“The steak up here is just the best,” Robyn said, licking her lips at the very thought.

“My sister from Newcastle visited recently, and we just went out to the pub for dinner and got this fabulous steak. She said “this is the best steak I’ve had in years, it’s full of flavour and perfectly cooked,” and I had to agree, but that’s just what you get around here. 

“Lovely fresh food that is better than anywhere else.”

So, aside from the perfectly flavoured steak that stocks our local stores, what is it that drew the Sydney born and raised Robyn here?

“My husband came up here at six weeks old,” Robyn explained.

“His father had a timber mill at Lansdowne, so they used to come up for holidays.

“My first introduction to Forster was through him, and ever since then it’s always been our plan to retire here.”

It was an anxious wait, but finally that blessed day arrived in 1999, when Robyn and her husband packed their bags and headed on up the highway.

“My daughter cried when I told her we had bought a house,” Robyn laughed.

“She is still in Sydney with her husband, and they have a business there so she couldn’t move too, but she was very sad.”

Spending most of her early trips to the Great Lakes in the Tuncurry caravan park, Robyn was somewhat relieved when they finally had a place to call home, but she still has clear memories of the good old days,

“I can still remember the toilets at the caravan park,” she said.

“They used to put a tyre on the toilets when they got full because they were just pans! It’s just changed so much. It was all dirt roads back then.”

Despite the lack of big events and balls in the Great Lakes, Robyn insists she would never go back to Sydney, except to see her daughter and grand children.

“I wouldn’t change a thing about this place. You can get anywhere so quickly, go to the doctor, you’re there in 5-10 minutes,” she said.