubted it if the question had been put to us. Our gate which has been through a number of transformations all leading towards a general state of collapse was in a state of wholeness! New wire and a wonderful new bush craft gate latch!
Then once through we saw that we had a driveway and new wonderful slashed homesite surrounding our shed!
Could this have been the work of our neighbour Tom?

As we settled into unpacking, a white ute pulled up at our gate and yes, our kindly neighbour jumped out of his ute to explain that he had fixed up our gate and as he had been out with his slasher he thought he would get the grass around our shed and usual camp site under control! The generosity of the action is really beyond words. We had a lovely chat to Tom who told us the sad news that his 'girl' - his faithful canine companion, had recently been trampled by a bull in the course of her daily work and now got about on three legs. But like a true rural trooper she was soldering on full of life. Tom let us know that his horses had been getting out on to the road via our place so he had fixed up the gate and put up a temporary fence between our blocks. With a quick discussion of our future plans he was off back to his house on the hill and we got to some serious work.

Our plan this time was to camp in the shed. So step one was to drag everything out and get busy with some sweeping!
An hour or so later we had a spiderweb and (almost) dust free shed to set up. We rearranged some of the existing furniture and got our bed set up ready to go.
Dom got to work on the next most important task, the fire pit and with some wood collection done we settled into an evening by the fire.
Both still a bit tired from recent stomach bugs we settled into bed early for what was not the most relaxing night of my life! Cold! Very, very cold! The sleeping bags and doona ensured that we were warm from above but the earth had other ideas and she pumped her coolness from the ground, through the concrete and into our air mattress, making sleep for me a destination I couldn't reach! Eventually I succumbed to exhaustion and awoke to forgive all. Morning at our place is truly the most beautiful thing you could experience. Crisp, clean and raring to go, it fills you with an energy that a sleepless night could not drain.
Our plan for the day was to track down Hilda, the church from our block. With map in hand we ventured west, heading towards Oakey on beautiful wide outback roads.
Forty minutes and few misturns later we were in Macglagan, and then out of it again! A true blink and you will miss it town, so a u-turn was required and we were back again. After a quick stop at the convenient public ablutions we trotted into the local general store for information. The shop owners were not entirely sure which of the four (!) churches in town was the original Anglican church. They told us that all church services had been amalgamated into the one venue, but gave us a good guess as to which one we were after and tickled our senses with the suggestion that the property had been on the market previously and was perhaps on the market at the moment! Dom requested a sausage roll from the hot box as compensation for their help, to be told it was in fact a gourmet beef roll! You will have to ask Dom as to the accuracy of that description...

We scampered around the corner to the church and wandered around admiring the building from the outside.
On the western end was a lovely, but dust covered, stained glass window which in my imagination-fueled reasoning had the letter H and a nun's habit as its features! We clambered onto stump camps to peek in the windows and had become convinced it must be our Hilda. Then, on a whim I reached out to try to the door handle to a rear entrance and she was unlocked!

With a little apprehension we entered to experience the serenity and power that is this building.

The original section (approximately 5 by 6 metres) is beautifully lined and retains a stunning stained glassed window, pulpit and other furnishings.
Next to this, a more recent addition we assume, is a grand hall with side room.
In the midst of some snooping I wandered into another side room of the original building to find piled in the corner a stack of paperwork and to our great joy laying there on top was the most recent registration of a business certificate for St Hildas Anglican Church! Confirmation that we had found her! Laying in the pile were various documents, original account books, orders of service and prayer books all stamped with the St Hildas stamp. Interestingly there was also a half bottle of good quality scotch whiskey, standing abandoned. We took as many photos as possible, from as many angles, to ensure we didn't forget her presence. Somewhat reluctantly, we said good bye to our girl and drove home (the long way, thanks to a wrong turn brought on by BJ deciding to regurgitate his lunch of grass in the back seat!)

We stopped in at Crow's Nest to restock and stumbled onto the second hand store, which I had originally thought to be a bric or brac outlet, only to find that is has a 'hardware' wing complete with original range ovens! Definitely a place to visit again in the near future.

Back to the block and more wood collecting in preparation for another evening. While I wiled away the hours with a good book Dom got busy working on operation build-a-bed. Not too many people can say they have slept in a bed built out of a toilet! Dom took a wall of planking down from the bush toilet and turned it (with help from our collection of water containers) into a delux raised bed!
We spent the evening rugged up (much more prepared this time) by the fire and read our books by the gentle light of our Coleman lamp, then into bed for another restless, but more rewarding, sleepwise, night.

The next morning we awoke to a general sense of dampness! A fog had rolled in overnight and our bedding and everything we touched was coated with a frosty dew. But upon emerging from the shed, once again everything was forgiven, ten fold, as we witnessed the beauty of our block under fog, with the light of a gentle sunrise drifting through the water vapour, slowly burning it away into the clarity of day.

For larger versions of any images on this page just click on them!

A delicious cooked breakfast of crumpets and a casual pack up saw us heading home by mid morning with thoughts of our Hilda in our minds.

A side bar - dogs. You would think that buying 2 1/2 acres of bushland would satisfy the wildest dreams of our canine children. And to some extent this is true, they love to scamper about sniffing out the wildlife and enjoy the spontaneous walks which more often then not end in Mum ducking into the Hall toilets for relief, but our dogs are in essence city dogs. Every time one of us opened a car door to retrieve an item, Gypsy was right there asking in her puppy dog eyes if perhaps we could now go home to the place with the couch and the beds and the walls? So on our second day, frustrated with her whining (despite her fancy new dog dress to keep her warm!) we simply opened a car door and let them climb in! A wonderful evening was had by all, the dogs curled up together in their little piece of civilisation imaging they were at home on their leather couch and we didn't have to worry about what they were up to! Spoilt much???!!!
In a postscript, today I spoke to the lovely Laurel, property advisor for the Brisbane Diocese of the Anglican Church. In the way of everything involving the purchase of this land she responded to my initial inquiry regarding the fate of Hilda by saying - 'Oh, I have her paperwork right here on my desk, next week I will be recommending to the church council that the site be put up for sale!'

I know, I know, this keeps happening to us. Laurel filled me in that the building was officially closed as a church about 12 months ago and closed up for good six months ago. She was intently interested in our dreams of returning her to her original location and took notes. Laurel explained the process that they would undergo to sell her and we swapped contact details. She also provided me with some excellent contacts to help with my search for information on the burial on the block. So here we have something to watch with interest, within the month our Hilda will be up for sale and the universe alone will decide her fate!

OK universe, we hear you!

This is the first blog entry that hasn't involved us piling into the car and driving a 6 hour return trip! No, we didn't scamper off to the block rather than going to work (not that we aren't tempted each and every morning!). Today, I got an envelope in the mail!

About two months ago I sent an email off into the ether in the general direction of the Anglican Church Archives in Brisbane, posing questions about our block, the church we have been told was there and the burial. I had long given up hope that I would get a response, imagining my email sitting in some dusty inbox in the depths of the archives with not even an ape-like librarian to take care of it.

Then out of the blue a few days ago I got a reply that succinctly questioned my postal address as information previously posted in response to my question had been returned, addressee unknown. I replied with my work postal address and jeepers if an envelope didn't arrive today!

It contained four pieces of paper, a lovely purple with comps slip, a two page photocopy of The Crow's Nest Parish Paper - February 1947 (notice the apostrophe in Crows!) and a printout from the Crows Nest Parish Year Book 1911-1952.

The printout reads as follows:

"1911 - Year Book indicates dedication in 1911.

1953 - CLOSED and building moved to Maclaglan (Oakey Parish History).

P&F Report 1953 - At the request of the Parish officials and after proper investigation, permission has been given for the removal of the Anduramba Church in the Parish of Crows Nest for re-erection on the new church site at Maclagan in the Parish of Oakey.

P&F Report 1975 - Permission to sell the site of the former church which was closed twenty years ago and the building removed."

The Parish Paper lists the Parish Churches including St Hilda the Abbess, Anduramba. It has this excerpt:

"ANDURAMBA: Services here have improved immensely. We look forward to having our church here filled for the monthly services very soon. Our thanks to the women folk who recently gave the church a thorough cleaning and polishing. There are whispers of other things to come at St Hilda's and as interest grows, more will be done."

Could those whispers have been - hey lets take this church away! Who knows. But by the end of my reading here we have more information. The church was called St Hilda's and we have confirmed dates of its existence and removal. And a location where it currently is!

I jumped straight on the web to see if by chance I could stumble across a photo of the church in its new home, only to meet with immense frustration. The keen eyed of you may have noticed that in the yearbook printout above the new location of the church has two distinct spellings:

Maclaglan or Maclagan

Impatient to the end I quickly typed the first option, not noticing the differences and was thwarted! Not a single google response to a town called Maclaglan. How could this be I thought? This is simply not possible! So back to the Anglican archives I went to check if they still registered a church there, was it still a town? Yes, it was, but now according to the Anglicans with an e - Maclagen. Confused much? Imagine how the people who actually live there feel!

So search for that I do - and still nothing, nada, zip! In frustration, in fury, I return to the paper and in midst curse of the tree it was pulped from, I notice the difference... one l, not two! Maclagan. So back to google and success! Hundreds, no thousands of results, mostly completely useless but confirmation that the place exists! It has a general store, public toilets (thank you Commonwealth Government Public Toilet Maps) and if I really wanted to I could buy realestate there! It turns out that Maclagan is a small town west of Crows Nest (now part of the Toowoomba Mega Council, so technically our neighbours!), just south of the Bunya Mountains in Rosalie Shire. And there are three churches there! So a new adventure has been added to our list of things to do! We will definitely have to head out to see what St Hilda looks like!

And Saint Hilda! Next step on my researching oddysey was to find out a little more about the church's namesake. I was happily reading away on Saints and Angels dot com about a strong willed young royal who commanded armies of men when my eye drifted to the top of the page and the entry:

Feastday - November 17

For the non-Flowers of the readers that is none other than Dominic's birthday! Yep! The one day of the year when all good practicing religious types venerate the life of our Hilda, is also the day we venerate the life of our Dominic!

OK Universe We Hear You Already!

This uncanny coinkydink follows on from some other strange goings on - some of you will have heard the stories, others perhaps not. There was the large black crow that overflew us on a visit to the block, circled, landed in the tallest tree of the block, grasped us in his beady eye and cawed with command. Then flew off. Ok - we thought, the crows of Crows Nest know we are here.

Then there was the trip to the bottle shop just after returning from the trip to the block where we met Tom, our neighbour. Contemplating the reds, I spied a lovely bottle with the name Church Block and in excitement called Dom over to see! Only to have pointed out by him that right next to it on the shelf was a bottle called 80 Acres. The significance I hear you asking? Only that we have bought The Old Church Block and our lovely neighbour Tom is the proud owner of eighty acres! Couldn't make it up if I tried!

So stay with us on this magical mystery tour! Who knows where we will end up!

Oh and a quick postscript - have been in contact with the council in Toowoomba and have had confirmation that no planning permission is required for dam and swale earthworks, and we will be able to live in a caravan on the block for up to one year during construction! Yay!

We have been working on home designs also and are pretty happy with our latest concoction, a longhouse-pod hybrid. Check it out below (click on it for a larger version).

Do do do do do do do do Do do do do do do do do Do do do do do
(the theme to the x-files!)

Unexpected guests for breakfast...

Another Sunday evening and feeling tired from a weekend at the block. We went for an overnight stay this weekend with Luke, Chris and Sue, adding to the lengthening list of family member visitors to our place.

Dom, Luke and I got off to a great start leaving the coast at 6:00am and with a couple of junk food stops on the way got to the block mid morning to set up camp.

We noticed the region was a lot drier than on any of our previous visits, but still dramatically beautiful. A comparison below shows the Anduramba Hall now and on our last visit:

Driving up to our gate we could see a few strange lumps scattered across the long grass. On closer inspection these turned out to be four confused cows and two curious horses! Our neighbor Tom's stock were set in for a weekend of their own on our land and had been rudely disturbed by our arrival! For a self confessed horse and cow phobic this presented a new challenge! Watched closely by the stock, we opened the gate and Luke navigated his way around bovine and horse alike to drive up to the shed.

Then came yet another comic attempt at animal wrangling as Dom and Luke confidently harahed and waved hands to move the animals back down the slope to Tom's place and the security of a fenced field. I stumbled about keeping a safe distance (100 metres or so seemed good to me!). The horses figured out the plan pretty quickly and did what they were told. The cows had different ideas (or more likely, no ideas at all!) and scattered one way and then another with their herd-brain in synch, and at no time looked to be heading for home.

Eagle eyes will spot the tiny-Dom demonstrating long-distance cow wrangling.

So in the end we settled for them being not where we wanted to pitch the tents and that was that. I should note; however, that prior to the wrangling, I did manage a minor breakthrough of touching the nose on the bolder horse ever so gently!

We set to erecting our tents, got the camp kitchen set up and the fire stocked.

After a grand tour for Luke it was time for some snoozing and relaxing and further wood gathering. By mid afternoon we headed into town to check out the annual Crows Nest show. The $12.00 entry fee was a bit steep, but who can complain when the money will go towards the community. We wandered about the pavilion checking out local art works, prize winning vegetables and even a prize winning bucket of wheat! We stopped by the poultry shed and checked out some beautiful and some strange poultry and bumped into a beautiful placid great dane who was feeling a little down after not winning the day.

There was a small sideshow alley and the required wood chopping zone.

Preparations were in place for the night's events which were going to include a lawn mower grand prix! It was decided that only a pluto pup could round off our country show experience and searched and searched to no avail! Who could have predicted, not a deep fried, batter wrapped sausage to be found. So we left the show grounds and went into town to await the arrival of Chris and Sue. Dom ducked into the local cheap shop to pick up a couple of pillows (inconveniently forgotten by us in our pre-dawn packing!) and we sat in the town square to wait.

Soaring interest rates are forcing young people to live on park benches with cheap shop pillows as their only comfort.

The undisputed rock golf champion of Crows Nest.

A phone call to Sue revealed that they would not arrive for another hour, so a quick trip out to Lake Perseverence filled the time, driving past the local model airplane club dogfighting their way above a field.


We met Chris and Sue at the local caravan park where they had rented a cabin and decided a night of fire gazing was called for, so popped into the local fisho to grab some dinner and then headed out to the block. It was well into dusk when we arrived so a quick glance about was all that our latest visitors had time for before we settled into our fish and chips and an evening of discussion and planning and wine and beer! Chris and Sue headed home, while the younger generation kept the fire company (and the beer from freezing) into the night.


After a restless, cold night we awoke to find we had unexpected guests for breakfast. The horses had returned, right to the middle of our camp and the cows were loitering around the edges!

Celebrity chef - Anduramba style.

The horses seemed very interested in our morning coffee brew and whatever it was that we were preparing for our first breakfast, so we generously gave them an apple each in the hope they would be satisfied. They weren't of course, and added to their intruding behaviours the cruel trick of walking up behind a horse-o-phobe as she sat peacefully reading in the morning sun and snuffling in her ear!

After a stern word or two, they got the point and wandered off to greener, less human dominated pastures.

Chris and Sue arrived just as the boys were launching operation 'dig-a-hole' the goal of which was to figure out the make up of our sub soil. Good news apparently, they hit clay after only a few inches and with a mini-dam water test, confirmed that our land may be suitable for the creation of a stable dam in the future.

We cooked up a delicious breakfast and enjoyed the serenity for a while.

Chris and Sue were taken on the grand tour and were satisfyingly impressed! Then it was all hands on deck to pack up camp and we returned to town to check out Salts (this has become a habit!)


We were having a lovely time wandering around the store and Chris was explaining the ins and outs of recognising a quality piece, when the grumpy shop-keep (not the usual jovial host) approached us and insinuated that we were damaging his stock. Not a pleasant experience for any customer, so we withdrew our custom and thus ended the visit on a slightly sour note. My advice now would be to peer in the window before entering and if you spot a jovial brit brandishing his hands as he entertains his customers with tales then enter, but if you see a grumpy grandpa scowling down from his lofty perch, then leave him be.

So home again now, and we are more convinced than ever that the right plan would be to convert the on-site shed (with the addition of a caravan?) for living, until we are certain of what we want in a house and where we want it. I will have to contact the council soon to determine if this will be possible. It seems the logical choice!

Note: some of the images in this post must be attributed to this photographer. As he is a Software Engineer we cannot show his face.