Away they go!
Well today the adventure began!
In true ‘nothing like the last minute’ fashion Calem submitted the final draft for his major project for his masters degree at 10:20pm last night, after a full day stint to complete it. Then a few hours of further last minute preparation including adding final items to the food drop boxes and packing up the cars, got to bed at 2:30am only to awake at 4am ready for the adventure to begin…..
Scott & Calem along with Toni and Colin headed off this morning, with 2 cars, 2 floats and 4 horses. With an aim to leave at 6am, Matilda felt the need to develop claustrophobia and took a lot of coaxing to get on the float. With the help of her companion Shadrack and a lot of TLC by Toni and Colin, they proceeded out the gate at 7:30am, with all four horses on board!
At this point we would like to thank Colin & Toni for all their assistance in making this trip possible. While we have had a lot of constraints on our preparation time, we have come a long way from when our plans began mid 2008, and Colin particularly has done a lot of work to assist us in getting where we are today.
Back to the trip…..
The boys are taking the weekend to get up to Providence in NSW and get organised, ready for departure Monday morning. They will be packed up with supplies to last them through the next 7 days where they will be met by the rest of the crew (Jessica & Jessie, and 2 additional horses) next Sunday evening. They will be travelling from Providence through to Khancoban in those 7 days, taking it slow and letting the horses adjust to their new environment and lifestyle.
Some history on the National Trail…
The Bicentennial National Trail was initially organised by RM Williams and Dan Seymor and after 3 years of planning and preparation and in time for the opening in November 1988, they had established and marked the route from Cooktown, Nothern Qld to Healesville, Victoria. The concept had become reality not only for horse riders but also for bush walkers and mountain bike riders. As a multi- purpose trail it was officially launched as the Bicentennial National Trail.
Check out their website for further information: http://www.nationaltrail.com.au/
I will try and keep you up to date on the boys adventures over the next week.
With hopefully lots of pictures to follow.
Thanks everyone for your support!
Jessica
The Odyssey Crew
From Napier in New Zealand – excited to see the first instalment! Looking forward to following the trip, and vicariously enjoying your adventure!
Keep safe, keep posting, and enjoy!
– Keith & Marilyn (Twig).
kdelarue said this on March 1, 2009 at 4:35 pm
Hi Keith, Hope your enjoying NZ.
Just wanting to confirm you guys for Dargo as i have some food drop boxes & horse pellets to drop by this week. As you’re not around perhaps dropping them at Scott’s might be best???
What do you think?
Chat soon, Jess
theodysseycrew said this on March 1, 2009 at 11:00 pm