London no longer calling for Cumnock’s Carly and Cass

Loving the country life, London girl Carly Roberts with her children, Tyler, Hunter and Willow.

Home, ultimately, is where you heart is.

Sisters-in-law from distant shores, Carly and Cass Roberts know this more than most after making their futures in Cumnock after marrying local brothers.

The two are now looking to put the tiny central west village on the highly-profitable market-town map.

They are fast seeking stallholders interested in their brainchild, the Cumnock Fun Day, set down for mid-Spring.

“This is definitely going to be a first for us and we’re hoping for it to be an annual thing,” Carly, originally from south-east London, explained.

“We’re going to bring-in jumping castles, food carts, we’re going to open up all the venues, the Men’s Shed… we’ll have the fire truck, the police car and have all our local businesses open,” she enthused.

The 300-population farming community midway between Orange and Dubbo is a thousand miles from her former home, and she couldn’t be happier.

“I was kind of back-packing, not really settled, and a friend said, ‘why don’t we go to Australia?’ So we went.”

“To get an extension on my visa, I went to work for three months at Cumnock on a farm… I had zero experience, but it was good to get-out of my comfort zone.”

Meeting her future husband, diesel mechanic Toby at Cumnock’s place-to-be (the Royal Hotel); she found adjusting to the central west surprisingly easy.

“Cumnock has the beauty of lots of friendly faces so there was not a long time to feel lonely… you’ve just got to get used to driving 45 minutes for groceries and shopping, but I adjusted pretty quickly,” Carly said.

Cass comes from a more typical rural background, a dairy farming family from Ontario on the Great Lakes separating Canada and the United States.

“I graduated Uni as a teacher, but there were no teaching jobs at the time, so I decided to kill two birds by travelling and teaching.”

Like Carly, she moved to Cumnock to enable extension off her work visa taking an au pair position on a sheep farm. “I met (future husband) Blake at the Cumnock Pub — how romantic!” she laughs, adding that developing a taste for Australia’s great culinary pride, Vegemite, was her greatest surprise.

New blood being a wonderful thing for a small community, Carly and Cass have immersed themselves in the community.

“Me and her came up with the idea and we presented it to the Progress Association, and they loved it,” Carly said.

“We have our markets on every month and we thought, ‘why not have a big one?’ With the drought, pandemic, floods, we thought it would be a great way to brighten our community and showcase our town,” Cass explained.

“We’re making a really strong move for market vendors, as many as possible, as well as sponsors,” she added.

Living and embracing village life, Carly said, has brought out the natural organiser inside, a role that she couldn’t have imagined back “home”.

“I’ve got myself on a few committees, we held a cocktail party recently that raised a lot of money that went directly into our public schools P&C account,” she said proudly.

“Where I lived, I didn’t even know who my neighbours were, so there was no motivation to improve your suburb, but here, you know everyone, so you’ve got a motivation to improve the place you live in,” Carly concluded.

From Ontario to Cumnock; Cass Roberts with husband, Blake.