Forest Discovery Centre

In the afternoon we had a booking at the Forest Discovery Centre, about a 10 minute walk away from the Caravan Park. There was an interesting video about the 1961 fire which completely wiped out the Holyoake township as well as Dwellingup itself. When the fire started, every man in Dwellingup had to go and fight the flames (with hose pipes and little else), leaving their wives and children behind, not knowing what was happening. 

Communication was poor, but the flames and smoke could be seen from a long way off as it moved nearer and nearer to town. There were numerous breakout fires, as the wind changed direction and lightening strikes caused more trees to burn down in 14 places. After 4 days, 133 houses and 78 vehicles had been destroyed, but by some miracle there were no fatalities. The residents had been evacuated to Pinjarra. Only the Dwellingup Hotel survived. 

Holyoake School in its heyday.

Dwellingup Hotel in 1911.

The Forest Discovery Centre was full of interesting exhibits. After viewing the video, I had a quick look around:

These Zamia seeds were used by indigenous people to make flour, but they had to be soaked thoroughly beforehand.

This workshop was originally used to train apprentice woodworkers, until funding ran out.

Now there are all sorts of courses being offered.


It’s set in the middle of the forest where all the yellow acacia bushes are out at the moment.

In the evening the group was supposed to meet for dinner at the Dwellingup Hotel, but we received a message that they had almost run out of food after the big influx yesterday. So plans changed and everyone met at S and H’s chalet in the Caravan Park and V ordered takeaway pizza. It was a very convivial ending to our wildflower weekend.

Saturday evening’s dinner when we helped to eat up most of the menu items!  There were two other groups crammed into this small dining room.