Why Orange NSW is becoming a magnet for tree changers

Food writer Sophie Hansen moved to Orange for love, but her tree change resulted in an unexpected career pivot

“My whole life turned upside down when I met Tim in 2005. I was Sydney born and bred and very happily working in publishing but when I got engaged to a man whose business was based on a farm near Orange, I knew it was me who was going to make the move. I knew enough about the burgeoning food and wine scene to understand that making a life here wouldn’t be too hard. It never occurred to me to take my job with me. I just walked into my publisher’s office and said, ‘I’m engaged and I’m moving to the country. Thanks – it’s been great.’ Today, women around Australia are doing extraordinary work from farm offices that none of us could have imagined. It’s a really exciting time for women in regional towns like Orange.

When I moved to the farm, I was keen to carve out my own space and source of income and I wanted to keep writing and telling stories. And so, my blog, Local is Lovely, was born. I plugged away at it for a few years before a publisher asked whether I’d be interested in writing a book and my career has evolved from there. Earlier this year I launched my latest book, What Can I Bring?, and I run a B&B on the farm, hosting monthly cooking classes and co-hosting a podcast called Something to Eat and Something to Read with bibliotherapist Germaine Leece.

Our family has grown, too. Tim and I have two teenagers so we’re keeping pretty busy. Many producers underwent a period of evaluation during the pandemic, and we were no different. We decided it was time for a change from farming red deer and now do Angus cattle. It’s been a big shift.

Orange has always had a reputation as a beautiful area, and I can barely turn around these days without meeting someone who’s moved here recently. I can’t blame them; we have four distinct seasons, a year-round calendar of events and interesting people in the community flying the flag for what a great lifestyle you can have here.”

“It’s an exciting time for women in regional towns like Orange”

Former rugby player Peter Mortimer and his wife, Julie, moved to Orange to give their five sons a country upbringing. He’s now the owner of Mortimers Wines.

“My wife, Julie, and I knew we wanted to raise our kids in the country. We both had an idyllic childhood in Wagga Wagga but we felt it was about an hour too far from Sydney. Mum and Dad were around the corner in Millthorpe so Orange made sense; we bought land in 1993 and moved when our eldest was 10, with our youngest arriving soon after.

I don’t know that I had any burning desire to produce my own wine in the beginning. With five boys at home, I needed an income and it made sense to use the land we’d bought.

Our goal was to grow and sell grapes to other wineries but after we saw the first bottle of chardonnay made from our grapes with another name stamped on it, Mortimers Wines was born. By 2007, our winery had grown so much that I gave up my TV job to focus on this, working alongside Julie and our son Daniel, who is the general manager.

All five of our boys moved away at some stage but then they started to come back and I think it’s proof of Orange’s pulling power. Locals will tell you our town is progressive, and we have a great range of top-notch facilities for bringing up a family; we found the schooling here to be terrific. We’ve seen tourism boom in recent years – particularly around food and wine and whenever there’s a festival nearby, whether it’s the Parkes Elvis Festival or the Bathurst 1000. You won’t find a more vibrant town in regional Australia.

Adjusting to conditions can be tough – there are times when you’re blown off your feet and times when you’re watching crickets – but we’ve got a great support network, which counts for a lot. When you’re growing a business, you need solid management behind you and over the past 25 years I’ve been a CommBank customer and had excellent business managers looking after my interests. When we expanded to add a new barrel hall and accommodation, I wasn’t sure how we were going to afford it, but they made a plan we could stick to and we haven’t looked back. Now it’s all about creating a place where we can spend quality time with our children and 11 grandchildren. That was the whole point of the move, after all.”

“Orange felt like the perfect place to raise a family”

Proud Juru/Kanaka man Gerald Power was attracted to the welcoming nature of the locals. He’s now the deputy mayor of Orange and the founder and CEO of Indigenous Cultural Adventures.

“It wasn’t cool to be Aboriginal in the 1970s and as I travelled from my home at the time in Bowen, Queensland, I encountered discrimination in some communities – until I got to Orange in 1980. Here, I found everyone welcoming. The council had a resettlement program where they were trying to attract Indigenous people to the town with housing and employment opportunities. How could I say no to creating a home somewhere so forward thinking and rooted in community? I’ve been trying to pay it forward ever since.

I’d always wanted to share our culture with visitors to Country but since I’m not Wiradjuri [the Country Orange is located in], the process was not straightforward. I had to approach Elders for permission to do tours on their behalf and they had some reservations about a Juru/Kanaka man leading them – rightfully so. Fortunately, the launch of Indigenous Cultural Adventures in 2016 came at a time when focus on First Nations history increased dramatically. The Elders couldn’t believe how much interest there was in their history, culture and customs. Eight years on, we’re offering both cultural and bush tucker tours with a team of nine. I want to keep growing and create employment opportunities for First Nations youth.

It’s crazy to think I’m the first Indigenous person to be elected to Orange City Council. I set the goal of becoming mayor in 2004 and it took 17 years to become a councillor then be voted in as deputy mayor. I was thrilled to be able to show First Nations people here that you can be successful and have a powerful voice.

The community here is vibrant, with a large population of immigrants of many faiths and strong support for asylum seekers. I’d like to see more migration and create more opportunities for young people. We’re a strong community but there’s room for improvement.”

“I’m the first Indigenous person to be elected to this council”

CommBank supports Bush Summit

Orange was one of several host towns of this annual initiative, which spotlights the challenges that regional and rural communities face. Launched in NSW in 2019, the summit aims to help develop agendas and policies that will enrich the lives of everyday Australians. To date, it has led to real, beneficial outcomes, including the establishment of a Regional Youth Taskforce to advise the government on issues affecting young people in the country.

For Mel Mooney, an agribusiness executive in Orange who works across Central West NSW, her economic and agricultural background is a valuable resource for the farmers she supports

“I’ve always lived in regional NSW. I was an agronomist on the Liverpool Plains – the state’s breadbasket – and moved to Bathurst eight years ago for my daughter to go school there. A lot of my work was helping farmers apply for finance so I went into banking and joined CommBank two years ago.

My work is mostly based in Orange, and I spend a lot of time meeting farmers who are restructuring or diversifying or whose crops are struggling and need some extra support. To farmers, an agronomist is like a doctor. My customers know I understand their business, whether that’s cropping, vineyards, livestock or vegetable production.

I love the diversity and resilience of the communities I work with. In 2022, floods affected Eugowra and Molong and through Rural Aid, five CommBank staff spent a day replacing fences on a property. I think the farmer wondered what bankers knew about fences, but we’d all grown up on farms and drove the tractor and put in new posts. By the end of the day, he was pretty impressed.”

“I love the diversity and resilience of the local communities”

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