Vaughan Hibbs and Karren Scott are anxious to get on with their lives after fire engulfed their home on their Wairewa property in the final days of 2019.

The couple had left their 33-acre property on December 30 and headed to Karren’s mother’s home in Eagle Point.

They took their dog, Cooper, but left behind Pumpkin, the ginger cat, six chooks, 20 sheep and a ram.

“We were really naïve,” Karren said, explaining that she never really thought the fire would come near their property.

“We’d been clearing around the property the day before and I just grabbed a jumper and two photos of dad who has passed away and I said ‘we’ll come back tomorrow and get the rest’, but there was no tomorrow.”

“You think you’re impervious to what’s really taking place,” Vaughan said.

The couple had only purchased the property less than 12 months before the fire and the solid brick house stood more than 200 metres away from bushland.

There were few trees around the house, except for a large palm tree which survived the inferno.

Many longtime residents of Wairewa had also been confident that the fire wouldn’t reach their little valley.

But, of course, it did.

In all, 11 properties were incinerated in Wairewa, such was the intensity and fury of the unpredictable fire.

Vaughan and Karren’s brick home wasn’t spared either.

The couple sit in the sunshine outside their temporary home - a caravan – on their tranquil property.

On a calm autumn day earlier this week with the burnt bush now lush with regrowth in the distance, it’s hard to imagine a fire ever came near Wairewa.

Yet, the burnt homes and piles of rubble that line the valley tell a different story.

So too do the scars that residents carry after the reality of their losses became evident.

“It seems like so long ago that it happened,” Karren said.

Vaughan and Karren returned to their property following the fire to find all their sheep dead.

“Our ram died standing up, leaning against the tree, trying to protect the sheep,” Karren said.

Pumpkin the cat had perished in the hay shed where she loved to sleep.

“We just found a pile of bones,” Karren said. Four of the six chooks incredibly survived. “Once the fire got into Buchan South, it was like letting the tiger off the chain,” Vaughan said, nodding his head in the direction from where the fire came.

“They said it (the fire) had enough heat in it to make you drop to the ground at 300 metres,” Vaughan said.

“The radiant heat would have taken away all the oxygen.”

“It’s peeled the roof back just like a sardine can,” Karren said.

“It must have been just so intense.”

The couple was insured and have already decided to build an Anchor Home on their property.

The house is built in modules and should go up within 10 weeks once construction starts, but the couple is still waiting for their site to be cleared by Grocon.

“It affects your mental health just to look at it,” Karren said staring at the brick walls of the former house.

“My biggest fear is that with COVID-19 that Wairewa will be lost.

“I hope they don’t think we’re just a little spec.”

COVID-19 restrictions have also placed Karren, a primary school teacher at Lakes Entrance, under additional stress.

She is preparing remote learning classes from her makeshift office, a second caravan on the property, a gift from her mother.

With Term 2 beginning this week, Karren is keen to make sure she’s ready for her grade five and six classes.

Vaughan is hoping the couple will be in their new home by the end of July.

“That’s dependent on getting the building permits from the shire,” he said.

“I hope there’s no further holdups from here,” Karren said.

IMAGE: Karren Scott and Vaughan Hibbs with two of their chooks on their Wairewa property. Their home was gutted in the December 30 bushfires. K276-5783