Chris Hemsworth was only four years out from making his big landing in Hollywood as Thor in 2011, when he decided to leave tinsel town with his family.
Not physically – he has since gone on to do countless movies, including almost ten Marvel blockbusters – but it didn't take long for him to find out that his native Australia was the homebase he needed for his mental health.
The Furiosa actor, 40, has been back in Australia with his wife Elsa Pataky and their three kids since 2015, and recently opened up about making the big move just as his career was skyrocketing.
Why did Chris Hemsworth move back to Australia?
Speaking with Vanity Fair, Chris – who now lives in Byron Bay, a surf town south of Australia's Gold Coast – recalled initially moving to be closer to his parents, Leonie and Craig Hemsworth, but noted how his evolving relationship with Hollywood, and its occasional superficiality, was also a motivating factor.
He remembered thinking: "I'm sick of my face," and his conflicting feelings of: "Why isn't it on a billboard? I'm too famous. Why are there paparazzi here? Wait, why aren't there any paparazzi here?" He asked himself: "Well, which do you want, Chris?"
Now, he lives in a town that sees him as a true local, "one of us" a hotel employee told VF, and in a home with no room for boredom.
© InstagramChris' Byron Bay Family Home
Aside from its proximity to the beach, Chris and Elsa's home features an "enormous" fish tank, and houses their three dogs, rabbits, guinea pigs, chickens, donkeys, not to mention their horses that reside in their nearby farm.
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His daughter India, 13 in May, is a true animal lover and living a life straight out of a Disney princess movie; she keeps birds in an enclosed balcony off of her bedroom, and one of them even enjoys perching itself on her shoulder from time to time.
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Both India, named after Indiana Jones, and her mom are competitive horseback riders, and Chris described his daughter not only as "the best rider in the family," but also revealed: "Even when she falls off, she's more angry than she is afraid: 'Get me back on that horse!'"
© InstagramChris and Elsa's kids
Chris and Elsa met in 2010 after they were introduced by his talent agent, and they started dating that September. They tied the knot only three months after they first started dating, in Australia with a surprise, intimate wedding over Christmas.
They welcomed India in May of 2012, followed by twins Sasha and Tristan, ten, in 2014. Tristan was named after Brad Pitt's Legend of the Fall character Tristan Ludlow, and Sasha after a stuntman friend.
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