For David Ferguson, home has always been wherever he hangs his hat. “Emelia is from Hobart and while I’m originally from Gundagai, I’d been spending most of my time in Melbourne,” says the former wedding photographer. “When we got engaged, we decided to make a fresh start somewhere that was new for both of us so it wasn’t always Emelia hanging out with my mates or me with hers.” The location – Brisbane at first then Sunshine Beach on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast – seemed full of potential.

They bought a little house and welcomed their first child, Max, but Sunshine Beach was quite a transient place and the couple felt a little bit lost. “You’d get a group of friends and then they’d all leave and you’d have to start again.” So when David’s parents began making noises about moving on from the family farm, Kimo Estate, they made a radical decision. “I said, ‘Maybe we should go back and see whether I’m a farmer?’”

That was 12 years ago and while David had grown up around farming, he admits that he had “no idea how things worked” on the 7000-acre sheep and cattle farm they’d moved to. “For about 18 months I just set about learning the ropes.” Emelia, who used her contacts to set up an asset-financing business from the farm, initially found the social component – or lack thereof – difficult. “Everyone is so spread apart in the bush so you’re not running into people like you do in town,” she says. “But a couple of older ladies took me under their wing and introduced me to people they thought I would like.” She also joined a women’s business group that was fantastic for networking.

For David, the “what you see is what you get” frankness of people in the country made him feel immediately at home on the farm. “I love that straight-shooter mentality,” he says. “There’s a sense of community in the country I think is hard to replicate in cities.”

Once David had his head around the farming side of things, his experience in the wedding business began to latch onto other opportunities on the property. “I walked into the big grain shed one day and looked around and just thought: ‘Oh, this is a wedding venue.’ So we fixed it up, along with a couple of little workers’ cottages we had on our land.” He wasn’t the only one who saw the venue’s potential. For nine of the past 10 years, Kimo Estate has been fully booked for nuptials.

In the meantime, another project was underway. “We were having a barbecue and a chat,” recalls David, “and Dad and I went up the top of the hill and he said, ‘I reckon this would be a good place to build a house.’ I agreed and we went from there.”

David, who’d put himself through photography school flipping houses, enlisted the help of “an old chippy by the name of John Sweeney”, for whom one of the later huts on the property was named. Together they built a few ecohuts – triangular structures that mirror the shape of a tent in a symphony of glass and wood that capitalises on the acres of spectacular scenery outside their windows. And they proved just as popular as the wedding venue.

While the financial payoff from the move has allowed the couple to set things up well, the benefits of the move for their children (Max and Archie) have been far more profound than money in the bank. “Kids are happy anywhere,” says David. “But I think they’re happiest when their parents are happy as well.”

The Fergusons describe their move to the bush as the best decision of their lives – and they’re not interested in gatekeeping the secrets to their success. “I think it’s so important to showcase the opportunities in the country,” says David. “There are so many wonderful places to live, with easier lifestyles, welcoming communities and plenty of good jobs. I really think if people could see how much potential there was out here, they could achieve big things.” For David and Emelia, it’s the more the merrier.

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Published: 25 February 2026