Download the Club Bulletin for meeting 931 here.

From President Mina Ward:

With RYLA (Rotary Youth Leadership Awards) applications now available, it was great to hear from Lachlan MacKenzie, our club’s candidate, at Tuesday morning’s meeting. Lachlan has already had a fair amount of experience leading groups at scouts and through his church. As well as being a very active member of the Stradbroke Scout Group and Morialta Uniting Church, Lachlan is a third year Chemical Engineering student at Adelaide University. Listening to Lachlan speak, it quickly became apparent he thrives on testing his limits and challenging himself.

One of Lachlan’s most interesting life’s experiences to date was a Nullarbor Caving Expedition in 2012 and 2013. As well having to crawl on elbows and knees for extended periods, there was the opportunity to swim in an underground lake. Due to the purity of the water, it was possible to see to the bottom of the cavern some 40 metres below, creating a sense of weightlessness and flight. In another cavern, larger enough to house 3 jumbo jet planes on top of each other, the team played Frisbee!! Keeping in mind there have only ever been about 200 people inside of these caves, it was amazing to see the photos Lachlan had taken, even though he reports they do not do it justice.

Thank you Lachlan for taking the time to come and speak to us this morning, and thank you to Jim Bond, group leader at the Stradbrooke Scout Group for also attending this morning and for steering Lachlan in our direction in the first place. It is a pleasure to sponsor this young man to attend RYLA and we look forward to hearing about his experiences on the camp.

It was fantastic to see Susan Gascoine, Friend of Rotary, also at breakfast this week. Susan has set herself the challenge of walking the equivalent distance of Adelaide to Renmark by the time she turns 70. That’s 406 km (along the River Murray path) over a six-week period in May/April 2016 in order to raise $10,000 for Cystic Fibrosis SA. RCMS is helping Susan with this project, and if you feel you are able to offer any assistance to Susan either with promotion or being a walking buddy, then please contact Susan on [email protected]. Susan will be joining myself and some other members of the club with RC Kent Town to “Walk A Mile In My Boots” on 7th August.

The good news continues as this week we heard that it has been one year since a case of Polio was reported in Nigeria. This is another huge step towards the eradication of Polio and the goal of End Polio now being realised. The fight continues to support Pakistan and Afghanistan, which are the only two remaining polio epidemic countries in the world. Visit www.endpolio.org for more information.

Download the Club Bulletin for meeting 931 here.