My holiday block. And one day...........my holiday house. Well maybe....
My block is in a very small town in southern Western Australia called Woodanilling. The townsite of Woodanilling situated on the Great Southern Highway, 252 kms from Perth. It can be reached by road from Perth via the Albany Highway and is a comfortable 2.5 hour drive from the city centre.
Woodanilling was named after a spring in the Boyerine Creek one kilometre south of town. This spring, situated among the Casuarinas and Flooded Gums, used to flow into a beautiful pool which became a gathering place for the district's new settlers and became known as Round Pool.
The Woodanilling district was first explored by Europeans in 1830-31, the first expedition was led by Captain Thomas Bannister. The construction of the Perth-Albany Road (currently the Albany Highway) in the early 1850s bought the fine grazing lands in the region to the attention of many pastoralists, who took up leases while retaining their permanent settlement in places like York.
By the 1870s large leases were also being taken up to the east of where Woodanilling is today. Woodanilling was one of the many districts to benefit from the opening of the Great Southern Railway in 1889. Settlers were attracted here because of its close proximity to the railway and in 1892 the Woodanilling Townsite was gazetted.
In 1906 the Woodanilling Road Board was formed, and during the most properous years of 1905 to 1920 the districts population averaged close to 800.