Men’s Day Tour to Telopea Downs

Published on 06 September 2024

Veterans, retirees, members of Men’s Shed’s and those from multi-faith communities or diverse cultures from across Hindmarsh Shire have a unique opportunity during Seniors Month in October to participate in a free tour visiting at least three prominent properties at Telopea Downs.

The tour has been made possible through funding received from the Victorian Government’s, Department of Families, Fairness and Housing as part of the month-long Seniors Month.

On Thursday 10 October 2024, after departing Nhill at 9:00am, the bus tour will visit Bindarra Park, McBride’s Woolshed and Oasis Olives. Transport to Nhill will be available from Rainbow Library (departing 8:00am), Jeparit Library (departing 8:30am) and Dimboola Library (departing 8:30am).

Registrations are essential for the tour and places can be booked by emailing info@hindmarsh.vic.gov.au or calling into any of Council’s Customer Service Centres on (03) 5391 4444. As the tour will be free of charge and seats will be limited, places will only be available to residents of Hindmarsh Shire. A wait list will be established if the tour is fully booked.

Bindarra Park is the home of Darryl Dodson’s racehorse training facility and participants will be able to view horses being trained and discuss the training procedures with Darryl. Since starting his career in the early 1990’s Darryl has had over 5,500 starts for more than 660 wins across Victoria, South Australia and the Northern Territory.

Following the visit to Bindarra Park the tour will proceed to McBride’s Woolshed.

The McBride Group purchased the 47,677-hectare aggregation in September 2018. Now, the property will shear more than 100,000 sheep in 2024 in their recently constructed 12 stand shearing shed. Shearing may not be underway during the visit, but attendees will still be able to view the facility. The property also produces beef, wheat, barley, lupins, beans, canola and operates an Angus beef stud.

A catered lunch will be provided as part of the tour, held at the Telopea Downs Hall or at McBride’s Woolshed depending on the weather.

Oasis Olives is family owned and operated by Symington family with the business based in Kialla, Victoria. Oasis Olives purchased Olivaylle Estate, Telopea Downs in late 2021.  

Oasis Olives has grown exponentially and now has five farms in Australia. The Telopea Downs site is the largest farm with over 900 hectares, 70 hectares of which has mature trees in full production. Oasis Olives is currently doubling overall plant numbers which will see trees planted on 320 hectares. 

Bottling is no longer carried out on site, but a new mill has just been installed that will be capable of processing 10 tonne of fruit per hour. The facility can store 330,000 litres of oil which will expand as trees mature and yields increase.

It is planned that all participants will be returned to their starting destinations by approximately 5:00pm.

For more information or if you have any questions, please contact our Community Wellbeing Team on (03) 5391 4444 or email info@hindmarsh.vic.gov.au.

Monica Revell
Chief Executive Officer