Ash O’Neil and Carolyn Rose are among the hundreds of Halcyon home owners preparing to walk or run in events with Team Halcyon at the upcoming Gold Coast Marathon (6-7 July) and Sunshine Coast Marathon (2-4 August). We spoke to them about their motivations, goals and the benefits of taking part.

Ash O’Neil - Halcyon Parks - 5km walk in the Sunshine Coast Marathon

Why are you entering?

It’s my third time doing the 5km event. I’m doing it for the enjoyment, the companionship and for the fundraising that Halcyon does for Ronald McDonald House. Because it’s a charity that we’re contributing to I ...

Pickleball devotee Keith Bing discovered the “addictive magic” of the sport within hours of jetting into sunny Florida in 2012.

He and wife Sharon had returned to live in the US after spending more than 25 years working and travelling abroad.

Their first stop was visiting a college buddy of Keith’s at The Villages retirement community near Orlando.

The friend insisted that Keith immediately join him for a game of pickleball: a blend of tennis, badminton and table tennis, and the fastest growing sport in the US.

It was the last thing Keith felt like doing.

“I was completely jet-lagged and all I wanted to ...

The Halcyon family has dug deep to raise a whopping $50,000 for Queensland’s peak domestic violence support organisation, DV Connect.

Home owners, staff, family and friends have organised and attended events ranging from a trivia night through to a gala ball for this very worthy cause.

The funds will be used to furnish DV Connect’s new bridging accommodation complex, currently being purpose-built by Halcyon and Mirvac on the northern Gold Coast.

Due to open in June, the facility is the first of its kind in Queensland and will help affected women and their children start a fresh chapter in their lives.

The largest of ...

Halcyon Greens at Pimpama sits on the edge of the Gold Coast’s largest manmade wildlife sanctuary.

The 300-hectare wilderness hugs the northern edge of Mirvac’s Gainsborough Greens masterplanned community and provides a green haven for native flora and fauna.

For 15 years, conservationist Matt Keys has worked with Mirvac to oversee the transformation of the massive swamp, forest and farmland parcel into a purpose-built ‘lifeboat’ for the area’s native animals.

Today the fenced sanctuary comprises several large manmade freshwater lagoons, planted native forests, a thoughtfully redesigned 18-hole golf course as well as 50ha of preserved old-growth forests with trees up to 700 years ...

A whirlwind romance that started over an online word game has blossomed into marriage with a beautiful wedding at Halcyon Lakeside’s Recreational Club.

Surrounded by family, friends and fellow home owners, Lynne Shields, 60, and Trevor Renn, 63, signed, sealed and celebrated their partnership on Saturday 2 March.

It was the third wedding ever held in a Halcyon community, and Lynne said they had plenty of neighbourly support in pulling their big day together.

“You forget how much organisation a wedding takes,” she laughed.

“A lot of our friends here helped us out with the wedding; so many putting up the decorations, setting up ...

Halcyon has plenty of ‘ladies who lunch’, so it’s good to know there are also ‘blokes who breakfast’ at Vision by Halcyon.

Once a month, many of the community’s male home owners head off to a Runaway Bay cafe where they sit down to a hearty breakfast and a big helping of camaraderie for an hour or so.

Home owner Marcel van Hooft said the Vision men’s breakfast group started in 2016 by five of the community’s ‘early settlers’ who yearned for a big brekkie of lamb’s fry and bacon.

“These were the men with strong stomachs,” Marcel joked.

“They hunted around for a ...

Selling the family home is a big step, and for many people the decision to sell is understandably difficult. After all, our home is a sanctuary, it’s where we raised our family, and it’s where we can truly be ourselves. We form deep emotional connections with our homes and deciding to leave all that behind for somewhere new can be challenging. 

But as our circumstances change, our homes no longer become fit for purpose and it’s clear that it’s time to move. For many, this decision is closely followed by the next difficult decision – when should I sell to ensure ...

A major new ecological habitat spanning more than 58 hectares has been created on the northern Gold Coast by one of Australia’s leading environmental experts.

Habitat’s Matt Keys has transformed a tired cow paddock into a thriving ecosystem at Gainsborough Greens in Pimpama, adjacent to lifestyle community Halcyon Greens.

The region is now regarded as one of the most ecologically diverse areas on the Gold Coast and home to koalas, kangaroos, gliders, eagles, owls and dozens of bird species.

Mr Keys said that careful planning and design started 15 years ago to create a dual function for the ...

Halcyon Lakeside at Bli Bli is Australia’s best Seniors Living community after winning the accolade at the 2019 UDIA National Awards for Excellence.

Lakeside prevailed in a strongly contested field of projects from across Australia to deliver Halcyon its fourth national award.

The picturesque community overlooking two lakes picked up the gong just months after winning in the same category at the 2018 UDIA Qld Awards for Excellence.

Halcyon joint manager director Dr Bevan Geissmann said receiving the national award in the company’s 15th anniversary year was particularly momentous.

“We are enormously proud to receive peer recognition at the national level for Halcyon Lakeside,” ...

Find out how to maximise the sale price of your home and discover the right lifestyle for your ‘next step’ at one of Halcyon’s upcoming Property Q&A Sessions.

These informative sessions cut through the speculation and negativity swirling the real estate sector in southern states to present the facts on South East Queensland’s property market.

The Real Estate Institute of Queensland’s Felicity Moore will discuss the latest data on the region’s top performing markets: the Gold Coast, Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast. “It would be easy to think with all the doom and gloom forecast in the national broadsheets that Queensland’s housing ...