A New Life: Xandria Williams, part-time alpaca farmer, tells Sylvia Thompson how she got involved in the business.
Xandria Williams jumps off her quad and extends and invitation to see the alpacas on her Co Offaly smallholding before we retreat inside from the rain to hear how this London-based naturopath became a part-time alpaca farmer in the heart of the Irish midlands.
Like small camels without the humps, the young female alpacas are a little nervous of the visitor yet one nuzzles into Xandria as she shows off the softness of their fleece and their soft padded feet. Then, off she goes, back to gently graze with the herd.
Williams inherited 15 acres of boggy land near Carbury, Co Kildare and a modest house from her aunt, Shelagh Riall who died in 1999.
"I inherited two ducks, two dogs, two donkeys, six cats, 15 acres of Irish bog and a senile uncle," she says.
Having had a rather peripatetic childhood (born in Dublin, she moved with her mother to Belfast during the second World War, then spent the rest of her childhood between England, Scotland, Australia and New Zealand, during which time her parents separated), she became very close to a paternal aunt who lived in London and later retired back here with her husband, Charles.
"She sort-of adopted me. She had no children of her own. We used to send hour-long cassette tapes to each other telling each other about our daily activities. I used to tell her all my news and she would talk about walking the dogs and Charles cutting the turf."
After earning a degree in chemistry at the Imperial College, London, Williams worked as a geochemist in New Zealand, Fiji and Australia . While working as a geochemist during Australia's mining boom, she decided to buy a healthfood store in Sydney .
Soon afterwards, she quit the commercial consultancy work - "having worked in applied research for government departments, I eventually found I couldn't compromise my principles as a pure scientist in the commercial world," she says.
She began lecturing first in biochemistry and then also in nutrition at various chiropractic and naturopathy colleges in Australia.
Around this time, she also did a four-year, full-time course in naturopathy and began working as a naturopath and writing for health and lifestyle magazines while continuing her lecturing.
"In Australia , approximately 50 per cent of prime contact consultations (excluding medical referrals to specialists) are to naturopaths or chiropractors and 50 per cent are to doctors.
" In Australia, many people are aware of the risks of chemical drugs and aware of the impact of their thoughts and feelings on their physical health. Many are also into meditation and personal growth and development. For me, it was a very exciting place to be in practice."
However, her close bond with her aunt brought her back to this part of the world.
"When she was 83, I decided I couldn't wait in Australia for a call to say she had passed away so I moved back to London in 1996 and I came over here every month. She died three years later as I sat by her bedside holding her hand."
Ever since she has come back at weekends while continuing to work as a naturopath close to her house in Sloane Street , London .
During the last number of years, she has also written many books on subjects including candida, liver detox and chronic fatigue.
"I had got into the habit of coming over most weekends to look after Charles - and after he died on Christmas Day, 1999, the pattern just continued. "I always had a bit of a bent for a smallholding but a bigger bent for city sophisticated living.
But how did she get into alpaca farming? "I saw a supplement on alpacas in one of the English smallholding magazines.
I went to visit a farm in England where the owner had 800 alpacas and I fell in love with them. He said he had been looking for an Irish agent for a few years so I bought into it - initially as a silent partner with someone else looking after them - but now, I manage the lot."
Xandria speaks fondly of the group of people who have bought alpacas, some of whom pay her to look after them and simply come to visit them.
"I have sold alpacas to people in over 12 counties in Ireland. Some people buy them to breed and others have bed and breakfast or guesthouses and they like them as pets."
But, isn't it difficult to live this kind of dual existence between London and the Irish midlands?
"It's marvellous. I've been seeing patients for eight years now in London , just two minutes walk from my house. I enjoy my friends socially and at the club during the week and like many of them, I frequently go to the country at the weekends. My house just happens to be in another country.
"I do four and a half hours travelling to get here at weekends. As I drive down from Dublin airport, the excitement is building to get on my muddy Wellingtons and scruffy clothes and be out in the fields. Then, on Monday evenings, I'm back in my city clothes, taking the tube to Sloane Square.
Once, I'm there, it's nice to be back and I've all these ideas for my writing work. I hate leaving both places but I love arriving at the next place."
www.alpacas-of-ireland.com