Home for Bec and I is Maffra, a small town in regional Victoria. I was born here and have lived here for 51 years. Bec was born in Melbourne, spent some time in Western Australia, and ended up in the small towns around Maffra as a kid. We’ve been here ever since. The population sits at around 8,000 people, dead centre in the middle of a dairy farming region that’s slowly shrinking.
Maffra — Small Town Australia
What was once a thriving industry supporting local businesses is slowly dying as costs rise and multi-national companies put the almighty dollar before the local community.
Maffra is probably best known for its meat pies and the football team, The Maffra Eagles. Our two kids grew up here. One, Willow, is now living her best life in China. The other, Marley, still attends the same local high school Bec and I went to as teenagers — and no, we did not meet in high school.
It’s not an exciting town by any stretch. No cinema, no bowling alley, not much to do unless you’re into sport. The beach is about 45 minutes away, the mountains about the same. Melbourne is 222 kilometres straight down the Princes Highway.
Like a lot of small towns, Maffra is slowly going the way of nowhere — nothing for young people to do, crime on the rise, houses and cars getting broken into. People here work, go home, wake up and do it all over again. Most are happy with that.
The older I get, the less happy I am with that.
Once you hit 50, something shifts. You start doing the maths. Fewer years ahead than behind. You look around at the life you’ve built and you ask yourself whether this is really it. For me, Maffra has always been the answer to that question. Not in a bitter way — it’s my home, it’s where Bec and I got married and raised our kids, and it always will be. But it’s also always been the thing that made me want more.
I have never wanted Maffra to be my whole story. I always believed there was more to life than this, and travel has proven that right every single time we’ve left.
The world looks completely different once you’ve actually been in it. The cities of Asia that feel alive in marketplaces. Old town squares where you’re literally standing in history. Watching the sun go down over the ocean with a drink in your hand with nowhere you need to be tomorrow.
The best version of our lives is when we are travelling — free from the 9-5, free from the arguments about whose turn it is to fold the washing and who left the mess in the kitchen. Free from the smallness of it all.
Maffra will always be home. But it doesn’t have to be everything.
We’ve been giving straight-up travel advice for midlife couples since our journey began 26 years ago. Take a look at the story behind Street Eats & Window Seats.
