Rotary Club of Qualicum Beach Sunrise

In July our club hosted 9 Australians from District 9450 in Perth, Western Australia. Dave and Sue Taggert and Rev. Des Cousins from the Scarborough Rotary Club; Jen and Jim Benson from the Rotary Club of Hillarys;John and Paula Watson from the Matilda Bay Rotary Club; and Team Leader Colin Gilbert and Colin's wife Diane both members of the Rotary Club of Heirisson.

The Australians flew into Campbell River for the first stop on their visit to our District.

After 3 days in the Campbell River area, Dave Hanna and his group delivered our guests to the base of Mt Washington where the transfer occured. We drove to the parking lot and took the chairlift to the top where the Aussies frolicked in the few remaining patches of snow. After a Pub lunch in the Chalet we drove down Island to Rotary House and the guests met their hosts.

The next morning it was an early start to get to Port Alberni in time for the 8 am sailing of the Lady Rose to Banfield. Another spectacularly sunny day with several stops at fish camps and logging shows provided a wonderful taste of life on the West Coast. A 3 hour stop in Banfield provided time for a walkabout and lunch then it was back to the Lady Rose in time for the trip back to Port. We had dinner at the dockside in Port and then joined in the festivities that were kicking off the Tall Ships Festival that was to start the next day.

The third day was a day of rest, a walkabout in Qualicum Beach, some shopping, an informal lunch then back to the hosts for some respite in preparation for our evening Bahby at Rotary Park. District Governor Brian and wife Barbara were in attendance along with a good turnout from both Qualicum Rotary Clubs. The guests were stars of the show with there rendition of Waltzing Matilda and other down under melodies.

The next morning we delivered our guests to Nanaimo, their next port of call and after some hugs and a few tears we bid them adieu.

In early November after spending 3 weeks in New South Wales and Victoria, Pat and I flew into Perth to be met by Dave and Sue Taggert, Jim and Jen Benson and our hosts from the Hillary's Rotary Club Bill and Vanessa Holman.

The first morning our 5020 outbound team of Dave Nelson from Port McNeill, Dave and Coral Hanna from Campbell River, Pat & I, Richard and Nancy Calverley from South Cowichan and Van and Carolan Van Jepmond from Lacey met at the Beach Shack Cafe at the Hillary's Marina where Jim and Jen, our tour directors outlined our itinerary for our 4 days with Hillary's RC and it included: a visit to the spectacular Hillary's Aquarium and then to Caversham Wildlife Park where we got to pet and feed Kangaroos and scratch Wombats and Koalas behind their ears; a visit to a Winery in the Swan Valley where, at lunch, Ed ordered Kangaroo steak (delicious); a visit to the State Legislature where Jim's brother, an elected member of the Upper House, treated us to a sumptuous lunch in the Legislative Dinning Room. In addition to the Hillary's itinerary, our hosts, Bill and Vanessa were also on a mission to show us everything of interest in and around north Perth, they treated us like royalty. This was to be a common theme with each of our 4 hosts, they couldn't do enough for us. We were on the go from early morning until evening usually dropping into bed dead tired but by morning looking forward to the advenures of that day.

Our next host Club was the Scarborough Rotary Club and our hosts were Dave and Sue Taggert. Our itinerary for the next 4 days was in a word "chockers". We took a day cruise aboard Rotarian Bob Phelps boat to spend a day at Rottnest Island about a 40 minute run from Freemantle Harbour to Rottnest. The boat was moored at the Royal Perth Yacht Club in Matilda Bay on the Swan River across the river from downtown Perth and the 30 minute trip down the Swan to Freemantle was beautiful. On Rottnest we took a 1 hour bus tour of the Island, saw some "Quokkas" and some migrating Whales and then came back to the boat for a freshly caught seafood lunch followed by a swim, accompanied by Sting Ray's in the turquoise waters of the Indian Ocean. The Scarborough Rotary Club has an amazing record of both Community and International Service. They fund their Service projects with revenue from their very well endowed Foundation that has assets of more than $1 million AU. Contributions to the Foundation come from their very successful Karrinyup Swap Meet that runs every Sunday and is located in the covered parking garage of the huge Karrinyup Shopping Mall in North Perth. The Swap Meet attracts up to 100 merchants who pay for stall space and many hundreds of shoppers who pay an admission fee of $1. The Club realizes $4000 per week net and those funds in turn go into their Foundation.
The most impressive Service initiative of the Scarborough Club is their Wheelchair Factory located in East Perth. Under Rotarian and Project Director Brother Ollie Pickett and all volunteer labour (they have people on a wait list to volunteer)they can manufacture, package and ship a wheelchair for a unit cost of $100 AU. Thus far they have produced well over 20,000 wheelchairs. Our group puchased a Wheelchair as did Richard and Nancy to take home to their disabled ward.
On a lighter note we drove approximatly 2 hours east from Perth over the Escarpment and onto the great expanse of Western Australia to Toodyay a small farm (300 acres) that is owned by a Scarborough Rotarian. We toured the farm and enjoyed a traditional Aussie Bahby of steak and sausage and umpteen different kinds of salad. You havn't lived until you try and eat with flies crawling into every exposed orifice - thats why Australians wear those funny hats - anyway we tasted a wee bit of outback Australia.
Another interesting adventure was our glimpse of "Beach Culture" in Australia. Dave Taggert is a member of the Scarborough Surf Life Saving Club and we went with Dave to his Club to witness the events of a normal Sunday on the beach. The Club House itself is very upscale with a shop selling beach ware, a restaraunt, a storage shed for their competitive boats, many meeting rooms and just adjacent to the beach a huge and very comfortable covered bleacher section that would probably seat several hundred spectators. What do you watch you ask? On the beach and in the water (the surf was up) there were young people competing in a wide range of activities - races on the sand; swimmers swimming or paddling out around buoys; as well as young people receiving instruction in aspects of lifesaving. It's no wonder Australians do so well athletically because everywhere you looked on the beach young people were competing, it's truly part of their very core.

Our next hosts were John and Anne Lindsay, John is the President of the Matilda Bay Rotary Club. Paula and John Watson were our tour guides and they had created an itinerary that included a very interesting walking tour of Downtown Perth that ended at the Bell Tower which is located at the foot of Barrack Street. The Bell Tower is a part of a Park area on the Swan and after lunch we caught a tour bus that took us up to and around Kings Park the magnificent natural park that sits on a Bluff with a view of the Swan and Perth laid out before you. Kings Park reminded us a lot of Stanley Park because they have maintained the natural vegetation of the coastal plain of Western Australia. If you ever go to Perth, make sure you include a visit to King's Park.
One of the most interesting visits, arranged by Paula, was our day spent at New Norcia, a Benedictine community located 132 km north east of Perth. Founded in 1846 as a Aboriginal Mission and still somewhat active to this day, it presents an opportunity to see firsthand evidence of early Christian activity in Western Australia.

Our next host Club was the Heirisson Rotary Club. As we did with all of the Clubs we visited we attended the Heirisson RC meeting. Our agenda for these meetings was for each of us to provide a short profile of our Club's activites, something we got better at with each presentations. In each case we were the Program for that day. The Australians we met at the four Club meetings were incredibly open and friendly and you were truly made to feel welcome.
Our Heirisson hosts were Mike and Judy Fetherston, a couple that we really bonded with. Mike is a Geologist and has spent much of his working life in the northern and western reaches of Western Australia and is very familiar with the Aboriginal people and their art. Mike and Judy took us to Freemantle (another must see if you are in Perth) where we did a walkabout in this older and very trendy and interesting city. At an Aboriginal Art shop Pat and I, with Mikes help, purchased some authentic Aboriginal art to add to our native art collection.
Dianne and Colin Gilbert our official Heirisson guides arranged a day trip to Mandurah a city about 100 km south of Perth. Mandurah, the retirement capital of Western Australia, boast an incredible new and very up scale residential area developed around a network of man made canals that come off of the very large lagoon to the west of the city. We took the train from Perth to Mandurah, about a 45 minute ride, that runs down the median of the new Freeway that is under construction and when finished will link Perth with the Margaret River area in SW Australia. We were met at the station in Mandurah by Dianne who had arranged a busy day: a cruise on the Canals; a vist to the Marapana Wildlife Reserve; and at the end of the day Fish and Chips and a cool one at the Dolphin Quay in Mandurah.
The final activity of our Perth experience was a wind-up Bahby at Colin and Diannes home with everyone present. At the end of the evening there were lots of hugs, a few tears, and promises to keep in touch with a suggestion that many of us would get together in Montreal in 2010.
Rotary is all about fellowship and developing relationships and that is what the Rotary Friendship Exchange is all about. Perth was a great experience and probably our best vacation experience ever.