It's Australia Day...

Once again, the 26th January has come around, and we celebrate as a nation the landing of Captain James Cook at Kurnell, thereby marking the beginning of English settlement of Australia. If you wish to call it an Invasion that is your choice. However, I'm not here to start a controversial piece on whether Australia should or should not have been settled, or whether the Aboriginal Australians have been ill-treated in the past due to the settlement.

I'm here to tell you what I got up to this morning.

Some of you might know that we have had breast cancer problems in my family in the past. Well, I support a few things to do with raising money to find a cure for cancer, and one of those things was the Jane McGrath Classic this morning, held on Wanda Beach at 7am. Now, if you know me well, 7am is an EXTREMELY early time of the morning for me - especially the last day of the holidays. Yet, it was all in aid of a good cause, so not missing that fun!

Fun. Yes...walking 2.5kms in soft sand can be fun...when you take your time. This was not quite fun, especially as I wanted to do it in a fairly fast time to push myself. This was the first real fast walking I've done these holidays, so it was good to get in there and participate well. I finished around middle of the pack, because there were a lot of walkers and only about 10 people who really participated in running. We walked up towards Green Hills and then back, passing the start/finish line, going towards Elouera and then turning and finishing. All in all, I believe I did it in about 30 minutes. That's not too bad. You should have a go.

For the occasion I thought I'd wear my new McGrath Foundation shirt that I bought at the Sydney Cricket Test as a commemorative shirt for that particular test match (it's the Pink Test, and we went on the Pink Day). It fitted in really well, but we were also given a darker pink singlet when we got there to put on over anything we were wearing. This was to tell who was competing in which event, because there was something called the Wanda Xtreme6 held at the same time. This event is where runners run towards Green Hills, but instead of turning round, they continue running up into the sand dunes there, going over one or two of them, and then turn around and complete the course that was the Jane McGrath Classic. A bit too much effort required for that one.

Next year, I hope to see more people down there, having another go. The problem with this year was, where was the advertising? Didn't see much at all, only on Facebook. Go figure. But the numbers weren't bad for a public holiday, an early start, and a not-so-great looking morning.

Anyway, photos for today are of what I took while down there, using my little camera, not my big one.

Enjoy.

Looking out towards the sun...behind the clouds

A little more zoomed in

Looking towards Elouera and Cronulla

Zoomed in towards Elouera and Cronulla

Taken while out on the walk (looking a little dark...)

Surfers gathering in a circle...taken after the walk

I hope you are all having a great Australia Day (26th January), especially those that are overseas or cannot be with friends or family for some reason. Hope you're having a great time, anyway!