Earth Sanctuary, Alice Springs, with a little help from the stars

The Falzon family left the Mornington Peninsula for central Australia to create Earth Sanctuary, doing their bit to help the environment.

Co-director of the Earth Sanctuary, Dan Falzon. Picture: Emma Murray

Dan Falzon looks out across the Red Centre of Australia to the back of his family’s 40ha property.

“We’ve had a bit of rain over summer so it’s lush and green, with blue sky today,” says Dan on the phone to The Weekly Times.

“It’s a very pristine environment. Central Australia is harsh but there’s a lot of beauty and growth here.

“It’s the most grounding place I’ve ever been to. It tends to strip things away in your life.”

Alice Springs is a long way from his family’s hobby farm on the Mornington Peninsula, where Dan, 46, and his two brothers Tom, 45, and Ben, 47, grew up and where they still return a couple of times a year.

But since 1999 the three siblings and their dad Joey have called the 40ha property home, making the seemingly random move after a radical decision: to build Earth Sanctuary, a complex dedicated to sustainability education – as well as astronomy – through tourism.

While they may be isolated, the Falzons have nonetheless earned repute and fame for their work.

Earth Sanctuary hosts about 10,000 visitors in a normal year, including through events such as the recent Dark Skies Festival, and with plans to take the Sanctuary on the road to towns around Australia in coming years.

With the three siblings working as paramedics, they have gained the most attention through the 2014 TV documentary Outback Paramedics, which led to the 2020 six-episode series Outback Brothers.

Dan, who for years has worked as an actor including on Neighbours, says the TV shows were inspired by his family’s inspirational lives.

“Ben started as a paramedic in 2001 and Tom and I a bit later in 2006. We were always involved in some kind of volunteering, going right back to Surf Lifesaving on the peninsula,” says Dan, who job shares with Tom, while Ben is a full-time paramedic.

“More than a million people watched the first documentary because in a way being a paramedic is exciting. But we found the response from audiences was they were struck by my family’s journey and the sustainability message.

“That’s what led to Outback Brothers, about finding solutions for climate change.”

Dan – who still works as an actor including in a recent SBS drama – says he and Tom both studied marine biology and zoology at university but left early to travel overseas and start their independent record label.

“But we arrived back in Australia really thinking about this issue (of climate change). Y2K was a bit of a catalyst, raising questions about what if, and how fragile our system is.

“At the time about 1700 scientists wrote a scientific paper, Warning To Humanity, with disturbing data on fisheries, climate, population, forests, soil, and biodiversity.”

He says they then bought the property in Alice Springs because it “called” to them and have since worked hard to build accommodation domes, a homestead, entertainment shed and star observatory.

“We included astronomy because once you start looking at our solar system and how inhospitable some planets are it reminds us we have a very special home here.”

Dan says their key message is that most actions to help the planet are easy, especially accountability of consumption: ensuring, for instance, wood is from plantations, reducing quantity and increasing quality of meat in a diet, and where possibly shopping locally and with short travel distances.

Surprisingly he advocates meditation.

“There’s a lot of anxiety around and not just because of climate change. The technology boom has put a big strain on families and so I think meditation plays a huge part in our lives, to find more balance.

“Before you engage on any journey if you’re peaceful you will make good sound decisions.

“Just breathing and taking five minutes to be calm makes a big difference.”

He says COVID-19 has been a “dress rehearsal”, showing how we can reduce our environmental footprint.

Not surprisingly when asked if he has political aspirations, Dan says “never say never”, currently working with the Northern Territory government on economic recovery for the region.

“The message is always to inspire change. We are not here to be leaders, because we are all in this predicament together.

“We want to support people to be their own leaders, through our own journey inspire others to do something in their own lives.”