Episode 347 - What Windmill?

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

Welcome

00:00:24Simon Mackley: Welcome to episode 347 of the parkrun adventurers podcast a podcast about life if your life is all about parkrun I'm Simon and I'm joining you from Quandamooka Country And I'm Melissa Ellis and I'm coming to you from Wurundjeri Country and welcome officially to the team Simon Thank you very much. It is fantastic to be here again and to be on the team

00:00:49Melissa Ellis: Yay, and you're going to have a regular little spot, so yes, the third Monday of the month.

00:00:57Simon Mackley: Yes, I've put that in the calendar now.

00:00:59Melissa Ellis: We've had a few announcements that have happened since you were last on. There's a bit of conjecture about messy desks and post-it notes, but we'll put that all in the past.

00:01:11Simon Mackley: Fair enough, that's a good idea. Yeah.

00:01:14Melissa Ellis: I'm done with beeping people out and getting shocked about announcements. But anyway, Simon, we do have or we have let slip in the last couple of episodes about the date and the location for next year's Palm. So that's a bit exciting. I know people had been waiting, wanting to know, so they could book annual leave and make their plans. So would you like to reinforce the details?

00:01:43Simon Mackley: Well, my understanding is that we're going to Toowoomba in Queensland, so return to Queensland on the 13th of April next year.

00:01:53Melissa Ellis: That is correct. So, yes, it'll be our second visit to the state of Queensland, Kingsland even. Oh, yes. And going inland this time. So Ollie and I did mention Queensland. A couple of months ago about Toowoomba being the largest inland city or the, yeah, the largest inland city. Yes. I've never been to Toowoomba, but a very pretty place apparently. So that's good. I'm looking forward to going and learning all there is to know. And, of course, we're going to have Eman on the ground to help us with the local knowledge.

00:02:30Simon Mackley: Yeah, he's going to be able to race everyone, I guess. I'm sure he's going to be wanting to see the fast people as well as the slow people. Yeah.

00:02:38Melissa Ellis: So yes that's out now we've ripped that band-aid off and we hope that people are as excited as we are to be going up to Toowoomba for Palm at 2024.

00:02:50Simon Mackley: I was gonna say I'm excited it's gonna be back in my backyard I'll be able to drive there and it'll be yeah maybe the second time I go to Toowoomba because I'm going in a couple of weeks time. Oh what's that for? I'm going with some of the the ambassadors from South East Queensland. We have a catch-up every quarter, and this time it's the western side, so we're heading to Toowoomba.

00:03:12Melissa Ellis: Ah, very good. So, yes. And what about your parkrun day, Simon? Would you like to tell us what you did on Saturday?

00:03:20Simon Mackley: My parkrun day was a bit of a fail. I did not make it to parkrun. I woke up at 7.01. Wow. Yes, I didn't set an alarm, but that was purposeful because the previous day I had rubbed sunscreen in my eye and my eye, I couldn't drive. I couldn't see out of one eye. Yeah, I had no depth perception. So I thought if I wake up early, I'll go if my eye's okay. And I didn't set an alarm, as I say. So yeah, 7.01, I rolled over, woke up and went, there it is. That's fate. What did you get up to?

00:04:00Melissa Ellis: Well, I went to Diamond Creek parkrun on the lands of the Wurundjeri people to celebrate Craig Ryan's 250th milestone. And I did mention that at the end of last episode. So it was my third visit to Diamond Creek with my previous visits being in May 2016 and February 2019. So a little bit of time in between visits. It starts and finishes at Mahngrook and the course is an out and back on a concrete path with a short detour on the return leg about 225 metres up a side path. Not much has changed since my first visit and aside from a little extra car park at the start finish area the course remains pretty much as it was when it first began. The path, aptly named the Diamond Creek Trail, follows the curves of Diamond Creek, a tributary of the Yarra River, with the locality bearing the same name. Diamond Creek is about 23 kilometres northeast of the Melbourne CBD and was just a cruisy one hour's drive from Meltown. I was joined there by fellow adventurers TOC and Jacqui O'Connell, who'd made the trip from Inverloch, and Mel Fletcher amongst a gathering of Craig's family, of which included the very lovely Rebecca. It was a mild morning for the 239 runners, which is pretty standard post-pandemic numbers for the event, and it was event 437, which makes it one of Victoria's older events, was actually number six to launch in Victoria and places it in the top 100 launches in Australia, beginning in November 2013. So that means it won't be too long before the birthday boy will be announcing their 10th anniversary. After the event, we gathered for brunch at the Vines Cafe, which was a short walk up to the main street. And a fun fact about the Diamond Creek course, you can allegedly see a windmill at around the one kilometre mark. Although in my three visits, I am yet to spot it. So maybe the listeners will need to visit and provide me with some evidence.

00:06:10Simon Mackley: What sort of windmill is it? Is it one of these newfangled energy ones or is it like an old Dutch one?

00:06:17Melissa Ellis: No, Simon. It's a real one. So I actually Googled windmill house because I did want to have a vague picture of it in my mind's eye. And it was, it's a prominent landmark in the area apparently and was built in 1973 by a Dutch naturopath and they raised their family there. So it pretty much looks like a Dutch windmill. Amazing. It says it includes shingles, a circular staircase, rotating blades. It's on 110 square metres with five levels and round walls. So, yeah.

00:06:56Simon Mackley: That's a decent size, and you haven't seen it in the three times you've been to Diamond Creek.

00:06:59Melissa Ellis: It's 50 feet high. So, no, I haven't ever noticed it, but apparently it's there.

00:07:10Simon Mackley: I'm sure it's there if you've been able to look it up on Wikipedia or Google.

00:07:15Melissa Ellis: The Windmill House, local landmark. There you go. Okay.

00:07:20Simon Mackley: If I ever make it to Diamond Creek, I'll be keeping an eye out for a windmill. 50-foot windmill.

Streaky September

00:07:26Simon Mackley: There we go. Well, we, as you guys announced last week, Streaky September is so close. We're only, what, a week and a bit away from the start of it. And the lovely Pippa has provided us with some audio, like for the start of streaky September.

00:07:45Pippa White: Hello, parkrun adventurers, it's Pippa. Here in the UK, there's been a change in the mornings. It's steadily getting a little bit darker. So I'm going to guessing you guys in the Southern Hemisphere are starting to see the lightness coming up. And this means only one thing, we're getting close to September and it's time to be streakers. So what we're starting from this week, it's time to reflect on last year. For those of you who came and streaked in September, what was good, what was bad, set yourself a little target. And the Streaky September itself predates the pandemic, even predates Mel and Ollie. It started around 2018-ish. Somebody's going to tell me where I've got that right or wrong. And the idea is to get a little bit of action, a bit of spring into your step. It's a two kilometre run or walk a day, a little bit more if you're on the bike, a little bit less if you're swimming. Maybe call it 30 minutes of exercise. Every day, starting from a minute after midnight and making sure you've started before midnight, it's a no excuse, get out and do that exercise. At this point, the challenge is 30 days. If you're a returner or a long-term streaker, what are you going to do different this year? For me, I'm going to try and make sure I do a walk at lunchtime to add into my regular walking and running because I think I could really do with getting out of the office and getting some of that fresh air. For other people, it could just be walking with a friend once a week or walking eyes wide open without a brolly and a great big smile. Anyway, here's to an exciting streak in Streaky September 2023. I look forward to hearing your adventures.

00:09:24Melissa Ellis: And thanks for that, Pippa. Pippa's going to bring us a little Streaky September news every week now as we get right into the middle of the Streaky September challenges. So we look forward to hearing from Pippa every week.

00:09:35[background music]

parkrun news bulletin

00:09:38Melissa Ellis: But in other news, Simon. Yes. Full disclosure, this blog post has been read after the recording that occurred on Monday evening Australian time as it was released on Monday in UK time. Now, it is a blog post called Changes to the Nordic Special Day Events and it reads... 2023 saw changes to a number of the parkrun special day dates in the Nordics, with Norway moving their day to May 1st, Finland to Ascension Day and Denmark to June 5th. Sweden retained their special day on June 6th. Previously, the days for Norway and Finland were set on Christmas Day and had never been used, and only one event in Denmark had traditionally used this special day on the same date. The new dates proved to be extremely popular, with 300 people attending in Finland, 500 in Norway and close to 1,500 in both Denmark and Sweden, with the pull of the parkrun double bringing in many tourists from overseas. In particular, there were a couple of events which had extremely large turnouts, with Amager Strandpark having 644 participants on June 5th and Sosinkwa 727 the day after. Thanks to some great efforts from local volunteer teams, the events were successful and created some epic memories for everyone attending. But at the same time, it hugely stretched the capacity of teams used to handling 20 to 50 parkrunners each week. All indications suggest that the numbers will continue to grow in future years. In addition, it raised some tricky questions around potentially requiring special permits for these larger events and the implications of a serious incident occurring. Indeed, this was the reason for Malmö Ribersborg parkrun not hosting a special event this year as any permit application would have been subject to a fee, which is not in line with the parkrun delivery model and may have involved additional requirements that could not be met. As an organisation, we have a duty of care to our event teams and our volunteers. Given the above, we have given some serious thought about what we can do to mitigate the likelihood of events experiencing extremely high numbers again, but still keeping the concept of a special day for our parkrun countries, which are fun and help to bring people together from across the parkrun world. We have decided that the best course of action is therefore to have a joint Nordics special day, which means that all events in Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway would all have the possibility to have an extra event on this day. Outside of Easter and Christmas Day, there is actually one day in the year which is a holiday across all four Nordic countries, Ascension Day. This is always on Thursday, 40 days after Easter, usually in mid to late May. In 2024, this will be on Thursday, the 9th of May. By spreading out potential visitors across the Nordic parkruns, we hope to significantly reduce the risk of events being overwhelmed. It would obviously still be up to every event to decide whether they would want to host a parkrun on this special day, and we would encourage people to let the event teams make up their minds about this in their own time. We see this as a positive change and look forward to parkrunners in the Nordics enjoying the opportunity to join their local events on this day, together with visitors from other parkrun countries who will come to visit our beautiful events. We hope that this early announcement of changes will minimise any inconvenience for those already planning trips for 2024. No changes have been made to the dates of special days in any other countries.

00:13:05[background music]

00:13:22Simon Mackley: So we had in Dazza's, we actually had something from Calum Burrell and he was posting about something called the re-index, which I certainly was not aware of. And apparently it's a new addition to the running achievements app. I know we talk about the 5K app quite a bit, but the running achievement app is out there as well and has a lot of interesting things in there as well. So I wanted to ask you a couple of questions about where you are on the running achievements in some of these things. How does that sound, Mel?

00:13:54Melissa Ellis: Oh, that sounds good. Yes. Yes. I also saw about this re-index. It's a bit of a conversation point.

00:13:59Simon Mackley: Yeah. So maybe we should explain what the re-index is. So it is where you go to an event twice or more. And it gives you an index like with the Wilson and all that sort of thing. So the re-index, actually, what's your re-index?

00:14:18Melissa Ellis: Mine is 49. So I have been to 49 events more than once. That is phenomenal.

00:14:27Simon Mackley: Absolutely phenomenal. I think I'm on 33, which I thought was pretty good. That's pretty good. Yeah. I had to look back and see, you know, like I was actually quite surprised how high that was, but yeah. So what about some of the other ones? What's the highest altitude parkrun you've ever done?

00:14:45Melissa Ellis: Yes, I looked this up. So it's Jindabyne Sport and Recreation parkrun, which is 983 metres of elevation, or is that above sea level? What's, I don't know.

00:14:56Simon Mackley: It would have to be above sea level, yeah.

00:14:58Melissa Ellis: Highest altitude. So that's the start point, isn't it? The event starts. Yes, we've had this discussion with the South African ones.

00:15:06Simon Mackley: Yes, yeah, it definitely is. Yes, and mine's like, yes, 614. And I was actually surprised that That was Gungahlin in the ACT. I didn't realise it was actually so high. So it's only, what, almost 400 metres below Jindabyne, which, yeah, I thought that was quite an interesting one.

00:15:22Melissa Ellis: Isn't that funny? Gungahlin wouldn't come to mind when I was thinking altitude.

00:15:27Simon Mackley: Neither me. I was very shocked to see that. And actually I've just realised my re-index is actually 23, not 33. Okay. 33 is where my floating finish position is. And this one was, it took me a while to get my head around, which is your consecutive finish position. So if you finished third, fourth, fifth, whatever. So I've got 33 consecutive, which, yeah, blew my mind.

00:15:58Melissa Ellis: What about you? So my floating finish position number is 29. Wow. So you're beating me on that one. It's not something I track, I think I was saying before. I wouldn't have known.

00:16:12Simon Mackley: I wouldn't have known about that one either. It's, yeah, another one that sort of popped out of nowhere. Now, Baywatch. So this is where you've done an event with the name Bay in it. So I've done one, which is actually the one that's two kilometres from my house, Redland Bay.

00:16:27Melissa Ellis: Redland Bay, yeah. So I've got none. None? No bays, no.

00:16:34Simon Mackley: Interesting. Okay. I'm sure you're going to kill me on Beehive. So I've got five out of 21. So Beehive is where you have 20 bees and a queen.

00:16:48Melissa Ellis: Yes, yes. I'm killing you on that one. I've got 18 out of the 21. So I just need two more bees.

00:16:59Simon Mackley: Two more bees. Okay. So you've done your queen. Yes. Okay. Excellent. And then hillbilly, I think is where it's a parkrun with the name hill in it correct I've got three out of eight I've got four okay well that was yeah that's interesting so that you know plenty of new ones on there that we haven't got in the 5k app

00:17:23Melissa Ellis: No, it always pays to have a little look around and they're always being updated too. And thank you very much to the app creators for the effort that they put in. Definitely.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:17:34Melissa Ellis: Anyway, moving on, we've got a roving report to bring you this week. So just the one and we're hearing again from Action Man. So let's have a listen to what he's been up to.

00:17:40[background music]

Roving report Alistair — "Action Man" — Wentworth Common parkrun

Talking to Clara — Wentworth Common parkrunner (her regular home event), 18 different parkruns visited

00:17:57"Action Man": Hi, this is Action Man or Alistair here for parkrun adventurers interviewing Clara from... Wentworth Common. In sunny Sydney, New South Wales. During the special week of a very fantastic race, which starts with a C, ends with an F. It's not a race, just like parkrun's not a race. It's a run. But we have a lot of people over here at Wentworth Common. But why would, if you came to... Some with a C. Why would you come to Wentworth Common, Clara?

00:18:32Clara: Wentworth Commons is one of my favourite parkruns in Sydney. It's a nice flat course, extremely friendly volunteers. And yeah, I just love that there's, you know, bits of tree, bits of shade. You really feel like you are, you know, running in nature at times. And then around the turnaround point, you get to also enjoy Olympic Boulevard and, you the big stadiums that were built for the Sydney Olympics.

00:19:03"Action Man": That's a good answer, good sale. Well, okay, you've said this is a common parkrun for you. Is this your home parkrun?

00:19:12Clara: Yeah, so this is the one that I come to most of the time. Where I live, there's not any parkrun that's like particularly close. So every one of them that are nearby are at least about 15, 20 minutes away. So I do go around to the other different ones, but this is my favourite. So I come here the most.

00:19:32"Action Man": All right. That's a good answer. You've said you've been to at least a few other ones. How many parkruns do you think you visited?

00:19:38Clara: I visited 18 parkruns.

00:19:40"Action Man": 18. It's a good number. It's a good number. Okay. Well, with 18, that means you must have a top three. What would your top three be?

00:19:47Clara: Wentworth Common. Bam. Yep. Absolutely. Rouse Hill. Rouse Hill is pretty and it looks like it's a farm. You are running quite a lot of hills though. But yeah.

00:20:00[crosstalk]

00:20:00"Action Man": A lot of undulation is what they say. Yeah.

00:20:04Clara: yep um and I think my other one would be Galston so Galston is also in Sydney um it's up in the hornsby shire and it's run the parkrun itself is in fagan park which is actually a really um pretty park with lots of buildings um that are sort of especially built for like a nation's kind of um theme so you know got sort of houses that are built to like an American theme and an African theme and a Japanese theme um so you're running through this really pretty garden with like Lakes and stuff like that so yeah that's another favourite

00:20:42"Action Man": Awesome, awesome. All right, well, what in your experience has been the most spectacular or interesting event to happen during a parkrun?

00:20:53Clara: Oh, that's a hard one. I actually want to say that I haven't had anything like crazily spectacular or unexpected happen in a parkrun, which means that the parkrun events have actually all been running really well. No one got injured. That's good. You know, no one, you know, no one became unwell or anything like that. So, yeah, I think I like to keep it that way.

00:21:16"Action Man": All right, cool. No defibs needed. That's excellent. That's excellent. Or no plane crashes. Great. I'm glad about that. Is there anything you would like to tell us, the parkrun adventurers listeners, to bring them to come to visit Wentworth Common?

00:21:30Clara: Wentworth Common, plenty of parking, so you don't have to look for, you know, look very hard for parking. Yes, parking, toilet block, nice flat course, really friendly volunteers. We've always felt really welcomed here. And not too crowded too, for the people who don't like massive crowds. Yeah, there's a good crowd, but not too big. So yeah, I highly recommend this park around.

00:21:55"Action Man": What about Caramel Lattes? Are they nearby?

00:21:58Clara: Oh, that's a good question. I believe there is some. I have never been to try it out.

00:22:02"Action Man": All right, okay, cool, cool. Oh, well, thank you very much. That was a great interview. As you hear from Clara herself, come, Wentworth Common. If next time you're in Sydney town, that's where you've got to be, all right? Cool. Action Man, over and out.

00:22:10[background music]

00:22:24Simon Mackley: And that's another great report from the action man down there at Wentworth Common, which I absolutely loved when I was down there a couple of months ago. And, yeah, it was good to hear Clara's top three, even though she was cheeky getting her Wentworth Common, her home event in there. But, yeah, Rouse Hill and Galston are two ones we don't hear a lot about, really.

00:22:47Melissa Ellis: No, we don't. I did both those events, Rouse Hill and Galston, when I came up for longest run and I rate Galston. I loved it. I think it's three laps and it does have some hills in it, but I really thought it was a pretty event. Yeah, it is.

00:23:01Simon Mackley: It's very pretty. And it was well described as to the different parts of the park as well. So my co-ED from Mossman, Mary, she's actually one of the RDs there now because she moved up into that area. So, yeah.

00:23:16Melissa Ellis: Shout out to Mary. Exactly.

Dazza's

00:23:19Melissa Ellis: But, Simon, moving on to Dazza's. This week, Dazza said, it's World Photography Day. Welcome to Dazza's. Come on in and share your parkrun photos. And first up, we heard from Billo Matthew Billington, and he said, Gather in, get closer. Love your work, girlfriend. And there was a very funny photo of Roberta standing immediately under the RD all alone.

00:23:54Simon Mackley: That was a great photo, and I can imagine her doing that too. Yes, cheeky girl. So we heard from Brett Bailey from New Zealand, obviously. So 98 parkrunners at Pegasus today in cool overcast conditions, daffodil theme for Cancer Society fundraiser with lots of yellow about today. Just Brunner and I on my 150th parkrun as Tanya had a day off feeling a bit poorly. Pack up volley duty this week as I'm RD next Saturday. And there was a picture of Brett and Brunner and there was a beautiful chalk marking of a daffodil in front of him. So it was a great photo.

00:24:32Melissa Ellis: Very good. Congratulations on your arbitrary 150th, Brett. Yes. We also heard from Greg Garner. Great morning at Wes Mitchell Park, parkrun, as Timekeeper with the other volunteers today. You won't guess that it's still winter here. And it was a beautiful photo of Greg with the volleys between the flags with Tin Can Bay in the background. I love that name, Tin Can Bay. What a shame that parkrun couldn't be called Tin Can Bay. Yeah, exactly.

00:25:00Simon Mackley: Then we heard from the Office Lady, a.k.a. Sam Schroder. We had a plan. Then we had a plan B. Then we had, we're pretty sure we ended up with a plan E. Luke, Asher, Evie and I headed to Panania with our fingers crossed. Brendan and Jodie, whose plane was cancelled last night, were on an early morning plane. They jumped in a taxi and Brendan caught the Tail Walkers on the second lap and passed us with plenty of time to spare. Of course, we enjoyed a long and lovely park faff afterwards at a nearby cafe. So there's a photo of Sam, Jodie, Brendan, Luke. Asha and Evie behind the selfie frame in Field of Dreams Park, Panania. With what looked like a giant painted rock.

00:25:44Melissa Ellis: It did.

00:25:45Simon Mackley: It looked like a Humpty Dumpty from what I remember.

00:25:50Melissa Ellis: And yes, we were watching Brendan's cancelled flight unfold the night before and waiting to hear if they were getting rescheduled flights and what the plan was going to be. And there was quite a A lot going on with social media and a lot of people following to see if Brendan Peel was indeed going to make it to parkrun. So thankfully he did with the help of the Office Lady and her two little dawdling Tail Walkers.

00:26:20Simon Mackley: Was she holding them back?

00:26:22Melissa Ellis: No, she wouldn't do that. That would be a bit cheeky. Very cheeky. We also heard from Helen Davis who said, late post as usual, my 250th at Frank Keenan parkrun with friends. And Helen shared a photo of herself in the selfie frame with Dawn, Stephen and Heather and popped this in so I could just say a special happy 250th to my friend Helen.

00:26:50Simon Mackley: Yep. Congratulations, Helen. That's amazing. And we heard from Andrews. He said, just 200 volley club adventurers hanging out at Kadina Trail parkrun. Congratulations to Dave Allmark for reaching his 100th volunteer this morning. And there was a picture of Andrew and Dave in their volley vests.

00:27:10Melissa Ellis: Ah, very good. Congratulations. I met Dave, I believe, at Palm. Okay. I do believe, yes, he came up and introduced himself.

00:27:20Unidentified speaker: Cool.

00:27:21Melissa Ellis: Now, we also heard from Geoff Glaab early Sunday morning in the US, but I hope I'm not too late for a flat white and a sausage roll. We had a much cooler and less sticky morning than we're used to in August at Joe Creason. I rounded out the field of 39 finishes as the Tail Walker and volunteered for the 100th time. And Jeff shared a photo of himself holding... V100 foil balloons out there at Joe Creason. So congratulations, another V100, Simon.

00:27:50Simon Mackley: Amazing. Yeah, they're coming thick and fast. Our adventurers are good volleys. They certainly are. Then we heard from Booz Dayton over there in the UK. So she said, crossed Pooh Sticks Bridge and entered the forest to find the Gruffalo at Hamsterley Forest parkrun. There was a picture of Booz and the Gruffalo. And I had to look up what Pooh Sticks Bridge was because I couldn't remember what Pooh Sticks was. So I'm going to give you an explanation of what it actually was because it doesn't sound so good on a podcast. But when you read Pooh as P-O-O-H, like Winnie the Pooh, it's different. So Pooh Sticks is the unusually named sport that comes from the popular children's stories of Winnie the Pooh. Not only is the name a little unusual, so is the sport. It involves standing on a bridge and dropping a stick in the water, then racing to the other side to see whose stick goes the fastest. Wow, what excitement.

00:28:52Melissa Ellis: But I don't understand the connection with the Gruffalo and Pooh Sticks Bridge and why – because the Gruffalo is not in Winnie the Pooh as far as I'm concerned. That's a completely different story altogether. And Hamsterley Forest, is this related to Gruffalo's and Winnie the Pooh somehow? I don't know.

00:29:11Simon Mackley: Okay, so Pooh Sticks Bridge, I do know what this is about. So the bridge that they played Pooh Sticks on – was actually A. A. Milne used to walk across that bridge and sometimes would write on the bridge. Right. So that was where he got the idea of it from. I don't know why the Gruffalo is there as well. It may just be a coincidence that the Gruffalo is also from that same thing or the person who did the Gruffalo statue might be from that area. I don't know.

00:29:25[crosstalk]

00:29:40Melissa Ellis: Right. Oh, well, maybe somebody can write in and tell us. Yes. But Simon, we also heard from Chris Gore and he said, today Karen and I completed the Nor'wester Challenge, a new challenge we created that includes all WA parkruns north of the 26th parallel by completing Hampton Oval parkrun. This is a challenging parkrun that is run on concrete paths, blue metal trails, sand dunes and beach. While it is not the hardest parkrun we have done, I would put it up in the top five. It was made even more challenging today with the 20 to 30 knot wind. The parkrun crew here are very friendly and we had a lovely time at the local coffee shop, The Soak, afterwards. And there was a photo of Chris and Karen in the selfie frame out there at Hampton Oval. And I like the fact that they've made up their own challenge, Simon. Yeah, that's pretty good.

00:30:37Simon Mackley: The Norwester. No, that's awesome. I wonder how many there are up there because I don't see that in them. Yeah, how many are there? Come back to us, Chris. And then to round it out, we've got Andrew Turner coming to us from South Africa. So World Photograph Day is coincided with my first parkrun in South Africa and the final letter of the alphabet. So I guess a rare frame shot is appropriate. Oh, you've stitched me up here. Oh, I've stitched myself up.

00:31:04[crosstalk]

00:31:06Melissa Ellis: Zandvlei.

00:31:07Simon Mackley: Zandvlei. Zandvlei is a beautiful location with a run around the lake and the mountains nearby to provide an amazing backdrop. The volunteers were friendly and it was great to have a quick runner to follow around the tricky to find course. And there was a magic photo of Andrew in the selfie frame with the lake in the background.

00:31:26Melissa Ellis: Yes, that was a nice photo. And he is a fast runner too. So he would have needed a quick runner to chase. Otherwise he would have been lost, probably. And Simon also wanted to give a special mention that we also heard from Joyce Adams that we met recently at Studley Park, our visiting American. She's back home posting from Roosevelt Island. And Andy Airey posted for the first time, I think, a picture of his wife with her cake to celebrate her sixth alphabet. Amazing achievement. But...

the Obi Award — Geoff Glaab

00:32:00Melissa Ellis: I'm not leaving any more envelopes to be lost in the mix, sticky notes and post-its and all that kind of stuff. I've got it right here in my hot little hands, Simon. Excellent. So I've got the honours today. So let me open the envelope. This week the Obi goes to Geoff Glaab. Hooray. Hooray. So congratulations, Jeff, another multi-Obi award winner, I think, and congratulations on your 100th volunteer. Oh, it probably was a close draw with all our 100 volunteer club members posting this week. True. But that's it for Dazza's.

00:32:15[background music]

Consolidated Club Report

00:32:55Melissa Ellis: Now, moving on to the adventurers Consolidated Club report for Saturday, the 12th of August. No. Now I'm even worrying that I've updated it correctly. It is not Saturday the 12th of August, Saturday the 19th of August. Of a total of 448 members, 348 took part on this date in seven countries across 186 locations, I hope. In the UK, there were adventurers at 30 events. The UK is growing, Simon. It is. There were three events in South Africa, two in the US and one each in Germany and Ireland. Locally, we had adventurers at 42 events in New South Wales, 40 in Queensland and 34 in Victoria. South Australia had 12, WA had seven. There was five on the North Island, four in the ACT. Tassie and the South Island had two and one in the Northern Territory. Where were all the Victorians? Oh, yeah. We were all together at, I don't know. I've run out of excuses. I don't know. I'm just not too bothered. We know we're the greatest state. We don't have to win.

00:34:22Simon Mackley: Okay. Over to you. Okay, yeah. So the largest front. So internationally was at Knowsley, UK with two. That was Helen and Andy Rutter. And Merthyr with two again, David Irwin and Tracy May. Locally, no surprise, Shellharbour with nine. So we had Ollie, Chris Fraser, Patty Oshimo, Louise Aitkin, Gaillyn Cooper, Dave Foster, Delvene and Kristen McKenzie and Scott Matthews. At Casula, there were seven. Dennis Peden, Kristy Hill. Real winners. Sorry? The real winners. The real winners? Casula.

00:35:07Melissa Ellis: Why were they the winners? Because they're actually touristing.

00:35:12Simon Mackley: Okay, gotcha. Sorry. Casula with seven. So Dennis Peden, Kristy Hill, Kathy Crispin, Paul Rainbow, Rebecca Gordon, Wayne Whiteley and Sherry Brandman. And Diamond Creek just missed out with only six, with TOC, Jacqui, Craig and Bec, Mel Fletcher and I'm guessing that's Mel.

00:35:38Melissa Ellis: I was assuming I would be reading that, so I put moi.

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

00:35:41Melissa Ellis: Ah, gotcha. And there was lots of launches this week, Simon, across the world. There was five. Amazing.

00:35:50Simon Mackley: Where were they?

00:35:51Melissa Ellis: One was in Australia. It was in Kalbarri in WA. It is called Jakes Point parkrun. And unsurprisingly, it's at Jake's Point in Kalbarri. They had 21 participants and six volunteers. The course is two laps out and back on a sealed coastal pathway with ocean views. The start-finish point is north from the lookout car park near the Bean Drifting Coffee Van, which is where they gather for their post-run coffee.

00:36:20Simon Mackley: Wonderful. Yeah, it's nice to have a new one in Australia again. And WA needs another one, right? For the one above the parallel, is that...

00:36:29Melissa Ellis: Maybe.

00:36:30Simon Mackley: I don't know. I don't know where Kalbarri is, to be honest.

00:36:32Melissa Ellis: I drove through it when I went to Carnarvon, but I couldn't tell you which side of the 26th parallel by my memory. Okay. Fair enough. But I bet Chris and Karen Gore will tell us soon. Well, let's hope they do. Might be in their new challenge. Exactly.

00:36:49Simon Mackley: Another one we had was Lavender Mill in South Africa, and we are lucky to have Johan Janssen. telling us all about it.

00:37:01Johan Duvenhage: South Africa continues to see a steady stream of launches after the first six months were relatively quiet. This week we welcomed Lavender Mill parkrun on the Leopoortje Farm outside Middelburg in the Mpumalanga Province. The town, known as the stainless steel capital of Africa, is conveniently close to one of the main routes from Gauteng to the Kruger National Park in the east, so it can be easily added to your travel itinerary or just for a quick weekend away. It replaces Middelburg parkrun, which had to close last year after the event venue was no longer available. The meandering course traverses through farmland and forest, mostly on soft sand trails, which may be difficult for parkrunners with buggies and prams.

00:37:44Melissa Ellis: And I was a bit cheeky there, Simon. I asked Johan to do that because I couldn't pronounce all that stuff.

00:37:50Simon Mackley: What, lavender mill? You know what I mean. I do.

00:37:54Melissa Ellis: The other bits. Now, what I can pronounce is Aberfields parkrun in the UK that launched with 180 participants. This course is one large and one small lap on a mixture of gravel and permanent paths, and it's at Aberfields Nanty Moyle, which is in Wales. Excellent. So welcome to them.

00:38:16Simon Mackley: Yes, welcome indeed. And there was another one in the UK in Wisbech. So it's in the Fenland district of Cambridgeshire. They had 129 participants and the course is four anti-clockwise laps of the perimeter of a path.

00:38:35Melissa Ellis: I think that's supposed to be park. Sorry, that's my typo.

00:38:38Simon Mackley: Gotcha.

00:38:41Melissa Ellis: And rounding out the launches in the world for the weekend, there was one in the USA and it was at Lackawanna. This is the one I didn't put phonetically, Lackawanna. Lackawanna Rail Trail in Elmira, which is in New York State. And they had massive two finishes.

00:39:05Unidentified speaker: Wow.

00:39:06Melissa Ellis: They kept that one super-duper quiet. They sure did. Now, that course is an out-and-back on permanent paths along the rail trail. So I think the first one in New York State, Simon, potentially?

00:39:20Simon Mackley: I think so, yeah. Don't hold me to that. Because, yeah, the other close one is in New Jersey. Yeah, so it's in New York State, but it is – yeah, it's the only one in New York State, but it's about three-and-a-half hours out of Manhattan – heading towards the Canadian border. So it's not exactly one you can get to easily from Manhattan if you're staying there. Yeah, so that would be Delaware and Raritan, which is still, I think, an hour out of Manhattan itself. Look at you knowing all this stuff. I did my research.

00:39:48Melissa Ellis: I like that in a co-host.

00:39:52Simon Mackley: It's nice to have another rail trail as well. They seem to be popping up everywhere. A good use of old rail lines. Yeah, we have heaps of them in Victoria. Yeah, we're getting them up here quite a bit as well.

Sign-off

00:40:02Melissa Ellis: Alrighty, Simon. Time to look forward again.

Streaky September

00:40:07Simon Mackley: So yeah, we've had only one submission from last week's request for submission ideas for Streaky September. So we've heard from the one and only intern who's training for the Punish.

00:40:21the Intern: Hi Mel, I've got an idea for the streaky September. With 174 metres of elevation on Mount Panorama, I need to get some training in for the punish. So if you can add seven or eight hill climbing challenges to the Bingoe card, it will be good for all the motivation I need to get moving.

00:40:42Melissa Ellis: Okay, so I'm not sure about that many Bingoe card entries for elevation, but we could put one on the card, Simon, for the intern's hill training.

00:40:54Simon Mackley: Yeah, just to mix it up.

00:40:55Melissa Ellis: Yeah, that's a good idea. So thank you for that, intern. And we'll have to keep our eyes peeled when we go up to the Punish later in October. I've got a suggestion that we could put on the card this year in light of the re-index that we discussed earlier. So why not encourage people to go back to an event for the second time?

00:41:19Simon Mackley: Yeah, that's a great idea. Go back to somewhere that you might have enjoyed but, yeah, haven't been back to. Hmm. Thinking about one for me, I reckon it would be cool if people volunteer in a position that they haven't done before. So go and try one of those ones that you've been a little bit scared to do or maybe not. You just don't get into the volunteer roster quick enough to get onto.

00:41:44Melissa Ellis: Hmm. That's a good idea.

00:41:47Simon Mackley: Helps keep parkrun going.

00:41:48Melissa Ellis: So if you've got any more ideas, please, it's not too late to give us your submissions. We haven't created the Bingoe card yet, so there's still plenty of time. We will be doing it in the next week. But, yeah, drop us a line if you've got something that you'd really like to see on the Bingoe card for next year. But... Let's see where we are going to be next week, Simon. What have you got on your schedule?

00:42:15Simon Mackley: So I'm actually heading back to Sydney for the third weekend in a row. And I am going to Whalan, which is on Darug Country, and I will be completing my Rayfarers final year.

00:42:26Melissa Ellis: Wow. Very good. That's quite an achievement.

00:42:30Simon Mackley: Yes, I'm pretty happy with it, to be honest, because Wentworth Common opened the weekend that I left to move up here. So I did that a few months ago and Whalan was the only one I had outstanding. Wow.

00:42:42Melissa Ellis: Now, we do tend to use a lot of Australian lingo and forget to explain things. So do you know off the top of your head how many events are in the regional challenge that we call Rayfarers?

00:42:56Simon Mackley: I do. That's actually 30.

00:42:59Unidentified speaker: Wow.

00:43:00Melissa Ellis: Yeah. I didn't realise it was that many.

00:43:02Simon Mackley: Yeah. So someone asked me the other day how many are in Brisbane and surrounds, and there's actually 50. Oh. So I'm 27 into that at the moment, so 23 to go.

00:43:13Melissa Ellis: Gosh. Okay. Anyway, yeah, so well done. And, of course, Rayfarers is named after Cathy Ray, who was the person to first do all those events and have it named in her honour.

00:43:27Simon Mackley: I can't remember how many she did to start it all off because technically anyone who went to the first one at St Peters is actually a Rayfarer from day one.

00:43:36Melissa Ellis: I know. There must be a line drawn somewhere at some point.

00:43:39Simon Mackley: Yeah, I can't remember what it was. Yeah. I mean, she's definitely the one that did it, 100%. But, yeah, I can't remember when it all sort of came about that Cathy did it. Where are you heading to, Mel?

00:43:51Melissa Ellis: Oh, I nearly forgot about me. I skipped over me, didn't I? I am going to take my little green car for another long drive. I haven't done a road trip for a little while, for a few weeks. So I am going to head to Parkindula Reserve in South Australia in the Mount Barker. Would it be the Mount Lofty Ranges? Yes. I don't know. It's near Mount Barker. That's all I know. That's a Friday problem. I've just checked. It will be event 17. And wouldn't you know it, I need 16 and 18. Never mind. But I'm going to say cooee to Anne Fry. Never know. Might cross paths with Anne while I'm over there. So I'm looking forward to that. I like my long car trips. I know Ollie doesn't. How do you feel about long car trips, Simon? Yeah.

00:44:40Simon Mackley: Well, it depends how long we're talking about. I'm pretty good for, say, three or four hours before a parkrun. But otherwise, yeah, I'd have to stay overnight.

00:44:49Melissa Ellis: Oh, I'm not going to drive to South Australia in the morning.

00:44:51Simon Mackley: No, I realised that after I said that. But yeah, I'm normally at three to four hours to get there. But yeah.

00:44:58Melissa Ellis: Okay. Yeah, no worries. Yeah, I think I'll be looking at probably... somewhere between the seven to seven and a half hours before I stop for my overnight accommodation. And I have my little regular place that I stop at now where I book myself into. And I know it would be within reach in the morning of driving out to Parkindula Reserve. So, hmm. Wonderful. Looking forward to that. But that's it. Thank you for joining me again this week, Simon. My pleasure.

00:45:29Simon Mackley: I'll be back in a month. You will. You will. You're on the roster now. I can say things like that now. You're on the volunteer roster.

00:45:37Melissa Ellis: Indeed I am. I need to make a Google Doc. No, I don't. No, we're fine. You can remember the third Monday of the month, I'm sure.

00:45:45Clara: I can, yes.

00:45:47Melissa Ellis: But as always, everybody, you can contact us via Facebook or our email, which is parkrunadventurers at gmail.com. That is it for another week. We'll see you all next week for more adventures.

00:45:50[outro theme playing]