Mansfield, this year, right now, as winter surrrounds the hills and beyond. Don't imagine for a moment the town of Mansfield shining in July with snow and frost. Forget the postcard images in your mind of an picturesque snowy village. This is an outback town. A street of shops. Estate agents and cafes, gift shops and ski hire shops and pubs. A small grocery mart with its rows of oranges and apples and flowers. The butcher with its prize winning local meats and sausages. The clock and the police monument acknowledging those long dead. The smell of the street, of stone, of the people, of the dogs, of the entity that can only be known as a town, a thing both dead and alive.

Imagine a street frozen in time. Imagine its inhabitants, the young local men in jeans, RJ Williams boots, thick jumpers and glowing faces - cattlemen, the gray-suited bald man with glasses (an estate agent?) shivering, a steaming coffee cup in hand, the handsome and the ugly, the elfine woman laughing - happiness, the roadside cafes, people sitting under the awnings, the brightly clad skiers blown by icy gusts of wind; the masks and the faces they reveal; the ski clad family with ski bags and piles of shopping; they fill their car and then wander down the street, peering into the shop windows, their ski coats fluttering, their hats pulled down over ears. The pick-up trucks parked along side the four wheel drives about to head to the snow. A barking farm dog, the crisp, cold air, the breaths of fog that pour like smoke from the mouths of people wandering the chilly town street. This then is Mansfield, a town alive, Winter and Summer - gateway to the mountains ...