Olinda - Culture and History

The Wurrundjeri people once inhabited this area, passing on to Yarra Valley where they passed their summers on the banks of the Yarra River. The first European known to set foot in the Dandenongs was botanist Daniel Bunce who was drawn from Melbourne by the image of the looming western slopes in 1839. Guided by a party of Aboriginal people he climbed Mt Corhanwarrabul (628 metres) and Mt Dandenong (633 metres) - the two highest peaks in the ranges. Bourkes Lookout (see subsequent entry) is now situated atop the former.

The first European settlers in the Olinda area were the Holden family who camped on the slopes from 1855 and felled mountain ash until the turn of the century. Official settlement began in the 1870s and fruit-growing accompanied timbergetting. Guest houses and tea rooms were established to encourage tourists when fruit prices fell.

Olinda was the only settlement in the hills to be formally laid out thanks largely to the efforts of John Dodd who opened the first shop in the main street in 1893. Distinguished Australian artist Arthur Streeton bought a house here in the 1920s. Novelist Arthur Upfield stayed at a lodge on Mount Dandenong in 1938 and used the area as the setting for two of his detective novels, The Devil's Step (1946) and An Author Bites the Dust (1948).

Markets are held at Olinda on the second Sunday of each month.