Australia!

Well I had a great time in Oz, I arrived in Sydney on Thursday evening and stayed with a Navigator couple, Ian and Helen and their family, who know Lynton and Philippa through the Navs network. Helen picked me up at the train station and one of the first things I noticed when I got out of the car was the strong smell of eucalyptus, honestly, I reckon Australia smells like one of my aromatherapy baths! The following day we drove for about 3 1/2 hours to get to the conference, which was south west of Sydney in a place called Kangaroo Valley; by the time we arrived there on Friday evening it was dark.

During the conference I went for a run each morning, which allowed me to see a bit more of the surrounding area; Australia is so different from NZ. When I was running I came across lots of red and grey kangaroo's, and wombats in the wild, as well as a spectacular array of bird life. I stopped to listen to the forest now and then, which was alive with all sorts of interesting noises, it sounded like an ancient rain forest to me. One morning I ran into a huge Kangaroo that was as tall as a man and quite intimidating let me tell you!

The conference itself was excellent. Paul Stanley focussed upon Christ like leadership and I was challenged to consider my leadership style; am I a leader who serves others or a servant who leads others? Paul Stanley is a wonderful storyteller and his stories are one of the things I will take away with me. Most of the other people at the conference were older, married men, which definitely influenced the weekend plans (it was down to the pub on Saturday night to watch the finals of the rugby league!), although that did not phase me much, I actually found the whole weekend very valuable, particularly the teaching.

The conference finished at about 1pm on Monday and I got a lift back to Sydney where I stayed with the Lynden-Bells, the family I stayed with when I first visited Oz on my way across to NZ. It was a brief but worthwhile visit and this time I got to catch up with my friend Saphy, which was great.

Then on Tuesday I flew back to NZ and lost three hours of my day (due to the two hours time difference, plus an extra hour of day light saving) and had dinner with the Brocklehurst's where I met the international director of Navigators Jerry White and Mike Treneer, the European director, who are over in NZ celebrating 50 years of Navigators in NZ. So I feel like I've met lots of international Navigators over the last few days, Americans, Europeans, Australians and of course Kiwi's, full on!

Later! From Ayley