Tours Coordinators – Mike Hartnell & Ted Morton
Tours (Day Excursions) – Geoff Jones
ZigZag Railway/Mudgee Tour
11-14 October
We are on the way on October 11 to ride the beautiful Zig Zag Railway and then on to Mudgee.
29 of us will be together for 4 days of interesting touring, fellowship and fun. And of course, food. It will be a great long weekend away.
Don’t forget, On Course recommends Travel Insurance in case there are any late changes of plan. Qantas Travel Insurance is apparently quite good and cheap.
You need to arrange your own Travel Insurance.
Look forward to seeing you for a fun
tour.
Mike Hartnell
Gosford Chocolate Factory
20 November
Cost $65.00 per person (due by 25 Oct)
Normal and vegetarian menus available, but unfortunately no gluten free.
We have 22 booked and up to 8 places available for the Gosford Chocolate Factory Tour. This is a special High Tea and Factory tour that they have arranged for our Probus Club members. There might be some good Christmas presents there. Some of us will go by car (about an hour from Belrose), some on a car share basis, and it is possible to get there by public transport too from Glenrose (but may take 2 hours).
Book with me by phone or email, or sign up at the next General meeting, unless all spaces are taken.
Normal and vegetarian menus available, but unfortunately no gluten free.
Look forward to hearing from you.
QLD SOUTHERN OUTBACK TRAIL – by Ted Morton
I am pleased to report that we have 29 expressions of interest for this tour. This means that we will have our own Club dedicated tour. We now have some say over the tour itself. The original tour has everyone flying to Brisbane on day one and overnighting in a hotel with the tour itself starting the next day. I am a bit adverse to this as the first day is wasted as far as I am concerned. I have been faced with a difficult choice of the possible options.
The option first was to start the tour in Belrose with a first night in either Armidale or Tenterfield then joining the tour route the next day. Then I found that the Toowoomba Flower Show will be around the time when our tour starts. The Belrose start option does not pass through Toowoomba. So I have had to make a decision about this. My preferred option now is for us to fly to Brisbane in the a.m. instead of p.m. We would then be picked up by our coach and driven up to Toowoomba. We will be able to see some of the flower displays. There is also a Cobb and Co and carriage museum there for us to visit.
Trade Travel has been asked to explore dates and accommodation based on this new start. If timing is actually after the Toowoomba Flower Show finishes we will still be able to see some flowers – just maybe not as glorious as they might have been. I hope you all agree that this will be the better start to our tour. A further advantage is that there will be a shorter drive on Day 2, ie a Toowoomba start instead of Brisbane.
Hopefully I will have the dates for the tour soon so we can all lock it our diaries for 2026! I will be able to obtain the itineraries for our actual tour at that time. I will look into Sydney airport transfers when we have dates.
MY TRADE TRAVEL EXPERIENCE
Judy and myself, together with Robyn and Chris Wood, have just returned home from a tour with Trade Travel called Wimmera, Mallee, Silo Murals, Salt Lakes, Sunsets & Homesteads.
It was a 6 day, 5 night fully escorted tour with 28 travellers. This was a busy tour with an amazing itinerary that had us visiting a great range of destinations including museums, farms and properties, heritage homesteads, a winery, gardens, sunset drinks at a pink lake and many morning teas and meals, often hosted by wonderful local community members. We also saw wall art murals and many decommissioned wheat silos painted with amazing murals.
Overall a great experience with a great driver and host and a chance to meet many other Probus Club members, mainly from Victoria and NSW. The only real hiccup was getting back to the airport for our flight home. The traffic was bad and there was a nasty rear end crash that blocked two out of the three lanes. Also the traffic near the airport was bad. As a consequence me missed our 5.15pm flight but were able to be rebooked on the 6.00pm flight back to Sydney.
Ted Morton – Mobile 0412 235 400
CONTACT GEOFF JONES REGARDING DAY EXCURSIONS
Phone: 0412 420 213
Magical Mystery $2.50 Opal Card Tour –
CANCELLED – Thursday, 16 October
TTFN+KBO
Geoff Jones
Mobile: 0412 420 213
Email: geoffjones1874@gmail.com