Southern Peninsula
Features inside: MOTHER’S DAY 2011 PAGES 32 – 33 FOOD & ENTERTAINMENT PAGES 34 – 36 SOUTHERN PENINSULA SCOREBOARD PAGES 37 – 38
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3 May – 16 May 2011
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Fern gully a secret no longer ONE of the best kept secrets of the Mornington Peninsula hinterland is the Endeavour Fern Gully, which is being preserved and adjoining paddocks revegetated by the peninsula branch of the National Trust. But the cat’s out of the bag after more than 130 people turned up Arthurs Seat Rd, Red Hill, for the first open day on Saturday, with many expressing amazement at the pristine state of a gully little changed since European settlement. National Trust volunteers, pupils from Red Hill Consolidated School, TAFE students from Rosebud, members of birdwatching groups, Red Hill Lions and members of peninsula conservation societies have been beavering away for about three years on the 27 hectares (67 acres) of land given to the trust by owner John Douglas nearly 40 years ago. Continued Page 2 Manna from heaven: Visitors to the first open day of the Endeavour Fern Gully in Red Hill are dwarfed by eucalypts as they stroll along a boardwalk deeper into the near-pristine bush.
History’s $10m price By Mike Hast A BLOCK of land in Sorrento that is part of Victoria’s history is on the market for $10 million plus. A member of the Myer dynasty, Richard Shelmerdine, is selling one of five blocks of the Eastern Sister, part of The Sisters historic site where Victoria’s first European settlement was based in 1803. The 2946 square metre block has 270-degree views from Blairgowrie Yacht Squadron around to the Western
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Sister, the headland on the other side of Sullivan Bay, which is a public reserve. The headland on the eastern end of Sullivans Bay was part of the shortlived settlement led by LieutenantGovernor David Collins who was sent by the British government to protect the embryonic sealing industry. Mr Shelmerdine won approval from the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal to subdivide the 1.2-hectare property last December.
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Lot 1 of 1915 square metres sold for more than $6 million soon after and a second lot of about 2140 square metres sold for a similar price. Mr Shelmerdine is retaining lots 3 and 4, and now the final block is on the market. As part of the VCAT approval, Mr Shelmerdine agreed to hand over a small parcel of land that will allow public access to Sullivan Bay and pay for construction of a path. The Eastern Sister property has been
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making headlines for years. In 1997 its owner, eccentric gay millionaire Peter Thomas Rand, died of prostate cancer, sparking a bitter and expensive legal dispute over multiple copies of his will. The dispute was settled by the Appeals Court in 2007 and the property put on the market the following year. It was bought by Mr Shelmerdine for $19 million. When it went on the market, residents, Mornington Peninsula Shire and
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federal MP Greg Hunt called for either the state or federal government to buy the property and return it to public hands. The campaign failed and after Mr Shelmerdine went to the VCAT and won approval for five lots, another call went out for government to buy the block that went on the market last week, which has a 67-metre frontage to Tideways Beach. Continued Page 6
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