Trips To Australia
2005 - The Wombats
The Wombat team were drawn from all over the west and south west of England and South Wales. Many of the team had met and established friendships at the Joshua Foundation team building weekend at Bude, Cornwall in September 2004. This was an excellent opportunity for the young participants of the Oz Experience to come together and meet their potential team leaders and fellow team members. Those who had not met at Bude were to meet up either on the bus journey which started in south Wales or at Heathrow. This was the beginning of the whole Oz Experience and if any one was nervous or even daunted by the thought of making the twelve and a half thousand mile journey to Brisbane via Singapore then they did not show it - though there was a lot of very excited people.
Singapore was the first Asian experience for the majority of the team - and wow what an introduction. We stayed virtually in the centre of the city, within walking distance of the popular Clark Quay, the Singapore Centre at Dobhy Gaut, and China Town. The Fort Canning Lodge where we stayed was great, with its own swimming pool, en-suite bathrooms and a fine breakfast. The Wombats had a little longer in Singapore than the Wallabies, and therefore went on a river and harbour tour, a G-Max Bungee bounce and some the boys did their best to impress some local girls working at one of the restaurants down by the river!
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Our flight to Australia left Singapore at nine o'clock in the evening and we arrived in Brisbane at six thirty in the morning. Most of the team tried to get some sleep on the flight - there must be some photo's circulating about that for which money should be exchanged to stop too many people seeing them. But by the time we landed we were all wide awake and ready for what ever Australia might bring. By this time everyone was so thoroughly fed up of Katrina and myself doing endless head-counts. We always seemed to have one team member missing and always seemed to be asking "Where is HE?" After a short bus journey into the centre of Brisbane, we booked into the Central Youth Hostel - which was excellent - we decided that we would try and adopt the old adage and "....live as the Aussies do...." and hit the beach. We jumped on a train and went to Surfers Paradise. Unfortunately this was a much longer journey than we were led to believe, and involved a bus as well as a train journey. Fortunately, the beach was all you would want it to be all soft sand and giant waves. We spent about four hours on the beach and then got back to Brisbane in time for a meal at the Hogs Breath Café - which most people were too tired to eat and more than one person put their heads on the table for a quick five minute nap. Needless to say, most people were in bed well before mid-night - though I had a knock at my door around then with three lads offering me a cup of lemon tea! Cheers boys, nice one.
The next day we were up bright and early and set off for the Australia Zoo - that's the one made famous by Steve Irwin. It was an unbelievably great day, and we saw everything from Crocodiles to Javanese Tigers and Wallabies - and of course we saw Wombats, our very own team mascot. That evening we set off as a team to watch War of the Worlds in the centre of Brisbane. The next day (Sunday) we met our Conservation Volunteers team-leaders (Des and Sarah) and set off for Kooralbyn where we would be staying whilst working at Gilgal and Mount Barney National Park. At Kooralbyn Katrina and I operated an open house policy whereby everybody called round to us for breakfast and evening meal - and of course regular screenings of Neighbours and Australian Big Brother.
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The work we did was often quite gruelling, digging out lantana (a weed with sharp spines that cut even the hardiest of volunteers) at Gilgal and laying new paths at Mount Barney. We did manage though to enjoy ourselves by going on an Aussie Muster and Bush Dance - the Rocking Chair dance will stay with me for ever more - and a trip to Lamington National Park at Binna Burra, and a bush walk in which we saw rare Brush-tailed Rock Wallabies and wild Koalas.
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The Oz Experience was unfortunately over far too quickly, but for the Wombats friendships will be forged that will live on for many years to come. Reunions are being planned - some have been executed. The team went away bright eyed young people off on their first experience of a new continent and came back battled scared veterans of the Lantana Bush Wars. They are a great team one and all….even though they kept calling me Dad!
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