As many of you know, we returned to Boonah,
Queensland this year to celebrate John Denver’s life
and music. Once again we stayed at
The Outlook Training and Resource Centre,
which is located on Ipswich-Boonah Rd Boonah 4310
The venue includes a large kitchen/living
area, perfect for our activities and sleeping
accommodation in one building.
Situated just one hour from Brisbane, it is a delightful
rural setting and it is a perfect location for people
coming from interstate as it is not too far to travel.
We started to arrive shortly before lunchtime on Friday,
13th October, and although there was a short delay in
accessing our accommodation, we quickly made up
some sandwiches and had a light lunch in the shade of
Alistair and Carmel’s ‘Lumbago’.
The afternoon was lazy as we caught up with
everyone’s news and we welcomed a new member,
John Barry when he arrived with the Mercury Cougar,
which was once owned by John Denver. This caused
much excitement as John explained how he came to
purchase the car and then later found out who the first
owner was.
After a shared dinner, we held our annual general
meeting, where decisions are made for the coming
year(s) in regard to Higher Ground Australia. The AGM
gives new comers an idea of how we operate, and is a
forum through which ideas and events are discussed.
This year, a cake was donated to HGA by one of the
local businesses. It had been decorated and was in the
shape of John Denver’s face. We agreed to cut it the
following night at our sing-a-long.
The following morning we were up bright and early to
start a new day. The promise of attending the local
Saturday morning market was alluring. One
enterprising local decided to pull out their John Denver
related odds and ends to sell at the market. Needless
to say, it was a good move as all JD items were
snapped up by our members.
A visit to the market by the rest of us, some being
driven in John’s car (what an experience) and Maureen
managed to advertise our sing-a-long through the local
radio station.
The rest of the day was at leisure, although some of us
went to visit the local lavender farm and the ‘boys’ went
down to prepare the ground for the tree planting, which
was to take place the following day.
By this time our other members had arrived, the items
for the silent auction were ready, the peace cloth was
displayed and our peace-cloth panel was ready to be
decorated. Dinner was eaten and we prepared for our
annual sing-a-long. We had decided to run a ‘back to
school’ theme for a gold coin donation, and found that
those who dressed in their school clothes must have
had a distorted view of school days as they were quite a
motley bunch, not to mention, badly behaved!
And the fun began....

Janette