There are two inescapable things about Nagambie: the insistent signage everywhere reminding you that champion racehorse Black Caviar was born here in 2006, and the throngs of families and schoolkids who fill the Victorian town to the brim in the warmer months. I used to be one of them, competing in the town’s annual high school rowing regattas, but the memory of burning lungs and aching thighs has kept me away for 20 years. Lakeside at the Nagambie Lakes Leisure Park.
When I became a father last year, I knew someday my road would inevitably lead me back here to join the other families, like a duck returning to its familiar nesting ground. But it’s June when I drive into town, and the masses of families are nowhere to be seen. A bronze statue of Black Caviar presides over an empty carnival-coloured obstacle course bobbing in Lake Nagambie.
The dense pack of campervans that normally park along the shore have been reduced to a thin line shrouded in fog. I’ve driven 90 minutes from Melbourne to see what Nagambie, a small town in the Goulburn Valley, has to offer in winter, when the vineyards have been picked bare and the crowds dissipated. But I’m here to challenge my own memories too.
Two decades on, now with a partner and baby, could Nagambie win me back? As the social and sporting centre of town, Lake Nagambie is naturally the first place to stop, and Nagambie Brewery and Distillery has prime views over the water. It’s quiet outside, but inside is crackling as locals.