To thee I'll return, overburdened with care;
The heart's dearest solace will smile on me there;
No more from that cottage again will I roam;
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.
Home, home, sweet, sweet, home!
There's no place like home, oh, there's no place like home!
- from “Home, Sweet Home” by John Howard Payne (1822)
“Homes” — we spend a goodly portion of our time on earth living in them, saving for them, paying for them, maintaining them, and sometimes, when we've been away for too long, sickening for them, so it's quite understandable that many of us have a certain fascination with them. The aim of this series is to identify and highlight some of those habitations which stand out from their neighbours for whatever reason, be it architectural, historical, environmental; or maybe because they're unusual, opulent, luxurious, quirky, or just plain outrageous in design or setting. If it's the sort of residence which catches the eye and makes you wonder about the lives and motivations of the builders, owners or occupants, then it's a contender for this series. Undoubtedly, many other cachers will have their own pet examples of the above which they've spotted during their travels and, if so, I invite them to add their own entries to the series – I'd really love to check them out 
.
To kick things off, I've chosen a small, heritage-listed cottage which was built and occupied by an early settler and his family.
Schwerkolt's Cottage
The Schwerkolt Cottage is an original pioneer's stone cottage in a garden setting surrounded by 2.25 hectares of bushland. Johann Schwerkolt began building the cottage in 1884 and its three rooms are furnished in the style of the period. Other buildings on the property include a slab barn, a smithy, a stone smokehouse and a wine cellar. In addition, a museum built of local stone and timber has been designed and constructed in the same style as the cottage. It opened in 1977 and houses various related memorabilia, including an excellent textile collection from the 1800s to the 1950s and a wide range of locally produced clay products made by the many brick and tile works established in the area in the early 1900s. A collection of farm implements and household items is housed in the outdoor display area at the rear of the museum.
The Cottage is open on weekends and public holidays from 2-5pm with free entry. There are extensive gardens and parklands, a barbecue and picnic area and a children's playground - which are available at all times (as is the cache). There are public facilities and excellent off street parking.
For some interesting web views, check out this link Panoramic View (I haven't seen anything like it before, it's worth it!)
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Schwerkolt's Cottage then (circa 1916) ....
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.... and now
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The Cache
You will need to take a short tour around the Cottage and its surrounds to gather the necessary information to calculate the final cache coordinates.
A. The Cottage
How many windows does it have (nothing tricky here - just count the obvious external windows) ?
B. The Smokehouse
In the recipe for "German Smoked Wurst", how many tablespoons of black pepper are used?
C. The Smithy
It's not a chestnut, but there is a tree spreading over it. What type of tree is it? (No, "gum" or "eucalypt" is not the answer - and it's not latin either.) Take the 2nd letter of the 1st word in the name and add it to the 1st letter of the 2nd word, using their alphabetic positions (i.e. a=1,b=2,etc)
D. The Wine Cellar
How many poles are used in the construction of the cellar door (not including the door frame or supporting posts or rails - just the obvious vertical poles on the face of the door)?
The cache may be found at the following coordinates
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S 37° 48.(A-2)B7 |
E 145° 12.C(D-C)6 |
It's not far away and, despite the area being prone to muggle infestations on those pleasant weekend afternoons, should be easily accessible if you're careful. Note that there is a significant dropoff only a few metres from the cache, so "keep the littlies on a short leash" - the cache is an easy find in a traditional spot and you should not need to get closer than 7-8m from the edge – but be extremely careful if doing it at night!
Nearby Caches
It's a rather pleasant walk along the Mullum Mullum Creek downstream from here, and there are 2 caches within easy walking distance -
“Bridge over troubled water” by Quasar is about 300m downstream on the same side of the creek
“Yarran Dheran” by Geodes is about 900m downstream on the same side of the creek. If you're coming from this direction, do the wp “Track Junction” first.
For the interested ....
Johann August Schwerkolt was born in 1823 in Burschen, a small agricultural village, about 150km East of Berlin, in what was then known as Prussia. August and his first wife, Paulina left Germany and sailed to Melbourne aboard the Emmi, landing in 1846. August and Paulina had nine children, three of whom died at an early age. Paulina died in 1884, and in the following year, when he was 64 years old, August married Wilhelmina Both/Oppel, a german widow with three children. Two of Wilhelmina's daughters married two of August's sons. August and Wilhelmina themselves had three children; twins and then a daughter who was born three months after August's death in 1887.
(It must have been very cosy in that cottage - there could have been anywhere between about 8 and 16 people squeezed into it at the one time - assuming they all lived at the Mitcham site.)
Schwerkolt first bought land in the 1850’s at Northcote, then in 1861 he purchased the Mitcham property. He is listed as a gardener in Northcote and a charcoal burner at Mitcham, the charcoal being used by local smithies. Once the heavily timbered land was cleared he established a mixed farm with fruit trees, vines, dairying, poultry, bees, wine-making and a quarry. He supplied some of the road metal when Whitehorse Road was being made in 1886 and at an exhibition in Amsterdam he won a prize for best colonial wine.
The cottage consists of a kitchen-living room and two bedrooms surrounded by a verandah. All three rooms have been furnished with items typical of the era - including patchwork quilts on the beds, chamber pots under the beds and, in the main bedroom, a square wooden commode and a chest of drawers and wardrobe holding clothes in the style of the period. Along with the small beds and cot in the second bedroom, old dolls and toys may be seen. Some of the more unusual items in the kitchen are the tin coffee bean roaster used on an open fire, the hand-operated cake mixer that mixed batter in a baking tin, the bottle cutter made from a metal rod with a different sized ring at each end (this was heated and placed over the neck of the bottle and held there before being plunged into cold water, thus removing the neck of the bottle to make a jar), a large cup with a spout like a teapot for feeding recumbent patients, a very ornate moustache cup and saucer and a cylinder-type gramophone.
Other collections include textiles from 1880 to 1950, costumes, lace and needlework, jewellery, toiletries and household appliances such as a hand operated washing machine, old irons, sewing machines, food mixers and toys.
An authentic slab-built barn was brought from Olinda and re-erected on site - as was the smithy - and the stone smokehouse was constructed using an old family photo as a guide. When the underground wine cellar was cleared of dirt and debris it was found that it contained many wine-making items, mostly in good condition, which had been left inside when last used. The cellar has been restored as closely as possible to the original.