To all our leaders, members and walkers, I hope that you have all enjoyed your end of 2020 celebrations and are ready for a new year.

2020 taught us a lot about what is important, with exercise and bush walking being the perfect way to keep sane in some challenging times. 2020 was certainly challenging for the Committee to try and balance the safety aspects of Covid-19 with running a walks program, hopefully 2021 is simpler.

Leaders

To all our volunteer leaders who led walks during 2020 and have started our 2021 program, thank you! It is very much appreciated that you trust our members and walkers to do the right things to keep safe on our bushwalks and are continuing to share your skills and experiences.

Members

For those of you who were members at 31 March 2020, we have extended your membership by a year and for those who joined after we have also extended your membership proportionately to reflect that we had limited opportunity to offer walks last year. For those who have been walking with the Club, thank you for following the Club’s guidelines and following your leader’s instructions.

Walks

I hope that 2021 has some more normality. However, our new normal will continue to require pre-booking and pre-paying all walks, and limiting numbers. Car pooling may be organised by your leader, or they may provide you with the contact details of others on your walk so that you can choose to organise your own car pooling. Whether we return to Sunday walks with no limits and no booking will depend on government safety requirements and what our leaders are comfortable with.  Keep checking our website – it’s updated as leaders propose walks.

Club nights

We will also take some time to think about when it’s appropriate to start face to face club nights again. In the meantime I encourage you to join one of our virtual club nights, we have had some great interstate speakers we otherwise would not have been able to access. The author of From Snow to Ash, Anthony Sherwood will be our February speaker – a great opportunity to learn more about the Australian Alps.

As always, if you have suggestions, or would like to be involved with the Committee, please contact me at President.

Happy walking!
Kris Peach