2012 Annual Report - Hunter Wetlands Centre Australia

EventsWe celebrated Easter with EasterBunny Adventures on EasterSaturday.We played golf and raised just over$2000 for the cente.We attended Tocal Field Days.We attended SOFA Festival.We held the inaugural HunterPaddle Challenge.We celebrated 10 yrs of our listingas a Ramsar Wetlands.We hosted a number of artexhibitions; an exhibition from theNatural History Illustration Schoolat Newcastle University and theWUPA Art exhibition. We werealso fortunate during the year tostart the path on re-establishinglinks with our sister wetlandsin Japan, Kushiro InternationalWetlands Park. A concurrentexhibition was held at eachwetlands featuring photos of their‘sister’ site. We hope to continueto share and exchange informationwith Kushiro throughout thecoming years.Kushiro International Wetlands Park - JapanThe first Hunter Paddle Challengewas held on the 16th September.We were fortunately enough tohave journalist/ author, ScottBeven of ABC News24, agree tobe Ambassador of the event andthanks to Scott for his endorsementand giving up his time (and energy!).Scott not only opened the racebut chose to particpate on theday. With a short time frame toorganise the challenge, we had40 competitors and realised weneeded to change the name fromthe Hunter Kayak Challenge to thePaddle since had Stand Up Paddleboarders and outriggers in themix. 8 paddlers dared to throw intheir vessle 60kms upstream atLorn and head down the mightyHunter River picking up the 30kmpaddlers at Raymond Terrace onthe way. A huge thank you to ourvolunteers on the day who assistedwith marshelling and a myriad ofjobs (including our bank manager -those ads ARE true!). Thank you toDart Enery & Maria’s Farm Veggiesfor your financial sponsorshop andNBN and The Herald for generousassistance to promote the event.We certainly learnt alot from theevent of what works and howwe can improve to make 2013bigger and better. What a greatway to highlight the beauty andimportance of the Hunter River andit’s estuary. The 2013 Hunter PaddleChallenge is set for Sunday 8thSeptember.23