When the Springs Connection - a group of lesbian and gay business people in the regional town of Daylesford, Victoria - first got together to plan a local LGBTQI festival ChillOut in 1997, they had no idea just how successful it would become. Celebrating its 21st birthday this year, it’s not only the largest annual celebration in Hepburn Shire, but also the biggest queer country pride event in the country.
Taking place over the Labour Day long weekend, the festival regularly attracts 25,000 visitors for an estimated economic benefit of around $10 million, still managing to maintain a friendly vibe that has attracted so many LGBTIQ people to settle here.
That includes Max Primmer, 68. He met his partner Ken in Melbourne in 1970, and Ken proposed in 1984, although he sadly didn’t live to see marriage equality become a legal reality, dying in 2000 after a long illness. “We’d never really been one for moving much during that time,” Max says.
A few years later, in 2003, a best friend suggested they get out of Melbourne and head up to ChillOut for the weekend. “We booked the accommodation and stayed the weekend and on the Monday morning I said, ‘I really feel so comfortable here. It’s just got a lovely atmosphere. I think I want to live here’.”
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Heading back to Melbourne, Primmer checked out a rental house in Daylesford on Wednesday. “They rang me on the Friday and said, ‘it’s yours,’ so I started packing and two weeks later I was living here.”
A sizeable queer community calls the town home all year round, with the HIV/AIDS crisis seeing a lot of men move to the peaceful surrounds of Daylesford and neighbouring Hepburn Springs in the 80s and 90s. The arrival of celebrated chef Alla Wolf-Tasker, who opened The Lake House restaurant two decades ago, helped encourage a thriving food scene and the Springs Connection supported queer people setting up small businesses in the area.
Primmer says his outgoing personality helped him build good relations with straight allies, too, when he joined the ChillOut planning committee the year he arrived. He’s never been shy, coming out to his parents in 1964 at 15 years old. Primmer says he’s lucky they embraced him, and it fills him with joy to see ChillOut celebrate that spirit annually.
In 2008, Primmer experienced kidney failure and went on dialysis, eventually getting a transplant four years later. That experience inspired his drag persona Di Alysis who makes an annual appearance at the ChillOut Pride Parade. “We started making the costume in November and were finished in early December. I’ve got makeup organised on the day and I’ve started getting excited now.”
Sam O’Connor, 25, was born and bred in Daylesford and has seen the festival flourish from a small celebration to the country champion it is today. “I’ve kind of grown up with it,” he laughs. “We’re pretty much a country Mardi Gras, there’s nothing else quite like it.”
Max as Di Alysis Source: Supplied
While O’Connor agrees he couldn’t have asked for a more welcoming environment, like most teenagers he still struggled with coming out. “It’s quite a difficult thing, regardless of how many gay people there are around you. Me and my friends would go to the parade and carnival day just so we could be amongst the ChillOut vibe. It was a slow process, but ChillOut has definitely helped me feel more myself.”
He’s had a lot of love along the way, including from his mum Trudy, a lesbian whom he describes as a best friend. She joined the festival’s planning committee when he was a kid. “Each year I found myself becoming more involved, with a bit more glitter and another rainbow flag, jumping in the parade. It gives you that confidence boost to know that people are here to support you and there’s nothing wrong with us. We’re all the same.”
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Supporting rainbow families is the goal of straight ally Anne E. Stewart’s ChillOut talks at the Story House and Garden. We Can Live a Rainbow is all about fostering greater understanding and respectful communication. She moved to Daylesford 27 years ago as a single mum with two young boys. The former librarian turned professional storyteller is passionate about community and is another regular contributor to the ChillOut cause, previously hosting a celebration of the town’s queer history, So Who Was the first Gay in the Village?
Her first hands-on involvement was helping organise a parade float in 2010, with drag queen Milly Minogue dressed as a nun. “It was called Saint Dorothy of Daylesford, and naively I didn't know ‘friends of Dorothy’ was a euphemism for gay.”
Stewart’s learned a lot since, raising her now adult kids to celebrate difference too. She recalls with a chuckle her son Dominic, then in grade five, taking to task another kid for teasing a third about having two mums. “He’s a smarty pants like me. It’s kinda genetic.”
Anne E Stewart with Milly Minogue Source: Supplied
That’s the beauty of ChillOut, Stewart says, that it fosters a healthy, open-minded community spirit. “Merryn Tinkler, the festival director, is fantastic. It’s great to have someone pull it all together. Sometimes these things get so big and they burn out, but they’ve managed to keep it going, which is fantastic. ChillOut seems like it’s going to continue to grow.”
