ChillOut will go ahead
The ChillOut Festival will go full steam ahead this weekend despite fires which flared up around the township of Daylesford last week.
ChillOut director Jim Culbertson and his partner Geoff live at Muskvale, 8km from Daylesford. The fires burnt out most of their 250 acre farm, and they lost livestock and a hay shed.
Culbertson said, compared to the fires which ripped through Marysville and Kinglake three weeks ago, the pair were lucky they were not harmed and their home was saved.
Thank goodness for the CFA -” they did a great job. It’s just incredible how quickly these things take off. I’ve never seen anything like it, he told the Sydney Star Observer.
Although it’s been a trying time, Culbertson laughed that the fire damage had finally defeated the hardy feral blackberries in the area.
Areas hosting ChillOut events have not been affected by the fires.
ChillOut president Doug Pollard said it is important people were not scared off from the festival as a result of the fires because the town needs support.
It’s really important that we support bush communities and don’t stay away and let their local economies collapse.
We need to continue to support them and obviously we’ll take CFA advice and won’t run things that are unsafe, but at this stage there is no immediate danger to the town.
