Karin Bruce is almost part of the furniture at Southern Ocean Lodge, having been there to witness the structure rise from the scrub and now part of the team erasing the scars through revegetation.

“It’s been a great journey,” Ms Bruce said this week. “It’s the first time I’ve been involved right from the start of a project and it’s been amazing.”

“It’s been a lovely place to work. These views, many of us take them for granted on the island. But everyone who comes through that front door, well it’s like paradise for them.”

Ms Bruce was employed originally to collect and propagate stock of local plants for future revegetation and to keep the building and material supplies flowing.

After about six months at the site the cook left and Ms Bruce, who couldn’t bear the thought of 65 hungry builders, took on the role of cook and mum-away-from-home to many of the younger workers.

Now she is involved in serving breakfast daily and then at lunchtime changes into her gardening clothes to continue the landscaping and revegetation work, “the best of both worlds”.

She doesn’t live on site and travels about 40 minutes each way to work, preferring to get away for some time out.

Everything she plants has been grown from seeds or cuttings taken from the site and Ms Bruce used the verandas of the staff accommodation as her greenhouses, moving the pots to suit the season.

“It’s very rewarding to see the results of your work like this. The revegetation and landscaping work will go on for some time yet,” Ms Bruce said.

Cheers to local produce

Southern Ocean Lodge is an excellent asset for Kangaroo Island and is providing a new outlet with great potential for Island food and wine providers, according to John Melbourne of Andermel Marron and Two Wheeler Creek Wines.

His business is providing marron, red and white wines (particularly sauvignon blanc) and its distinctive lemon myrtle liqueur.

Self-drive guests have visited Andermel Marron “where we provide an interesting and tasty stopover”.

Mr Melbourne said the lodge – done with great taste and style – was good news for island providores, providing a new outlet and in the bigger picture helping to put Kangaroo Island on the international tourist map.

“There will be flow on effects for hospitality on the island when international and national guests return home to tell of their experiences. Even if those people can’t afford to stay at Southern Ocean Lodge they will come and stay at other accommodation.”

Mr Melbourne said the kitchen staff at SOL had also spread the business around by taking different items from many providers.

Every wine stocked at Southern Ocean Lodge is from SA or Kangaroo Island.

Same story on a new scale

The scale may be different to Southern Ocean Lodge but the intention was the same for Ivan Ellson, 88, when he built Kangaroo Island’s first motel - Ellson’s Seaview Motel - in Kingscote.

Hospitality was in the blood for Mr Ellson, whose mother Florence had run the Seaview guesthouse on the site from 1924 until it burnt down in 1960.

Mr Ellson and wife Mavis built the Seaview on its current site in 1964.

“There was no accommodation to compare with it when we built it. It was another 18 months until the Ozone built its motel wing,” Mr Ellson said this week.

“Magnificent” was how Mr Ellson described the new Southern Ocean Lodge, having visited with his home assistance worker Lisa Parry on the day after it opened in March.

And to prove that marketing has not changed so much, Mr Ellson reported that in 1964 he invited tourist agents to visit and gave them dinner and an overnight stay to help promote the new motel, just as Southern Ocean Lodge has done.