She wanted to live somewhere that could accommodate a horse.

After falling in love with the animals aged eight, she’d previously had a horse of her own but had to give it up when she moved from Spain to Hollywood. Australia with its wide open spaces would give her the opportunity to ride every day.

“That was my deal with Chris,” she says.

“I said I would move to Australia but I wanted to live on a property, a farm, and have horses and he knew that. I wanted to enjoy that.”

Next year marks 10 years since the Spanish-born actress and her Aussie husband made Byron Bay their home and as Pataky laughingly explains, horses have now taken over their lives (they have seven at home).

Not only is she a keen show jumper, which in turn saw her chosen as an ambassador when show jumping was introduced into the The Star Gold Coast Magic Millions Carnival in 2021, but many weekends are now taken up ferrying the couple’s 12-year-old daughter, India, to equestrian events. For Pataky, who is also raising their 10-year-old twins Tristan and Sasha, it’s not the time that’s an issue but the complex feelings that arise when your child excels in a competitive sport.

“I get more nervous when she’s riding than when I’m riding,” she explains.

“I’m not scared, it’s more a nervousness like ‘how is she going to do?’ I’m not worried about her falling because I’ve fallen off my horse 100,000 times and, you know, when you are a rider you’re going to fall, it’s more whether she’s happy, whether she’s enjoying it and, yes, then the disappointment of when you do things wrong.”

Worse, she says, is when the horse has a refusal, stopping in front of a jump, which is all part of the sport but hard on a tween when they’ve spent months practising for an event.

“It’s a good experience to get kids into sports where they have those disappointments because that’s what’s going to happen in life but as a mum it always hurts you when you see them sad,” she explains.

As she settles down to chat in the Gold Coast’s Bilinga Surf Club after a photoshoot which saw passers-by stop in their tracks at the sight of the luminous nymph riding through the waves atop retired racehorse now competitive Off the Track showjumper Bruce, it’s clear that success and stardom do not exempt Mr and Mrs Hemsworth from the normal challenges of parenthood.

Indeed, as she changes from designer dresses back into her shorts and sneakers, Pataky beautifully articulates that cusp-of-adolescence moment when children begin to show signs of the people they will become.

In India’s case, what’s emerging is a gutsiness and ambition that’s not altogether surprising considering her genes.

“She always says to me, ‘we’re so similar’ because we are. We love cross country, we love adrenaline and she loves horses that are challenging. I was exactly the same when I was a kid.”

What’s compelling about Pataky is that her barefoot, sand-strewn, kid-wrangling, ordinary life seems to sit effortlessly alongside being an A-lister in glittery, star-studded Hollywood.

One minute she’s lugging a horse float to Bangalow and fuelling on dumplings from a food truck, the next she’s spending hours frocking up to accompany her husband to this year’s Met Gala after he was chosen by Anna Wintour to be co-chair of the event.

Where those two contrasting elements of her life neatly align is at the The Star Gold Coast Magic Millions Carnival where one day might be spent with her family picking up tips from the show jumpers while the next might be cheering on her fellow ambassadors, including King Charles’s niece Zara Tindall, as they compete in the traditional exhibition gallop along Surfers Paradise beach.

As she says, the equine bonanza, which this year includes twilight racing with a cocktail vibe, is so spirited and joyful that all the ambassadors have become firm friends.

Indeed, midway through our interview NRL legend and Maroons coach Billy Slater and his wife Nicole, who are also ambassadors, arrive at the surf club and Pataky is sharing hugs and kisses and swapping stories about their kids and recent holidays.

“Can you come for dinner this evening?” she asks them spontaneously, noting that she’ll be home from puppy training class for their new german shepherd Bailey at 6.30pm.

Oh, she adds, she’s flying solo with the kids because Chris is currently filming in Los Angeles until Christmas.

Pataky and Hemsworth have always been the least precious of stars whether they’re hanging out on the beach with actor Matt Damon or entertaining the other Magic Millions ambassadors, which also include Tindall’s husband Mike and Argentine polo star Nacho Figueras and his wife Delfina Blaquier, at their sprawling home, complete with nearby horse arena, in the Byron hinterland.

“We’re like a big family. We have dinners and have the best time,” says Pataky.

“Zara and Mike have brought their kids to our home. We have so many pets and their daughter Lena fell in love with our bearded dragon lizard. They had to buy one for her when they got back to England.”

They’ve also enjoyed big multi-family outings to Sea World and Wet‘n’Wild where the sight of the Thor actor and the 21st in line to the British throne on the slides must’ve been amusing for fellow park goers. In fact, Pataky has visited the Tindalls at their home, Gatcombe Park, where they not only watched the Magic Millions Festival of British Eventing but met Zara’s mother Princess Anne.

“It was an incredible experience. It’s one of the biggest and well-known eventing festivals and so I took India and we went to Zara’s home and we were hanging out with her and her husband and we just had the best time. It’s one of my most beautiful memories enjoyed with horses,” Pataky enthuses.

What’s amusing is that even the famous, who are constantly meeting other celebrities, can be intimidated by the royals.

As she explains: “Princess Anne is really lovely but it’s funny because they tell you all these rules before you meet her and then when you get there you forget the protocol and what to call them and you get so stressed but then you just go with it.”

Despite her multiple roles – wife, mother, actress, ambassador and businesswoman – it’s clear what makes 48-year-old Pataky happy.

As she effortlessly rests her head on the horse’s mane during our photoshoot then dismounts like a teen gymnast despite the voluminous skirt on a Scanlan and Theodore dress, you can see exactly what might have attracted a young Chris Hemsworth, 41, when he first met his would-be wife in Los Angeles in 2010.

Beyond being a remarkably beautiful woman, Pataky exudes a rare combination of energy and calm. Her eyes shine when she speaks about her passions which range from her family and pets to acting, painting, staying fit and the forthcoming Magic Millions Carnival yet there’s a peace that suggests she’s deeply content with her life.

Perhaps it’s because she’s so clear, so deliberate about the family life she wanted to create. As she says, growing up as an only child and initially living with her dad after her parents separated was sometimes lonely. It left her with twin determinations: to have a marriage that endured and to be fully present with her children.

“Maybe because my parents separated I always wanted to have a partner for life. I always say I want to grow old together,” she says wistfully.

Pataky and Hemsworth, who married just 10 months after they met, will celebrate 14 years of marriage on December 22 but as she laughingly points out, they regularly forget their anniversary because it’s so close to Christmas.

“No one gets angry, we both laugh,” she says, pointing out that they have always tried to work as a team.

Yet for all their obvious good fortune which includes healthy children, stimulating work and a home they love in a country which allows them privacy and freedom, Pataky doesn’t sugar-coat the truth of long-term marriage.

“I think we all have the idea of this beautiful dream of a marriage and loving each other and it all being perfect but it’s much more work than you think. It comes with so many challenges but it’s beautiful to grow into those challenges and learn about each other and how we change with the years and how we adapt to each other.

“You can think from the outside that a marriage is perfect but they all have their things and they all need a lot of work.”

Pressed to share one of their differences, Pataky laughingly describes the couple’s conflicting approach to airports. While Hemsworth likes to arrive with plenty of time before a flight, she loathes lingering at the airport so leaves getting there to the last minute.

“I don’t mind stressing in the car,” she says, “as long as I don’t have to wait for two hours when I get there.”

Up close it’s impossible to believe that Pataky will turn 50 in 18 months.

As she says: “I don’t feel that age. I feel like I have a very young spirit because I’m very active and I want to enjoy every moment. What scares me is not being able to enjoy all those things with my kids.”

While she and Hemsworth have always focused on fitness, she now concentrates on working out with weights after watching a woman in her 60s in the gym lifting 110kgs.

“The most important thing for anti-ageing is creating muscle so I do weights, like big weights, because it’s what keeps your body awake and alive,’’ she says.

One big change in the Hemsworth household this year is that for the first time since having children, the Fast & Furious star went to Spain for five weeks mid-year to shoot a TV series called Matices, a psychological thriller that follows six patients who participate in a rare treatment developed by a renowned psychiatrist.

She’s filmed several other projects since having children, notably the action thriller Interceptor, Poker Face with Russell Crowe and the musical drama Carmen, but none took her away from her family for long. So how did it go with her husband holding the fort?

“He’s an amazing dad and the kids are really happy with him so it was good. I wouldn’t be able to do it if he wasn’t there but it was good for the kids to feel like Mum is also working. The kids are a bit older and more independent so they were happy. I probably suffered more than they did.”

Pataky says she relished shooting the drama in her native Spanish, a language she’s had more success teaching her children (Sasha has adopted it most easily) than her husband.

Indeed, having been immersed back in acting – “I love creating a character and investing in it” – she’s now keen to work on a romance, a genre she’s yet to tackle.

Which leads to the rather pointed question of who would be her love interest? Would she choose her husband or perhaps another Hollywood heart-throb? Turns out she’d opt for Hemsworth.

“He’s always wanted to do a beautiful love story so why not? We’d be fine. He’s really good at comedy,” she adds, pointing out that she’d also love to play a mother now that she’s very familiar with the territory.

In fact with India turning 13 in May, she and Hemsworth are readying themselves to parent teens. It’s made her more grateful than ever that she prioritised being a parent even if it meant the couple received some flack when her husband publicly acknowledged that his wife had put aside her dreams in order to support his.

Some suggested the arrangement had left Pataky in the shadows but she fought back, saying she was comfortable with her decision.

Choosing to be there for her children was not only informed by her own childhood experiences but from a recognition of what would make her happy.

“It was hard for me not having that closeness and day-to-day (with my own mother) and I was an only child so it made me want to be there for my children. I respect every mother for how they approach motherhood.”

Now Pataky has the best of both worlds: a close relationship with her mother who she returned to live with age 14 and who now spends up to six months a year in Australia, as well as a deeply connected relationship with her own brood.

“We have a trust, all of us, and we talk about everything because I’ve been there with them,” she says.

“I know them by heart. I’ve been picking them up every day from school. Sometimes they are open and sometimes not but that relationship is really important to me and I feel very lucky to be able to enjoy those moments and not having to work.

“I love that I’ve been able to do that and I have no regrets about not being able to do jobs because I really wanted to be a present mum and I’ve been able to do that.” She expects raising adolescents will be both a challenge and a joy but relishes what lies ahead.

“You start to have more adult conversations and approach things in a different way. Sometimes you get a bit surprised by their questions but I enjoy it because certain things make you more close and you get to build that good relationship with them forever.”

With Tristan recently spending one-on-one time with his dad in Los Angeles, is there any interest from the children for following their parents into acting?

As Pataky explains, they admire their parents’ work but they’re too young to know. Plus in India’s case at least, it’s all horse for now.

Right now, Pataky says the family is focused on the Pacific Fair Magic Millions Polo & Showjumping extravaganza which has introduced prize money of $1 million for the Senior Team show jumping and $10,000 for the juniors.

They’ll be cheering on Zara Tindall in the Off-The-Track show jumping class, an accessible and safe competition which creates a pathway for those who invest in the retraining of thoroughbred racehorses for equestrian disciplines.

“The Magic Millions is such an amazing event with great ambience, and the ambassadors are like a family,” Pataky says.

Katie Page, co-owner of Magic Millions, says all the ambassadors are hand-picked for their love of horses.

“Horses are part of their family life,’’ she says.

Before they throw themselves into the carnival, the Hemsworths will spend Christmas with family and friends, enjoying some of the traditions Pataky grew up with in Madrid.

And with that, she’s off, back to Byron Bay and her children, grateful as always for the country that welcomed her so wholeheartedly.

“I feel like I’ve been adopted by Australia,” she says. “Even when I go back to Spain they ask if I’d come back but I don’t think so.

“Moving here was one of the best decisions we have made for our family.”

The Pacific Fair Magic Millions Polo & Showjumping will be on Sunday, January 5. For information visit magicmillionspolo.com.au