Veronica's visit

Veronica's visit

In October, we had the pleasure of a week-long visit from a Chilean friend, Veronica Loewe. Veronica is a researcher at the Institute of Forestry in Chile, and took the opportunity to look at pine nut trees and truffles while in WA.

Veronica arrived in Perth on October 4. After visiting tourist spots and research contacts in Perth, David and Veronica drove down to the Southwest via our former block in Dwellingup, which has some pine species rare in WA. After that we drove to our beach house in Bremer Bay, then on to stay with friend and former neighbour Ashleigh Murch in Denmark.

From Ashleigh's we visited Rod MacDougall's unique orchard of unusual fruit and nut trees near Denmark, then drove to the Valley of the Giants near Walpole, then on to visit the Truffle and Wine Company in Manjimup, where Stuart Hutchison kindly showed us their truffle operation.

From Manjimup we returned to a slap-up paella meal and a second night at Ashleigh's. The next day we drove west to Caves Road near Margaret River, with its grand karri forests, calling at Canal Rocks. Then on to Bunbury, where we were fortunate enough to be able to talk with world truffle expert Nick Malajczuk (joint founder of the WA truffle industry) and his wife Ann.

We returned to Perth that night, and Veronica left for a conference on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, on October 9. After the conference, Veronica visited Sydney and New Zealand before returning to Chile.

By fortunate chance, Nick and Ann had already arranged to travel to Chile in November to conduct a seminar, and they were able to catch up with Veronica there.