It’s hard to believe it’s almost a week since Jennie Jones and I left The House on Burra Burra Lane and went Under Cover of Dark, our destination the tiny
South West Australian town of Cowaramup. Besides exploring the South West and chewing the cud, we also popped in to see the Queen of the Pink Beanie and Naughty Ninja, Lily Malone. Twitter ran hot with one-liners (sometimes more!) as our weekend adventure got under way.
Seven thirty Saturday morning rolled around and I reversed Baby out of the garage, loaded up the boot, strapped Jennie in, and we were off. Look out Thelma and Louise! Our first stop was just south of Busselton for a much needed wake-up coffee. No pitstop would be worth it without an obligatory selfie with hilarious results. I’m not really sure what the servo staff made of it, but we were lucky Jennie was tall enough to rescue the stranded roll of toilet paper someone had placed out of the cleaner’s reach. Here is a picture of us having done our good deed for the day.
The first thing we saw as we cruised into Cowaramup was the cows lazing around the streets, under trees, in front of shops and hanging out in the park. No surprises there!
Cowaramup is now home to a wonderful herd of 42 life-sized fibreglass Friesian cows and calves wandering the streets, parks and shops of the village. The cows love having their photographs taken and often dress up for the occasion. ~ Meet the Cowaramup Cows.
But, there was no time to stop and admire them just yet because Lily was waiting at the homestead with refreshments and another pending adventure. Well, 
in all fairness, we were pre-warned about the nature walk but nothing could have prepared us for the breathtaking beauty of the nature reserve at Ellensbrook Homestead. If only we’d been warned about the mud! Jennie’s shoes took a hit as we crossed the creek to the Bathing Place of the Moon at Meekadarabee Falls and a view definitely worth getting our feet wet for!
Meekadarabee Falls were known to Aboriginal people as ‘the bathing place of the moon’ and there is a fascinating legend about the moss-covered waterfall and the small cave behind it. In Aboriginal legend, the cave is where the spirits of Aboriginal lovers, Mitanne & Nobel live. If you listen carefully you can hear their laughter echoing in the waterfall. ~ Parks and Wildlife WA
The perfect destination for three romance authors then, and it was very beautiful. Tired and muddy, we headed back to Lily’s ready for a 
snack and a well-deserved glass of bubbly…but not before we took Beanie selfie! The afternoon passed with lots of chats and giggles and, after sunset, we enjoyed more of Lily’s fabulous hospitality in the form of turkey lasagne and white chocolate tart…yum!
Over breakfast the next morning, we got down to talking about reading, writing, publishing and works in progress. There was still the little mystery of the missing cow to solve in our ‘bid to catch the Cowaramup Cownappers’ and time was running out. We headed out to the park to do a little investigation and left no stone unturned, but sadly, there was no sign of the missing bovine. 
What we did find was a whole lot of inspiration in the romantic little rural town. Jennie was thrilled it looked similar to how she imagined her town of Swallows Fall would if it were real. Lily agreed that if Tate Newell was there, he’d say it was His Brand of Beautiful.
On that note, our magical weekend of research and reveling drew to a close. We had time for one more wish before we left on our journey 
back to Perth. We gathered around the wishing well and wished that our friendship may last forever, our respective muses would go home inspired and, wherever our writing journeys take us, we bring continued joy and satisfaction to our readers.
Small Town Fiction 