Communication Preferences

1 day ago

Reminder about the General Meeting to be held on Saturday 30 January 2021 upstairs (or up the lift) at the Nobbies Centre building, starting at 1.30 p.m. Photo shows the building entry. To access upstairs from inside building - just go in a few metres and turn right. Informative, Covid safe meeting plus spectacular views! If you are not a member, but are interested, come along anyway and find out what Friends of Churchill Island Society (FOCIS) are up to! Just RSVP to our secretary Leah at Sorry Covid won't allow us to meet in CI's smaller function room this time, but thanks to Phillip Island Nature Parks for making the larger Nobbies function space available for us. fternoon tea to follow. After such a long break, it would be lovely to see you there, albeit masked! ... See MoreSee Less

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2 days ago

Former FOCIS secretary Christine is currently going through some FOCIS files. Here is an interesting photo that turned up in a 2014 email from Bushcare to FOCIS, letting FOCIS know that ABC's Gardening Australia would be filming there in that year: Costa from ABC's Gardening Australia having a nice time with Bushcare's Don Wilson and (former PM) Bob Hawk, Bushcare's "Major Day Out" was also featured on GA in that season. Though not a very good quality image, it is an interesting record! FOCIS will try to track down the GA footage they filmed in CI garden. ... See MoreSee Less

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5 days ago

Holidays almost over? Don't forget to include our beautiful Churchill Island in your itinerary! Farmers' market on tomorrow, but just a tip - when exiting on to the Phillip Island Rd, it's easier to turn left and get back to Cowes via the Newhaven roundabout. It's only a few more minutes and may save you lots of time waiting to do a right hand turn, thereby holding up others wanting to exit from CI. ... See MoreSee Less

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6 days ago

What a treasure trove of Churchill Island history the CI image collection publicly available on the victoriancollections.net.au is! Here is an image of three FOCIS friends who were volunteer 'guides' about 30 years ago: l-r: Jean Jamieson, from Beach St Cowes, Madeline Vegter and her husband Hank Vegter. The Vegters built the original stone house above Swan Lake on the Ventnor Rd near the Penguin Parade. While they travelled around Australia, they would collect seed from all sorts of native and other plants and grow them on at home and either plant them nearby or give them to friends to plant. There may even well be some of their 'plant babies' on Churchill Island! The mantelpiece looks great back in this era. We are not sure what became of the print above the mantelpiece here, which was a well-known one of a pair popular in early 20th century in Australia. Unfortunately the paper was not good quality and few of these remain intact these days. ... See MoreSee Less

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