The Trip over to Adelaide

Korewal Venturers, my Venturer unit, recently enjoyed the chance to make new friends and have a lot of fun at the recent Venture in Adelaide. Seven out of the 10 Venturers in the unit attended this event and all came back with glowing reports of the activities and organization of the Venture. The Venturers left on the 2nd of January for the 10 day activity from Melbourne Scout Head Quarters on bus one, one of the 8 coaches hired to transport the 450 or so Victorian Venturers on the contingent transport. The Coach trip over was brightened by jokes from our Coach captain, Matt Bourne (VL for Gardiner Venturers) and a game of truth participated in by many Korewal venturers and others sitting in the vicinity.

The coaches arrived in Adelaide to a great welcome from other Victorian Venturers and the organizers of the event. As buses were unloaded and each of us started to wake up, we all caught our last glimpses of other members of our unit, before embarking on the Venture.

At the showgrounds

We were registered very quickly and then shown towards our campsites, we were to camp with our Mega 10 units.... groups of about 40 venturers who were to do the same activity as you. My unit was camped closest to the food tents (at all three camp grounds) and the furtherest from any other people that I knew. I was introduced to my unit leaders, I met our VL, Ray woods, surprisingly from the next district, and an AVL Bev, from Queensland.

Then as I got swept away towards the food tent, I spotted a familiar face, someone I met from Mindwarp (QS Ideals camp). She introduced me to many people she knew and they became my companions for the rest of the night.

The second day was the Adelaide foot rally, a tour of Adelaide by foot. Each unit was split into 2 groups, these groups had about 20 people in them and they had a set of Questions which they had to do. Our group, in typical 063 fashion, decided that they didn't want to do that and opted instead for a rest in the shady Victoria Square.

This however did not last long as the group spotted a "City circle" bus and decided that it would be a good (air conditioned) way of seeing Adelaide. The group (of about 30 now) climbed on board the free service and went around the loop, however while on the bus, something more interesting caught the unit's collective interest.... they saw a "Toys R Us" sign and decided that was where we were headed next. We went into the previously quiet shop and caused havoc for a while, with 25 people in a lift and approxiamately half of the unit buying water pistols.

Our next stop was the local McDonald's restaurant, before we leisurely strolled off in the direction of lunch.

The Unit however was distracted by one of the marvellous fountains in front of the museum. The fountain was beautifully cool and it was such a hot day, we couldn't help but accidently fall in :-). The entire group climbed into the clear chlorinated South Australian water and had a brief swim which was recorded by the National Nine News team and then we made a short stop in Hungry Jacks for lunch.

After lunch we had to move back to Victoria Square to begin the grand parade. The parade was nothing more than the mass of all the contingents walking through the middle of Adelaide. The Victorians (the only contingent I could hear) were shouting "We got the Grand Prix" since this seemed to annoy the South Australians immensely and "We are the best cos we're Victorian" or "We love you cos your Victorian" which annoyed every other state beyond belief.

The opening ceremony was brief but hot and the South Australian premier tactfully shut the Victorian contingent up by saying "but we didn't want the Grand Prix, so we gave it to you". The Rest of the day past in packing up tents, cleaning up campsites and queuing for food.

That Friday night was the "Gaolhouse Rock" a disco in the old Adelaide Gaol. The crowd of Venturers were treated to a fire works spectacular and two dance floors...... and a barred and locked gate. All the Venturers were locked into the jail for a period of 1 and a half hours, while Adelaide recovered from the shock of having them there :).

Port Lincoln

That night, Units 061, 062 and 063 boarded buses PTL1, PTL2 and PTL3 (note the original naming system) at 2am to go to their Expedition destination - Port Lincoln, an 11 hour bus trip away. The bus trip was quiet as most people attempted sleep... some suceeding by finding a comfortable postion on the floor.

We arrived at Port Lincoln just before lunch so we had a lunch (prepared by the Salvation Army) and set up our tents, in the middle of a soccer oval, on a 40 degree day.

We were told we were going to the beach..... with mounting enthusiasm for the coming swim people raced back to tents to find their bathers and sunscreeen. "The beach" happened to be an hour away and we had to walk half a kilometer to get to water and then another half a kilometer to get to deep water, but the refreshment the water brought was relief from the heat anyway. Tea was served on the beach, where two idiotic people (me included) decided involuntarily to go coal walking, those two idiotic people spent the rest of the night in first aid being tended by St. Johns cadets and at the "local" Port Lincoln hospital while the others got to play with flares supported by the Port Lincoln Fire Brigade and State Emergency Service. Sunday was too hot for the planned activities to go ahead so we spent the morning on the foreshore talking, playing cards and enjoying the presence of our new friends and in the town stocking up on all the essentials, drinks, drinks, drinks and chips. The afternoon was spent quite happily at the indoor pool where long chains of Venturers were seen to be going down the indoor water slide and many people were found to be relaxing in the shade of the building, because since our arrival at the soccer oval, shade was in very short supply. The evening was also spent at the indoor pool where the entire place was booked out for our use. The chains on the slide seemed to increase to greater lengths and the unlucky few who weren't swimming took the opportunity for a nice refreshing long hot shower... since shower facilities at our home (the soccer oval) were very basic.

The next day was a bit cooler, (35 degrees rather than 40 degrees) cool enough for the planned activities of the past day and that day could go ahead, we spent the morning on a tour of Boston Island and had lunch on the foreshore and more time in town, (to replenish our already deminishing supplies of chips and drinks) then we had a tour of a tuna platform and were allowed to fish from the outside only - no catching fish from within the tuna farm. I caught a slippery mackerel and other people caught various other types of fish. That night there was a beach party which I did not attend and a game of football where the players were wearing their boxer shorts..... quite an interesting spectator sport!

Tuesday was another hot day and our unit was going to be spending it at Kallidy Bay doing various water sports. The sports were Canoeing, Jet-skiing and Water-skiing. Everyone who did the activities enjoyed them immensely..... but because of my burnt foot I had to forego the fun of these activities in favour of the shade of the command tent.

Tuesday night the organisers had hired a band..... A folk band :). The opening bars of the heel and toe polka drew the people from all over the camp... many pairs attempted the dance, to some funny results. At midnight everything was packed up and we were all waiting for our buses to take us back to Adelaide... we faced yet another long trip back but now we knew many people on our bus and the bus trip was much more interesting than last time :).

Woodhouse Scout Campsite

We arrived back at Woodhouse Campsite, our basecamp for the next 5 days and set up our tents in the 063 campsite. We were once again closest to the food tent and also in a good position for the bus stops etc. We had lunch and checked out many of the onsite activities such as the Internet Central and the areas being set up for the movies and the niteclub E.X.H.A.L.E. There was also other places such as the bank, the main arena and the shop that needed investigating.

That night we had the 2nd opening ceremony with bands such as Splash and Def FX. A lot of Venturers attended these concerts which didn't finish until 3am, so there was many a tired teenager at the next day's activities.

The next day I was onsite and we spent the day having a HOT shower, banking and spending, organising our next days' trip to Adelaide and sitting around our campsite making new friends and spending time with newly made friends, something my friends and I did a lot of whilst at Mega 10.

The Next day my friends and I recieved "city" tickets, which entitled us to travel to Adelaide. We went shopping, to see "Romeo and Juliet" and sight seeing and returned on a 6pm bus in time for the Queen's Scout Gathering.

The Queen's scout gathering....... Was one of the highlights of the trip.... NOT. The gathering was a gathering of all past and present Queen's Scouts from all over australia and the world. The Gathering was essentially an interest meeting for the QSAA, the Queen's Scout's Association of Australia. The meeting had about 100 Venturers and leaders at it, from places all over australia and the world, such as Canada and Japan and consisted of food, drinks and boring speeches, but it gave each of us the chance to meet fellow Queen's Scouts.

The next day was our second last full day at Woodhouse. My friends and I went on Challenge Hill obstacle course again and spent a lot of time hiding from the sun as the day was approxiamately 38 degrees again. That night there was some of what I would class as good bands, they played 70's dance type music and it was really good as every one was having fun trying to dance.

The following day was Sunday, the last day of the Venture, I was on an off site tour to Greenhills Adventure Park this day with about 50 other people. At Greenhills we played minigolf, went down the water slides, went on a jumping thing, went on a tour of the park and had water fights on the water bikes and pedal boats :).

Sunday night was the last night at the Venture. Each Unit had their unit photos taken and addresses were swapped. The closing ceremony was held and the organisers had approxiamately 1000 people doing the Macarena, during the 9pm Macarena fest. They also had a presentation from Victoria who is holding the next venture in the year 2000 called V2K or "Party of the Century". The premier of Victoria, Mr. Jeff Kennett welcomed all the Venturers to the 2000 Venture in Victoria and in return was warmly recieved by the Victorian contingent, but not by too many other people.

Goodbyes

The rest of the night was spent in small groups saying goodbyes and promising to write. In the morning the first contingent to board their buses was the Western Australians at 6am, many tears were shed as people said goodbye to people who had become so dear to them over the past 10 days. Next the Victorian contingent had to board their buses, this is where I leave the fun and friendship of Adelaide behind, with a hug for each of my friends and final reminders to write and visit, we were herded aboard the buses.

Once again on the bus I was able to catch up with my Venturer unit who I had not seen for basically the duration of the camp, except for the odd visit or short conversation. The trip home however was very sombre as many people contemplated going back to the real world after so many days in a friendly caring, catered for environment where there was always something to do and always someone to talk to.