Survivor: Carnarvon

To be honest there hasn't really been much new and interesting stuff going on. We have been going on in life. We have been really hectic but nothing new. Running our 3 youth groups, youth masses, encounter days, RE classes, jam sessions and the other random things that we do.

We had our Supervisor visit at the beginning of May, which really fun, going out for dinner with Ruth and Jill; whilst the boys went and played poker with the staff from Marist and on to watch The Avengers. We had a lot of things to discuss with our 'Supes' and new bits of training. But in that was a whole bunch of fun. We did find these random bicycle things which were fun.

Jill and I peddling to catch up

We also had a whirlwind of a visit from Ruth's brother Patrick. He definitely brought a bit of spark to the Emerald Team with all of his random comments. One comment he used to describe a tin of tuna with mayonnaise and corn was ' that's like chipmunk and banana.' Maybe it was a 'had to be there thing'. We took hi horse riding at one of our youth group attendees farm fort he first time. He now claims to be a horse rider! We spent the afternoon cantering around the paddocks which was fun.

Giddy up horsey

Getting my country on!

We did however just get back from year 8 camp. Being classed as part of the teaching staff at Marist college has it's perks, so we got to attend the year 8 camp. Not only was it nice to get out of the very small Emerald for a week and go and see some of the surrounding country. We sat on a coach for over 3 hours with 40 year 8 kids, screaming down the bus to each other quotes from ASDF Movies, that was fun. We arrived at Carnarvon Gorge and set up our tents, between Ruth and I we had an 8 man tent, our argument for the sheer size of it was that we were there for the whole week where as everyone else including the teachers were only there 2 nights. The reason we were staying was that they split the 140 kids into 2 smaller more digestible groups and we were the lucky ones to stay the whole time! The first night we introduced the kids to 'Big Foot' who kidnapped Mateo and Odyn and eventually sent them back with a message saying the kids have a series of tasks to complete so that 'Big Foot' wouldn't eat them ... lol. The next day we were sent on a 12km walk through the amazing Carnarvon Gorge, I was looking after a group of 13 kids along with another teacher. I had the privilege of being the chaperon at the back 'cracking the whip' trying to get them to walk just that little bit faster. Although I was 'cracking the whip' I did get to know the kids in my group really well; what else can you do on a 12km walk but talk? On the Wednesday of  camp we sent home the first group of students and teachers home to watch the State of Origin Game 1, but we were greeted by another bunch of year 8's on the Wednesday, so the fun didn't stop. The second group being a slightly larger group, were, lets say a little rowdier than the first bunch, so we had to compete a little more for cooperation but all was well. Unfortunately we had to take the second group home early, on the Thursday as it had started to rain and we were going to be flooded into the camp ground, which wouldn't have been fun at all, considering Ruth was getting over a serious cold, Mateo was in the middle of the serious cold and Odyn and I were on the edge of falling into the same cold. So we gladly took the Friday off and slept in until 12:30 ... heaven.

Well I wasn't complaining about our palace tent ... until we had to put it up

Trying not to fall in the creek

Ruth surviving the treacherous Mickey's Gorge

 I know that my team is very much looking forward to our up-coming mid-year break, and are enjoying making a video ... "A day in the life of the Emerald NET Team' Well I must be going, but I promise to blog soon.

P.S Please keep in your prayers a family that goes to Marist college who have been involved in a serious car accident, which has resulted in two of the youth I minister to, to be in intensive care. Please keep them in your prayers