Give a gift they’ll savour all year long. Gift a Membership Now

Lockdown Down Under

Willcox sisters, Easter 2020

Max describes how Australia has become a nation divided by the pandemic and its effects.

Virginia and Cath Willcock live on opposite sides of Australia. Virginia is chief winemaker at the historic Vasse Felix winery in Margaret River in Western Australia; Cath runs a wine-distribution business, Imbibo, 3,000 km (1,860 miles) away in Melbourne, Victoria. Above they are pictured with partners and children celebrating Easter 2020 together in Margaret River – Virginia extreme left – but their subsequent experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic could not be more different.

‘Here in WA we’ve been effectively living COVID-free for two years’, says...