June 13, 2025 • 55 mins
Today we sit with Heidi for Part 2 of our ANZAC Leaders Reflections.
🌿 Connection to History and Culture
-
What does the military history of Kokoda mean to you personally?
-
How do you help others connect with the story of Kokoda while they’re trekking?
-
What do you think trekkers should know before they come to understand Kokoda beyond the physical challenge?
🌍 Advice for Future Trekkers
-
What advice would you give to someone preparing for their first Kokoda trek?
-
What’s the biggest mistake you see trekkers make when they come to Kokoda?
-
What’s one thing you think everyone should do or experience while on the track?
🔥 Leadership and Impact
-
What does it mean to be a leader on Kokoda—not just logistically but emotionally and culturally?
-
How has leading people through Kokoda shaped your own leadership style or philosophy?
-
What impact do you hope each trek has on the people who join you?
❤️ The Deeper Why
-
Why do you personally continue to walk Kokoda?
-
How does Kokoda affect you long after each trek ends?
-
What legacy do you want to leave through your work on the Kokoda Track?
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Apodjay Production. This podcast is proudly brought to you by
Adventure Professionals www dot Adventure Professionals dot com dot au.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
For me, Mission Ridge and Brigade Hill. The whole Kakoda
campaign more people need to know about it, or know
everyone knows someone who's trek Kokoda, but to actually understand
the stories of what these young guys did, it's harrowing
what they went through.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
They were staunched to the end against odds uncountered and
they fell with their faces to the pone.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Welcome to the Kakoda Track Podcast, hosted by former Soljet
Glen Asa. This is the place to hear stories from
those who've trecked Kakoda and gained tips of knowledge about
what to expect on the track or to relive your
own amazing experiences. The Kakoda Track Podcast keeping the spirit
of Kakoda alive.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
And then here we'll get back to the Kakoda Track Podcast. Now.
Last time I caught up with Heidi, who's one of
my adventure leaders who I'm very very proud of. She
does a very good job and you can feel the
passion and the last episode I had written out eighteen
questions we only got through nine of them, so we
thought we'd double up and we'd do the other nine.
So we're going to talk a little bit about the
deeper wise behind doing Kakoda today. I'm going to ask
(01:26):
your questions around advice she would give you as people
that are going to track the track, but she has
had no insight to these questions, and that's what I love.
So she's got to work it out as she goes,
and that just shows what she knows, how passionate she
is about it without us having to pre organize the
questions and have preset answers. So this is just raw,
(01:47):
real stuff, and let's be honest, when you get out
on the track, it's going to be raw and real.
So I really hope you enjoy this episode. I thought
we'd kick into because we did nine questions the last time,
and I thought we'd do the next nine questions. And
I was saying on the intro to this, how I
don't give you an insight to any.
Speaker 4 (02:08):
Of the questions, no no idea.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
But I think that's a good thing because it shows,
well what I said on the intro is it shows
the rawness and the knowledge and the passion that we
have for what we do, and realistically, that's what cocata is.
It's raw, it's real. You don't really get to sugarcoat
anything or hide anywhere. So I kind of liked that idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Now we'll just rip straight in if you like. So
(02:34):
the first series we did because I segmented all the questions,
so we did your personal lessons. We talked about things
you know that you've learned from the track, even about yourself.
We've talked about what makes you go back year after year,
talked about the military history and culture. So now I
thought we're going to go through three sort of pieces
(02:54):
of this. It'll be advice for future trekkers, which is honestly,
most people listening to this show I have either track
Corcuta and they just listened to it for memory sake.
Oh you get people who are going to Kakuta and
looking for in So that's obviously why we do this.
So I thought we'd do one around advice, one around
leadership an impact, and then just around the deeper personal why,
(03:14):
which is kind of retouching on some of you know,
as an example, like when you go back first time,
second time, third time, fourth time, you know there's reasons,
but we're learning a lot as we go. Now that
you can sort of get a handle on it, then
there's a deeper why to why we keep coming back.
And I know certainly for me, you know, I could
have stopped at twenty or forty or fifty or and
now we're about to do one hundred or soon. So
(03:37):
I guess for me, I understand that the reason I
keep coming back, And we talked a bit about this
for you too, is just people, you know, the local people,
the trekkers, all that sort of stuff. So did I
thought i'd go through some of those again as well
in a little bit deeper context. If you if you're
if you're ready for that, no rapid five, no rapid
five questions. So my first one is what advice would
(04:01):
you give to someone preparing for their first ever Kokoda
t it.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
I think we have touched on this last time. I
don't overthink it, don't like do the training. Obviously we've
had we've had a few incidences where people haven't trained,
and that shows the show is pretty quick when somebody
hasn't done any kind of work towards getting there, you know,
(04:29):
But if the training doesn't need to be you know,
running thirty kilometers a week, or it doesn't need to
be you know, you don't need to be some kind
of crazy athlete to do it. So just so, I guess,
just enjoy the process of getting fit enough to do it.
Make it. You know, it's a commitment that should be
(04:51):
taken on over you know, at least you know, six
or twelve months before, you know, enjoying excitement leading up
to it, and then don't have any expectations. Just go
in raw and happy to embrace the unknown, because you know,
we get it all the time where people make themselves
(05:11):
so nervous they get over there and they'll ask a
thousand questions and then by the end you're like, oh,
I didn't actually even really need to know that. I'm like, no,
we just we just and we do it all the time.
Now we'll just smile and nod or you know, you
get it when where we get there, you know, those
kinds of questions or how long until dinner or you know,
(05:33):
just just enjoy the whole process of not knowing and
just embrace, embrace the unknown.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
You always say when it comes to preparation and instad
I was saying, like prepare for the worst and hope
for the best. But I like it when people get
to the end of the trip and go, oh, that
wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to
be, because that means they've done the right prep or maybe
the weather's been nice to them. But yeah, I kind
of like that whole concept with just prepare and then
over prepare almost you know, as we get older, make
(06:04):
sure we're not injuring yourselves, but make sure we're absolutely
prepared for worst case, which is, you know, if you
had horrific weather and if you had a new orness
or an injury or like, how do you mentally get
through that? And that's to me part of the preparation.
So what's the next reason is what's the biggest mistake
that you see checkers make when they come to Kakota.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
That's a good one. The biggest mistake packing too much?
That always packing too much, like and it doesn't really
affect them at the end of the day because they've
got a porter, so it affects the porter they and
you see them realize that too, like on day three
(06:44):
or four they're like, I really didn't need all of
this stuff. You know, some of the crazy things I've
seen people take over there, you know, to even like
beard clippers and chairs, and you know, it's all about
stripping back and getting right back to nature. So you
(07:04):
don't need to act excessively. Obviously you've got to tape
the necessities, but if you don't use it on a
normal day to day bases over here, like I just
follow the packing list even.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
If you do use it on a day to day basis.
I think a lot of us are worried about the
fact that it's very rare to spend eight days somewhere
where you can't just sit down to the shop and
grab a thing that you need, but you can actually
get away with so minimal, Like people would be surprised
how little we need as humans to get through a
day today. And when you're on Kakoda, I always say,
(07:40):
just be where your feet are. Nothing else matters outside
of where you are today and what you're doing today.
And it's very rare that we only have one thing
to focus on, but that's what we have. And you're right,
you don't need anything else really, like everything is supplied.
You've got your tent, you've got your clothing, you've got
your sleeping gear. You're probably not going to read as
many books as you think. You're probably not going to
(08:00):
watch as much TV shows or listen to as much
music as you think. You sit around and chat to
people of a nighttime, then you get a bit get
up and do it all again.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Yeah, what's one thing that you think or you would
love for everyone to experience while on the track.
Speaker 4 (08:22):
I think I mean kakoda. I think that's why another
reason why I love to code. But you can't. You
can't escape the experience. There's no way to hide. So
you know, when you when you say what do you
what do you want them to experience or hope they
can experience, it's sat them in the face, no matter what, Like,
(08:45):
no matter what, they're going to be exposed to the
rawness of kakoda. Like there's no way, there's no there's
no nice motel to kind of escape the rain, or
there's no there's no easier option instead of going straight
up the hills. So no matter what, you're going to
experience the full experience. There's nowhere to hide. So I
(09:09):
think just having that mental grip, I think I love
that people experience that like that the push you know
where on day three or four when you're feeling a
bit tired, Like you can see it every time when
people just flick that twitch and go, you know what,
(09:30):
I can actually do this and I'm going to make
it to the end. I think everyone needs to experience that,
but they're going to get it no matter what, because
like it slaps through the face.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Yeah, I think with the day to day trekking and
the hills, and you're right, you can't escape it. If
I could add in one thing, it would be take
time to get to experience the local people. And I
don't just mean importers. I mean I see people get
into villages and they're just tired, and even if it's early,
like two or three in the afternoon, we kind of
just lays around and recover. And I think even if
(10:02):
you spend thirty minutes doing that, but then go for
a walk through the villag go and talk to the kids,
going if you've got a footy, kick a footy. You
don't have to have a full football match. You have
to injure yourself, which is always a risk, but just
get out and walk around, ask questions of the locals.
Partaking the bigger villages like your manaris and the fogies.
The locals love to have a chat. You know, they'll
(10:22):
pull you up and they'll have a chat about things.
You can ask them questions and because all of a
lot of people just trying to preserve their energy as
best they can. And then at the end, I think,
I imagine just had a little bit more engagement in
the villages rather than just walking through them. So that's
probably the only thing I would really adding, because you're right,
the rest of the experience just it hits them, whether
they like it or not.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Yeah, No, that's absolutely right too. Yeah, if you don't.
And I think I found that on my first trip,
because it was over that five day period, I got
back feeling a little bit empty, like thinking, oh I
could have I wish I had to spend more time
or had more time to spend in the villages to
really soak up that environment. I guess we're so spoilt
(11:06):
now that we get to go back over and over
again and we know the locals and by name, and
I actually get so excited about going back to the
villages and seeing the kids that you know, there's a
couple of kids that I've been watching grow up now
for three or four years, and they always remember my
name and they'll come running over, normally wanting lollies or something.
But yeah, it's a really special thing to be able
(11:28):
to keep engaging with those kids. And the checkers don't
get that because nine times out of ten they don't
go back. So yeah, it's definitely important to stuff and
really get involved in the in the community, I guess
and talk to the locals, which.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Kind of segueys me into the next series of questions,
which around leadership and impact. And I want to ask,
what does it actually mean to you to be a
leader on Cookoda? And I'm not just talking like the
logistics of running a trip, which is good to know,
just emotionally culturally, like for you personally, what does it
actually mean to you to get to lead people on Comkoda?
(12:03):
Because I know it's something we talked about, then it's
something that happened, and then obviously COVID and all that
in the middle of that, but once it started to happen,
and now that you're you know, you're not too far
of hitting double digits and so on, so you need
getting all of this experience. What does it actually mean
to you? To lead people on kakoda.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
I think that's a really good question. Another one, I
think it's my own like I love like we talked
about this in the last podcast. I love the self
growth and the challenge I get from helping other people,
(12:42):
and it's become, I guess, really relevant. It's funny as
you get older, you kind of think, oh my gosh,
what was I doing back for when I was twenty
or why did I study that at school? And you know,
I think I've always been drawn to doing something like
in this way, and then all the little pieces come together,
(13:04):
you know, Like I studied geography at school, loved it.
I wasn't good at like many things, and geography is
quite a difficult subjects, but I was really good at
it and I loved it. I did indigenous studies, you know,
so I've always been really interested in different cultures and
indigenous history. So the little things like that that you
think back twenty years ago, why was I even studying
(13:27):
that or why was I interested? And then all of
a sudden, I'm here, and you know, I'm helping people
achieve this amazing thing, and I get to do it
over and over again. So I think it means to
me personally a lot of self growth and development, and
I keep getting to do that. It's like anything, if
you don't do it all the time, you know, you're
(13:48):
not continually stressing and have it stressing you know, your
mental growth and getting that development. So for me to
be able to keep going over there, you know, I'm
bring every time I bring back a little bit of
extra mental strength. You know that I've can put into
my business here or try and put into my family relationships,
(14:09):
and you know it just it gives me the opportunity
to keep growing and keep developing and whilst you know,
getting that fulfillment of helping other people achieve their goal.
It's a pretty special thing to be able to do.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
So leadership, this is in my experience, leadership isn't something
that's taught very often. We get put into leadership roles
by virtue of how long we've spent in a job,
for example, and then we slowly move up the ladder
and hopefully we've had some good leaders to learn from.
But even then there's very little formal processing, whereas in
the military, obviously, the processing for how we develop leaders
(14:45):
is very structured and there's things that they need to
know how to do, and we do courses on it
at every level of leadership. But out in the real
world that's not a thing. So Kakoda or any sort
of adventure leading, but particularly Kakoda, it's pretty intense as
far as you know things that can happen and think
people that you have to manage, and you really get
put in into a strong leadership position and maybe nothing
(15:08):
goes wrong, but if it does, that's when your leadership show.
So this next question is how has leading people through
Kakoda shaped your own leadership style or your own leadership philosophy.
Speaker 4 (15:24):
I think it's been life changing. I think the opportunity
to be taught I guess leadership skills by you and
you know, we've been friends now and you've been mentoring
I think with eight or nine years or something and
a fairly long time now, and just being surrounded by
(15:46):
you and people that you know that are in your circle.
It's taught me, you know that ultimate you know, becoming
the chaos, I guess, and you know, and even having
those skills or some of those skills, and I guess
I had a perfect I guess to practice those skills
(16:08):
which I didn't always get right, you know, either here
in you know, in my own personal life at the
time or on the track. But having you, I guess
to guide me and learn those skills I think just
being you know, then learning to be that calm and
the chaos. You know, I was. I was brought up
(16:29):
in a family of you know, hot heads, you know,
we were. I was that was a proper hot head.
And I see it now. I guess in my you know,
I've got one child, particularly who's quite hot headed, and
I stayed him. I was exactly the same and it
gets you nowhere. So I've learned those skills that I
(16:50):
und back even into my parenting that you know, that
I can be the calm and the chaos and just
tackle anything that that kind of comes along with a
little bit more emotional maturity.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
Yeah. I like that you mentioned parenting because my personal
belief is parenting is the most leadership, you know, the
most important leadership thing will do. But a lot of
us don't realize and a lot of people and we're
segueing a little bit away from Kakoda, but a lot
of people try and be best friends with their kids,
which is fine at different points and time, but they
also need leadership, particularly, you know, as they sort of
(17:26):
start to mature an age and start making their own decisions,
and we need to give them opportunities to grow. And
that's really what I've done with you guys who I
train as adventure leaders is I can be harsh in
my feedback sometimes, but the intention is always good, and
it's so that you make better decisions next time. And
I've certainly seen that develop in you. And as you know,
(17:46):
we deal with such different personalities and sometimes you get
a trip where all of those personalities are on one trip,
and as a leader, you've got to manage that because
if we don't, it affects the experience of everyone else
on the track. And I'm really big on that. I
don't want one or two big personalities overshadowing the whole experience.
And when I say big personalities, I mean positive or negative.
(18:08):
They can totally overshadow everyone's experience. And as leaders, I
like to just temper that a little bit, just to
make sure that you know, everyone's getting the experience that
they want to have, so.
Speaker 4 (18:18):
They're important.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
This next one is what impact do you hope each
trek has on the people who join you? So I
guess what I'm asking here is we know cocurata has
an impact on people, obviously, and when it's done well,
which we pride oss Alls on, then of course it
has an impact on people. But I'm more specifically wondering
what you would hope the impact that they have of
(18:40):
trekking with.
Speaker 4 (18:40):
You good one. I think I want people to go
home with more self belief. You know, you see it
all the time, especially young the youngest female generation, even
like you know, even the middle aged men. I think,
(19:04):
you know, they come over there and everyone's so nervous,
and then when they go home, they've just they've done
this huge thing. It's massive, They've accomplished this massive thing,
and all of a sudden, you see this self belief.
And you know, when you've got confidence in yourself, well
then you're more likely to be successful in everything you do.
(19:27):
So that's what I really like people to take away
from it, is that self belief that they can achieve
something that they think is probably a little bit out
of their reach. And then you know, then they take
that back in their own life and they might try
something else that they think is a bit out of
their reach, whether it be physically or mentally. You know,
(19:47):
then all of a sudden got that self belief to
try and tackle something else that they thought that they
weren't really capable of.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
We see that all the time too, where you see
people in particularly that around that day sort of four
or five, when they start to realize if they've struggled
with it, oh I've got this, and you start to say,
and then you see and walk through those arches and
you just wonder, wonder what else I could achieve based
off what I've just done?
Speaker 4 (20:11):
Yeah, Yeah, very cool.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
There's two different things that you mentioned. There's like young people,
and I also enjoy that journey of young people because
you're putting them into really uncomfortable situations, which in this
day and age is rare. We get the capacity to
control a lot of our experiences, and there's a high
levels of anxiety in young people today, and a lot
of that comes through wanting to control everything. They'll research
(20:35):
the hell out of things before they know. They need
to know the answers before they do a thing, which
means they also want to be good at stuff before
they do a thing, because they don't want to look
silly or and this is not a theory for people listening.
I've put over threeenty eleven to seventeen year olds through
youth development program, so this is what I've experienced in
a very large number of people. But then I also
think that when you're to a middle age A lot
(20:57):
of people I've had experience with on the track have
come over and they don't know why they've just it's
always been in the back of the mind. I always
thought they'd want to do kakoda, But when you talk
to them later and sometimes years later, they'll say, you know,
I was going through some stuff at that time, and
I feel like I almost needed Kakoda, and I had
no idea at the time what it was going to
change in me. And I've had that from one of
(21:20):
my best mates who was in the SAS, who's actually
very well known essays soldier and the emotion that he
got hit with that he didn't expect and he had
to do some healing. He's a very very tough human,
but he had to do some healing around one of
his best mates who was killed in Afghanistan, and he
got really emotional up on Brigade Hill and his wife
at the time, and they've been together since they were fourteen,
(21:42):
said I've never seen him cry. His kids had never
seen him cry, and he was actually annoyed with himself,
and he's like, you know, I don't like showing emotions.
But then when I talked from after everyone else that left,
it just brought up the emotions of his best mate.
He'd been killed, and he hadn't really processed that up
until that time, because you push that stuff away. So
I've had a business owner, a very good made of
mine down in Bendigo. He runs a good side business,
(22:05):
had it for nearly thirty years. He went through a
couple of years of struggle. He did Kakoda and Dosi
ten and he said, I look back now and I realized,
once I've done Cokoda, I needed something else, and he
did oz He ten. He's since done Colakoda two or
three times. He's done ez He ten three times because
it just helps him process all the stuff that's going
on in his business. And now he's at the other
stage where he's he's exiting out of his business, he's
(22:27):
selling it and moving into retirement. But there was a
stage where it looked like he was going to lose
a business, and he never told me that at the
time that he come and did the tracks, it was
just that he was looking for something. So I've had
that feedback a lot, and generally you find something. And
that's the old cliche that whatever we're looking for is
inside us. But the truth is you don't get much
(22:48):
chance in modern society to just sit down and look
at what's inside it. You're too busy doing, doing, doing,
Even you and I at home where we try and
connect to do these podcasts, it's four o'clock in the
morning as we record this because we're both doing, doing, doing,
and sometimes it takes us two or three days even
catch up on a phone call. But when we're all Lakota,
everything stops and all that matters, Like I said before,
(23:08):
is where your feed are. So yeah, it's pretty powerful.
And people who are coming on the track or are
looking to do the track, you might think you're going
for a physical challenge, or you might think you're going
for military history, or you're going to get physical, mental,
and emotional. You're going to learn things about yourself and
you're going to grow as a result of the experience.
And that's just what I've experienced over the years I've
(23:29):
been doing this. Yeah, absolutely, So I have three questions
that I want to go a little bit deeper on
the why for you now. One of them I feel
like we've already answered, but you know on the last
podcast in particular, but forget about leading trips and even
forget about the local customs and culture. For you on
a personal level, what's why do you continue to walk
(23:52):
just kakoda? And also why do you want to go
and do all the other things, you know, like because
you're going to lead eventually Killemannjarro's and every space camps
and you're going to be continually doing adventures stuff, So
it's not just coacoda. This is a deeper why on
adventure in general? What motivates you? Because you're very busy,
You've got businesses, you've got the farm to look after,
(24:13):
You've got, you know, children who are fast becoming adults.
What is it for you that adventure brings out of
you that makes you keep doing it?
Speaker 4 (24:23):
I really think it's just that that self belief. You know,
every time I come home from somewhere, I feel more
confident in myself. And we touched on this it's a
little bit low in the last podcast about like people
from the outside, I think that she's this really super
confident person, and I should be. I don't know, mentally
(24:47):
I should be more confident than I am. But I've
always struggled with my own self belief. And I actually
had this deep conversation with my mum not that long ago.
And I was always the kid that stood out, like
I was a bit of a black sheep. The rest
of my family, you know, my just to work quite
as physically active, and I was loud, and I was
(25:10):
a pinionated and like just you know, maybe a little
bit adhd. But back then that wasn't a thing.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
You know.
Speaker 4 (25:17):
I struggled at school a lot, and I was young
for my age, so I went to school when I
was only four and a half. So I think I
was probably emotionally a little bit immature, but that was again,
it was something that parents just did back then because
it was cheaper than pre school and just send them
off to school. So I think, and I think socially
(25:37):
at the time, I did quite well because I was
loud and I was outgoing and it didn't didn't really matter.
But once I got to high school, everybody else was
so emotionally like more mature than I was. That I
really struggled, and and I think people would constantly say,
get back in your box, you know, not in that way,
(25:58):
but people would constantly say to me, you too much,
you know, you need to slow down, or your own business,
or you're not allowed to have that opinion or and
again it was that was also a bit of a
generational thing. But you know, Mum especially I remember it.
She used to say, to me, so far up yourself,
you think the sun shines out your arm. So I wasn't.
(26:19):
I wasn't allowed to be a ray of sunshine, you.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Know, like and almost that aness is probably a mask
when you are younger and you've got to try and
step up with I mean a year and a half,
say four and a half year into six year old,
a big, big gap.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Yeah, massive, massive, And I think I mean, I guess
I already had that personality before I went to school, so,
you know, because Mum thought I was confident enough to go.
But it wasn't until like I said, it wasn't until
high school. But I kind of realized that I was
a little bit emotionally different. Everybody else will our cot
(26:54):
with things, and I was a hot head. So you know,
if I had a bit of a disagreement with the teacher,
it was there was not a little disagreement. It's a
big disagreement, and you know, I'd wag and all sorts
of you know, just silly stuff. And I think so
as an adult now looking back, I can see exactly
where I went wrong. And then I guess, you know,
(27:15):
not having that confidence in myself in my own personal
life with my parents. My parents by then a divorced
and whatever, and I was a bit lost, I think.
And then I moved away at fifteen. My mom dropped
me off. I guess I'd be another thing too. Mom
just let me move out when I was fifteen because
she's kind of had enough of me. And I moved
(27:37):
to Scone and worked on horse studs.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
That adventures is somehow reconciling all those experiences, now, is that.
Speaker 4 (27:46):
What you're Yeah, absolutely, I think just that lack of
self confidence as a kid and not having a direction,
you know, and being so unsure of what direction I
wanted to go in life because my environment was so
hectic and chaotic, you know, because I I've never really
given that permission to be a leader or be confident
(28:09):
or be allowed to have an opinion that I guess
now as a leader. And I think I naturally wanted
to be a leader when I was younger, Like you know,
you look back and I owned a dance school, and
then you know, then I had a gym, and like
and I've always wanted to be a parent. That was
kind of you know, and like you said, it's the
(28:31):
biggest leadership role we can have. I always found myself
drawn to leadership roles, but because of my upbringing, I
never had the confidence to actually follow through with it,
you know. And I see some beautiful young kids coming
through now that have amazing leadership skill, and I just
think if we could nurture that, or if mine had
(28:52):
been nurtured, you know, I might already be, you know,
on my fiftieth trip. But life experience too can just
I guess, teaches you that there's a journey and you
can't rush these things. You've just got to sit in it.
And now I get to continually do these trips and
continually become a better leader for myself even and now
(29:18):
you know, we talk about the youth development space and whatever,
and I can turn around it with you help those
young leaders as well make a difference. I think it
just continually allows me to have personal growth, you know,
in a world full of people that want to shadow
people with biak opinions and be dreams and goals especially
(29:43):
you know, we talk about this a lot. Living in
scoring as a small town and there's a lot of
small ideas here and so being surrounded by yourself and
given the opportunity to take other people across the track
and continually expose myself to people and places that have
(30:03):
big ideas allow me to have so much personal growth
and continue to have that growth. So I guess this
makes me super excited about what's in the future. You know,
where where do I go from here? And how many
cool how many really cool things I'm going to get
to do in the next thirty years.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
Hopefully this isn't one of my official questions, but just
off the back of listening to you answer that, do
you find it surreal that you can do this as
I know it's sort a full time job as yet,
but that you get to go on adventures and lead
people through pretty amazing experience. Because after the first one,
two or three, it's no longer about us. It's now
(30:43):
about them. I mean, it was always about them when
we leave, but once you've had enough experiences under your
belt to know all the things you need to know
on Kokoda in particular, now it is fully about other people.
Do you find that surreal that you get to do
that as a job.
Speaker 4 (30:58):
Absolutely? I find it. And even when I find myself
telling people, people are saying, oh, so what do you do?
And I am a very busy people person. I juggle
a lot of different balls and you know, but then
when you say at the end, there's all the other
things I do, they I'll be like, oh yeah, and
I also work part time as an adventure to a
(31:19):
guide And they're like, what what do you mean by that?
And I was like, oh, yeah, well I just tracked
Kakoda for fun. You know. We take people and they're like,
what you know? So, and then then I feel guilty
because I'm bragging.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Then I also think about it from a point of
view that Kakoda is a pretty tough experience for a
lot of people, and I'm not for a second disrespect
that it is. Don't ever underestimate it. But we get
to go and do something that is bucket list for
a lot of people and that is really intense and
they have to prepare for and we get to do
it multiple times. I find that quite empowering for myself,
(31:54):
no matter what's going on in life, even as I'm
getting older and I'm in my fifties now, and I'm
still able to be doing this, and I think to
myself at some level, maybe not as many as I
do in a year, but I'd like to be doing
this for another twenty years. And that's pretty cool because
when I first started trekking Kakoda, I was in my
late twenties and it was I was always one of
the youngest people on the trips, if not the youngest,
(32:17):
And now I'm getting a stage where I'm generally one
of the oldest. So I think on this trip coming up,
like I'm the only one that doesn't have a personal border,
and I think I'm one of the oldest or if
not the oldest, on the hen trips. So that's a
real shift over the last twenty years for me that
it helps me to maintain my physical health. I think
it help me maintain my mental health anyway. But just
(32:39):
by being out there, I feel more relaxed and more
I process a lot of stuff you know, that I'm
then working on when I get back home. But yeah,
I do. I feel very fortunate that this is what
I get to do for a job. And I just
got a young bloke who's just signed up to the
Adventure Leaders program yesterday actually, and he's already partially doing
this for a job and working for another company, not
(33:01):
working for us. He's already doing Kakoda's but he wants
to learn all the other trips and stuff as well.
And it's kind of cool to because he said, I
look at you, and I think I didn't realize you
could actually do this for a job. I said, yeah,
it takes time, but you're on that path, and you know,
if that's what you want to do, if you want
to do it full time, it's it is possible. When
I first started doing it full time, I didn't know
(33:23):
it wasn't a thing. So an example of that is
when I saw people walking Cocoda because I'd been in
the Army and the Army was my job. And then
when I see people walking Kakoda as a track leaders,
I thought, oh, this must be what they do for
a job. But most people have to have another job,
and I was in a village. I was in Minari
for the first ANZAC trip this year and a bloke
(33:43):
come up to me from another company and I hadn't
met him before, which is rare actually, but he was
very personality and he came up and having a chat.
I said. He asked me what I'm doing and you know,
and I said, I'm doing back to back. So he goes, oh,
it must be you must have a good employer to
give you time off to do that, and I said, no, no,
this is this is what I do. And it's what
do you mean. I said, Well, I'm my employer, this
is my job. This is what I does. I said, yeah,
(34:06):
so I don't think I've ever met anyone that does
this full time for a job. So that's a pretty
cool experience for me to know that you can create
something yourself, doing something you love that impacts a huge
amount of people. You think about our Anti trips. We
employed all up over those two trips, ninety boys from
the villages. So it's ninety people we've impacted. On a
financial level. We impacted you know, thirty thirty five trekkers.
(34:31):
We impacted ourselves as track leaders. It's a pretty powerful thing.
Speaker 4 (34:36):
Yeah, absolutely, definitely.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
I know you've had a bit of experience now and
I never want you So this next question is around this.
I never want you to come home any of you
trek leaders come home from a Cocoda trip and go right,
that was just co Coda, put in a bucket, come
back and pick it up next time. I want to
know how does Kakoda itself affect you after a trip,
as in long after, for days, weeks or months after
(34:59):
you finished trips. How does it have some sort of
positive effect on you.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
It's just that that empowerment, like you talked about saying,
when I come home reset and people say to me,
you know, how do you keep going back over and
over again? And it's a little getaway for us as well,
you know, because we're so busy in our in our
life running businesses and looking after kids and whatever it
(35:26):
is going over there, and yet yeah, yeah, it's still
a very serious role where we've got where we're looking
after people and making sure everyone's safe and get you know,
kicking boxes and you know, like you talk about all
the time. On the top, it looks nice and smooth,
but there's definitely some feet paddling underneath. And so yeah,
it's a very important role when we get over there,
(35:49):
but it's still a reset, it's still away from the
grind of life. So it gives us that time to
reset as well. You know, when we even have a nighttime,
when we go back into our tents and whatever, I
listen to books or podcasts and stuff that I don't
actually get time to do over here, you know, because
we are so busy that you kind of you do
(36:10):
you unload, you know, lots of things, and because you're
unplugging and you're you know, doing all those things where
you're not distracted by having at the moment, I'm just
like an uber mom. I've never stopped just driving some
sport or whatever. So over there you've got the sign
to just strip it back and analyze what's going on
(36:31):
in your own life. Even when you're walking. We tell
people there's just so much time to think, so much
time to get up in your own head and really,
you know, break down what's going on in your own life.
So I think every time I do that and get to,
you know, go over there, I come back so empowered
by what I've done, but with so much clarity around
(36:53):
the direction I want my life to go. So that's
definitely what I get out of it. It's just clarity.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
As we record this, I've done ninety five trips and
that doesn't change if I'm honest. Like I come home.
When I had the gym, and you know, I had
a few staff in Messiah and Jaden and those guys
working there, they said, it's almost intimidating when you're away
because we know you're going to come in with all
these ideas that you've had time to process. So I
come over and right, we're going to do this this this.
I sit and I write into my just notes and
(37:21):
my phone. I write on business plans and structures around
what I need to do on this and that and
the other thing. And then I come home and go, right,
team are doing this. This is like, oh crap. So
it's good for us, maybe not so good for around
this My final question for this series, and I have
also written out some rapid fire questions, which are short,
(37:42):
sharp answers whatever comes ahead first. But before that, what
legacy do you want to leave through your work on Kakoda?
Now to me, just want to give this some quantified
question a little bit. Legacy for me personally is what
we do with the local people, how we trek through
the local villages, even I always want to be respected
(38:03):
by the villagers as someone who respects them. I want
to provide I personally have a goal of wanting to
spend a million dollars a year in the local community.
So that's not about the dollars we bring in as
a business, but I would like to put that much
money across the track through employment at some point. And
we've never hit that number. That's a big number, and
(38:24):
that's two million keener, but that's always been a goal
of mine, and somewhere in my next twenty years, I'd
like to achieve that because I think that's legacy. It's
not giving handouts to people, it's them earning money, which
I think is very empowering to then go and do
the things that they need to do in their village,
as opposed to us going right, here's a thousand bucks,
you know, or here's donations crows or which we do
(38:45):
all of that too. But my personal legacy I want
to leave is that a lot of people and young
people coming through on the villages, in the villages as well,
get employee employment from us. So that's one of my legacies,
and then my other legacy for me personally is what
people take away. I like it when in five and
ten years people come back and go, you know, that
(39:05):
changed my life. Kakoda was so empowering for me. And
I've got a maid of mine who's coming over next
year for my one hundredth trip, who did Kakoda with
me twenty two years ago and we're still mates today.
And he's a very big businessman, like a huge businessman
here in Queensland, and he's bringing his family and he's
bringing kids and his brother and partners and all these
(39:27):
people are coming on this trip, you know, twenty something
years later. So to me, that's a legacy when someone
wants to do something all of these years later that
they don't have to do, but not only that, they
remember an experience from twenty something years ago and they
want to bring their family over. That's that's my sort
of legacy. I want that long after I'm gone, people
remember the experience that they had. So for you, what
(39:50):
legacy do you want to leave through your work on
the Kamkata track.
Speaker 4 (39:56):
I don't know how I follow that.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
I shouldn't have done that. It was just me thinking
out there.
Speaker 4 (40:03):
Can I just say I haven't really given it much thought.
To be honest, I guess like eight Trips has kind
of crept up on me a little bit.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
You know.
Speaker 4 (40:17):
You start out thinking, oh, no, it's just you know,
two or three trips, and then and then it's kind
of just snowballed into you know, and I do it
all the time, Glenn, when my next trip, you know,
when am I going against? So I guess eight Trips
has crept up on me that I haven't really given
it much thought. But it's it's definitely similar to yours.
(40:38):
You know. I want to be remembered as someone that
definitely impasted the country and the people in a positive
way and impacted my trekkers memorably, like in a in
a positive way. I guess the same as you that
(40:59):
I want people to think back and go, you know,
Heidi took us across and damn she did a great job.
She did such a great job that I want to
take my whole family back and I want them to
have the same experience that I had. I think, you know,
that's that's what it's all about, I guess, is have
(41:19):
it giving those trekkers that memorable experience that they feel safe,
and it's because it's not a fig holiday, it's not
it's not like anything else anyone will ever do. So
supporting people through that it's just such an important role
(41:40):
that I guess I just want people to look back,
like in twenty years and go, yeah, this was that.
That was an epic trip. And I want I just
think I want everybody else to feel like we feel,
you know, I want them to have that each that
that it's an amazing place, that it's amazing people and
(42:01):
it's the amazing history and and that's that's so important
as well. I want to be remembered as someone who
who kept the history alive, you know, that that didn't
let it die. It was really interesting. And every time
I go, every time I speak to someone about doing
kakota Is, I learn more about the history. And it's
just it's just an ever evolving story of what actually
(42:26):
when when I'm on over there, and you know, I
guess that's as a whole, it's pretty much the same
as yours.
Speaker 2 (42:35):
This next section is ten rapid fire questions, so short,
sharp hands. Whatever comes to the head, and if you can't
really think of ananswer, even we just move on. But
it's and it's Look, it's definitely stuff we've covered in
the mini podcasts we've done together. I thought I'll just
keep this one short and sharp, so you're ready to go.
Speaker 4 (42:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (42:53):
What's the number one thing people underestimate about Cocoda?
Speaker 4 (42:59):
The weather?
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Yeah? Well, I love when people get you think it's
going to rain against P and G. It's it's a
very good chance is going to rain, rain that we
don't understand.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
Yeah, well you know, and then when the boys are
digging motes around your ten so that the water doesn't
come into it. Yeah, Oh gosh, I'm terrible at this.
I could make a whole conversation out of that question.
Speaker 2 (43:21):
What's the most emotional moment you've witnessed on the track?
Speaker 4 (43:25):
Oh? Myself trying to read that poem on Brigade Hill
the first trip.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
How do you handle someone who wants to quit part
way through the trip?
Speaker 4 (43:35):
Depends why they want to quit, but probably just no.
Speaker 2 (43:40):
Yeah, I'm pretty tough on that. I don't let people
quit on themselves easily, just because I know that once
they often, once they get through that, then they're going
to be good. What's one item that every trekker forgets
but absolutely needs. Oh I don't have every treker forgets
an item. But you know what's something that you regularly
see people forget that they probably should have bought.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
Baffling. There's a lot of people don't take vaccaline.
Speaker 2 (44:06):
Yeah, and for those that I don't get our packing
lists or vasclines for putting on your feet, just a
light layer of vasseline to give a bit more water
resistance to your fee which stopped the breaking down, which
stops you getting foot right, which is actually a pretty
painful thing if you get it. So yeah, vaseline, Yeah,
vasoline is a good one. How do you mentally prepare
for each crossing even after eight times across the track?
Speaker 4 (44:32):
Well, that's a that's a good one. I I do
have to mentally prepare every time. I think that's something
that trekkers don't realize is that we feel like every
time like I'm super always excited, but we still have
to like take a few deep breaths and go right
(44:54):
times and knuckle down and get just done, you know,
like the first day where you know, or two days
where you're getting your trekking legs on. It still hits
us hard every time.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
You know, I think what helps in that situation for
us is that we've got them to think about. So
we've got all these other things we're thinking about, whereas
for the teker, they're just thinking about what they're experiencing.
So I reckon having other people to think about actually
helps us. So but I agree, even for me, you've
got to mentally prep every time. Question number six, what
does the spirit of Kakoona mean to you personally?
Speaker 4 (45:27):
The spirit of Kakona? Oh, well, that's really that's a
deep one. Findship.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Yeah, I was going to say, if I had to
rapid fire that it's just mayship for me. Yeah, I
think of the place of this rapha, but mayship in
particular just helping your mates get through.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
Yeah. Yeah. And you can be on the trip with
like most and a lot of people do, come with
no family or no friends, and by the end everyone
because you've stripped it back so raw and everyone's in
such a vulnerable place that by the end of it
you come out of it with some best friends. Then
you know, like you said yourself, friends that you'll have for.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Life, favorite village or section of the track.
Speaker 4 (46:11):
And why, oh that's impossible. My trek Is always laugh
at me because I'll say, oh, this is my favorite village. Well,
this is my favorite village. Yeah, yeah, I mean I
love HOOI beautiful, like picturesque, but like and you normally
(46:34):
you get there, especially if we stop there overnight, because
you get there, we keeps the time. You can have
a swim. It's before you've done any real physically hard work.
You know, people think, oh, because it is hot. By
the time we get there. If we stop there, you've
checked in the heap, so everyone has a beautiful swim
and thinks, oh, this isn't too bad. But hoy is beautiful.
(46:55):
I love era of hour. I think, yeah, you know,
looking out over that ridge line and watching the sun
goow down. No, when you've only got depending on how
fast we're going, but you haven't got far to go,
you can kind of see the finish in the distance.
I think that it's a beautiful place. They're all beautiful.
(47:17):
I don't know, I.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
Really I don't know why, but I always enjoy that waterfall,
climb up out of up into Lanumu, and you know,
I always enjoy that section, no matter how hot or
wet or whatever's going on. I don't know why, but
I've always enjoyed that section.
Speaker 4 (47:33):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, everyone, I guess terrain wise, that's definitely
the most beautiful section of the track.
Speaker 2 (47:40):
What's the toughest day on the track physically or emotionally?
Speaker 4 (47:46):
Oh, I reckon for Trekking and Beer at a Ridge. Yeah,
because you're getting close to home, you're fatigue. We kind
of talk it up a little bit, and it depends
on which way you're going to. Yeah, yeah, you know
(48:06):
when you go on the other way, that climbing Brigade
Hills pretty tough.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
So long, is it?
Speaker 4 (48:11):
Yeah? But yeah, no, I definitely think Him and a
Ridge is because it's just so short. I mean it's
not I mean it is short. It depends on how
slow you go, but it's so steep and it just
seems like it keeps going and going going, and go
around the corner and it goes up again. And because
there's normally, you know, because we let people kind of
got their own own speed up there, there's a little
(48:33):
bit of expectation around sometimes how quick you want to
get up there, and you're so close to the end,
I think everyone's just a little bit drained, and yeah, and.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
We talk about it for days, leading him up to it, so.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
That another anticipation.
Speaker 2 (48:50):
Number nine, Have you ever had a trek, a specific
trick that changed you? And how.
Speaker 4 (48:56):
Track or trek no trek?
Speaker 2 (48:57):
So out of your eight tricks or kakodas, has there
ever been one specifically that you feel changed you? And
if so, how, No.
Speaker 4 (49:05):
I don't think there's any one specific crossing that's changed me.
But there's definitely been specific moments across the tracks that
have changed me, like in different different which I guess
is so rewarding because it's nearly every time I go,
whether it's a conversation I have with you, or a
conversation I have with a trekker, or it could even
(49:30):
be a conversation I've had with one of the locals.
There's so many distinct moments across the track that I've
had that have changed my life completely.
Speaker 2 (49:41):
Now, this last one, I think is a good way
to end an episode, and this has been a really
good episode. I love the way to be honest, I
said this gave you his feedback last time. I love
the way you answer questions so deeply now, and you're
very confident when you speak, which is I think a
change over the years that I've seen you, because you know,
years ago, as you said, there was I don't know
(50:01):
if lack of confidence as the right word, but kind
of that feeling of you've got to be in your
box and if I step outside of that, you feel
a certain way. You've definitely changed in your calmness, of
your leadership and the way you're doing things. And that's
after only eight trips, so I can only imagine how
that goes. So this has been another really good episode,
but the last one, which is a great one to
finish for people listening who are thinking about Kakoda. What
(50:23):
would you say to someone who's scared that they're not
capable of doing this?
Speaker 4 (50:35):
Well? I guess that really depends on the situation because
if they're not like Chip, there is a few circumstances
like I'm not you know what, just have a crack.
Have a crack, right, What have you got to lose?
Speaker 2 (50:51):
Yeah? I think about I think about Michael, who you know,
who did our second antic trip and diagnosed with Parkinson's
and you know, sixty years of age, a fit sixty
years of age. But then when you have a diagnosis
like that and still was willing to give it a crack.
And yeah, there were some tough days in there and
some tough moments, but there was never a stage where
he looked like quitting.
Speaker 4 (51:12):
You know, he was never going to quit.
Speaker 2 (51:14):
And that's I've seen thirty year olds, you know, kind
of go through some mental stuff or just feel like
they're not sure, and you go, man, you can do this,
because I've seen people you know, do this who are
older and younger and have certain issues and they just
pushed through it. Anyway. So the thing with what I
love about Michael, and I'm going to do a podcast
with him soon, is when he got diagnosed and he
(51:36):
said to his doctor, I've always wanted to do it,
and he had been booked in pre the diagnosis, but
you know, am I able to do it? And his
doctor said, yeah, I think if it's been a life
long dream, you should have cracked it because this Parkson
is going to get worse, not better. And yeah, Banging
came over and had to crack it it.
Speaker 4 (51:51):
Yeah, And I think my thought process when You're just
asked me that question was, you know, straight away my
head went to, you know, well, I guess if you're
in a wheelchair, but it's Actually that's not even that's
not even a reason. If there's something in the world
that you want to do bad enough, you'll find a way.
Speaker 2 (52:11):
Just find people that will help support that goal and
dream and companies like us that go, okay, well it's
not easy, but is it possible. I guess let's work
it out.
Speaker 4 (52:19):
Absolutely, And what's you know, the worst that can happen
if you prepare, prepare yourself well, get the right people
around you. Anything possible. So there's actually no real reason
not to just have a crack.
Speaker 2 (52:34):
And once again, that's a Kokoda lesson for everyone listening
that you'll carry into life. If there's something you want
to do, just put the right people around you and
then have a crack. And that's such a motto for
success in life. Everyone's looking for the shortcuts or the
hacks to success, and to me, it's just surround yourself
with people that are willing to believe in the dream
(52:55):
and willing to work it out with you. Not people
that go, yeah, it's one hundred percent, but people will say, okay,
well let's work it out. You know, when Alissa wanted
to climb mount ever since she was fourteen or fifteen,
at the time, I didn't say there's no chance to
get out, or maybe one day I just say, Okay,
I don't know enough about it, let's work it out.
And you know, as a result, you're still on the
top of that mountain twice. So you need to be
(53:16):
surrounded by people in life that believe in you, because
there are so many people that are willing to put
doubt in your head. There are so many people that
are willing to tell you, even if it's out of love,
all the reasons why it's too risky or you shouldn't
do it, or and I don't know. History is not
written by those people, and legacy is not written by
those people. And for every one of you listening as
(53:36):
an individual, I don't care how old you are. Your
Kakoda trip is your personal experience and it's your personal legacy.
We're not all going to be legacy like Nelson, Mandela
and Mother Trays. Have it your own personal legacy, even
if it's just your kids see you go and do
this thing and go, hey mum, that's pretty cool. That's
a legacy right there.
Speaker 4 (53:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:57):
Absolutely, Hi, it's another great episode. Thanks for coming on
the show.
Speaker 4 (54:02):
No worry us of these.
Speaker 2 (54:09):
Elassy Harpuzas to be free racing Bondvisari.
Speaker 3 (54:28):
So the bond between Ossie's and the people of Papu
and New Guinea was forged in war and it endures
in peace. We felt that friendliness, that special connection in
the comforting presence of our porters and in every small
community along the Kakoda Track. Who we are and as
(54:56):
we are free.
Speaker 2 (55:06):
Okay, guys, thanks for tuning in. It would be awesome
if you'd share this with anyone you know that's going
to the Kakoda Track or there's been and has a
keen interest in the track. It's people and those that
choose to track it. The pillars of is Sharaba say, courage, endurance, makeship,
and sacrifices great words to live by, and this podcast
will often makeshift and a place for those that live
and love the Kakoda Track experience until next episode, live
(55:28):
a life that inspires you and those around you, and
remember to take time out to think about what's really important,
what's really important?
Speaker 4 (55:35):
What's really important?
Speaker 1 (55:38):
Thanks fellowstak to the Kakoda Track Podcast. To get it
touched or stay up to date, go to Kakoda Track
Podcast on Facebook or email Glen at Adventure Professionals dot
com dot ah. Don't forget to subscribe and share.
Speaker 2 (55:52):
With your friends.
Speaker 1 (55:53):
Let's keep the spirit at the Stories of Kakoda, at
the P and G people alive.
Apodjay Production. This podcast is proudly brought to you by
Adventure Professionals www dot Adventure Professionals dot com dot au.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
For me, Mission Ridge and Brigade Hill. The whole Kakoda
campaign more people need to know about it, or know
everyone knows someone who's trek Kokoda, but to actually understand
the stories of what these young guys did, it's harrowing
what they went through.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
They were staunched to the end against odds uncountered and
they fell with their faces to the pone.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Welcome to the Kakoda Track Podcast, hosted by former Soljet
Glen Asa. This is the place to hear stories from
those who've trecked Kakoda and gained tips of knowledge about
what to expect on the track or to relive your
own amazing experiences. The Kakoda Track Podcast keeping the spirit
of Kakoda alive.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
And then here we'll get back to the Kakoda Track Podcast. Now.
Last time I caught up with Heidi, who's one of
my adventure leaders who I'm very very proud of. She
does a very good job and you can feel the
passion and the last episode I had written out eighteen
questions we only got through nine of them, so we
thought we'd double up and we'd do the other nine.
So we're going to talk a little bit about the
deeper wise behind doing Kakoda today. I'm going to ask
(01:26):
your questions around advice she would give you as people
that are going to track the track, but she has
had no insight to these questions, and that's what I love.
So she's got to work it out as she goes,
and that just shows what she knows, how passionate she
is about it without us having to pre organize the
questions and have preset answers. So this is just raw,
(01:47):
real stuff, and let's be honest, when you get out
on the track, it's going to be raw and real.
So I really hope you enjoy this episode. I thought
we'd kick into because we did nine questions the last time,
and I thought we'd do the next nine questions. And
I was saying on the intro to this, how I
don't give you an insight to any.
Speaker 4 (02:08):
Of the questions, no no idea.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
But I think that's a good thing because it shows,
well what I said on the intro is it shows
the rawness and the knowledge and the passion that we
have for what we do, and realistically, that's what cocata is.
It's raw, it's real. You don't really get to sugarcoat
anything or hide anywhere. So I kind of liked that idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Now we'll just rip straight in if you like. So
(02:34):
the first series we did because I segmented all the questions,
so we did your personal lessons. We talked about things
you know that you've learned from the track, even about yourself.
We've talked about what makes you go back year after year,
talked about the military history and culture. So now I
thought we're going to go through three sort of pieces
(02:54):
of this. It'll be advice for future trekkers, which is honestly,
most people listening to this show I have either track
Corcuta and they just listened to it for memory sake.
Oh you get people who are going to Kakuta and
looking for in So that's obviously why we do this.
So I thought we'd do one around advice, one around
leadership an impact, and then just around the deeper personal why,
(03:14):
which is kind of retouching on some of you know,
as an example, like when you go back first time,
second time, third time, fourth time, you know there's reasons,
but we're learning a lot as we go. Now that
you can sort of get a handle on it, then
there's a deeper why to why we keep coming back.
And I know certainly for me, you know, I could
have stopped at twenty or forty or fifty or and
now we're about to do one hundred or soon. So
(03:37):
I guess for me, I understand that the reason I
keep coming back, And we talked a bit about this
for you too, is just people, you know, the local people,
the trekkers, all that sort of stuff. So did I
thought i'd go through some of those again as well
in a little bit deeper context. If you if you're
if you're ready for that, no rapid five, no rapid
five questions. So my first one is what advice would
(04:01):
you give to someone preparing for their first ever Kokoda
t it.
Speaker 4 (04:09):
I think we have touched on this last time. I
don't overthink it, don't like do the training. Obviously we've
had we've had a few incidences where people haven't trained,
and that shows the show is pretty quick when somebody
hasn't done any kind of work towards getting there, you know,
(04:29):
But if the training doesn't need to be you know,
running thirty kilometers a week, or it doesn't need to
be you know, you don't need to be some kind
of crazy athlete to do it. So just so, I guess,
just enjoy the process of getting fit enough to do it.
Make it. You know, it's a commitment that should be
(04:51):
taken on over you know, at least you know, six
or twelve months before, you know, enjoying excitement leading up
to it, and then don't have any expectations. Just go
in raw and happy to embrace the unknown, because you know,
we get it all the time where people make themselves
(05:11):
so nervous they get over there and they'll ask a
thousand questions and then by the end you're like, oh,
I didn't actually even really need to know that. I'm like, no,
we just we just and we do it all the time.
Now we'll just smile and nod or you know, you
get it when where we get there, you know, those
kinds of questions or how long until dinner or you know,
(05:33):
just just enjoy the whole process of not knowing and
just embrace, embrace the unknown.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
You always say when it comes to preparation and instad
I was saying, like prepare for the worst and hope
for the best. But I like it when people get
to the end of the trip and go, oh, that
wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to
be, because that means they've done the right prep or maybe
the weather's been nice to them. But yeah, I kind
of like that whole concept with just prepare and then
over prepare almost you know, as we get older, make
(06:04):
sure we're not injuring yourselves, but make sure we're absolutely
prepared for worst case, which is, you know, if you
had horrific weather and if you had a new orness
or an injury or like, how do you mentally get
through that? And that's to me part of the preparation.
So what's the next reason is what's the biggest mistake
that you see checkers make when they come to Kakota.
Speaker 4 (06:23):
That's a good one. The biggest mistake packing too much?
That always packing too much, like and it doesn't really
affect them at the end of the day because they've
got a porter, so it affects the porter they and
you see them realize that too, like on day three
(06:44):
or four they're like, I really didn't need all of
this stuff. You know, some of the crazy things I've
seen people take over there, you know, to even like
beard clippers and chairs, and you know, it's all about
stripping back and getting right back to nature. So you
(07:04):
don't need to act excessively. Obviously you've got to tape
the necessities, but if you don't use it on a
normal day to day bases over here, like I just
follow the packing list even.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
If you do use it on a day to day basis.
I think a lot of us are worried about the
fact that it's very rare to spend eight days somewhere
where you can't just sit down to the shop and
grab a thing that you need, but you can actually
get away with so minimal, Like people would be surprised
how little we need as humans to get through a
day today. And when you're on Kakoda, I always say,
(07:40):
just be where your feet are. Nothing else matters outside
of where you are today and what you're doing today.
And it's very rare that we only have one thing
to focus on, but that's what we have. And you're right,
you don't need anything else really, like everything is supplied.
You've got your tent, you've got your clothing, you've got
your sleeping gear. You're probably not going to read as
many books as you think. You're probably not going to
(08:00):
watch as much TV shows or listen to as much
music as you think. You sit around and chat to
people of a nighttime, then you get a bit get
up and do it all again.
Speaker 4 (08:09):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Yeah, what's one thing that you think or you would
love for everyone to experience while on the track.
Speaker 4 (08:22):
I think I mean kakoda. I think that's why another
reason why I love to code. But you can't. You
can't escape the experience. There's no way to hide. So
you know, when you when you say what do you
what do you want them to experience or hope they
can experience, it's sat them in the face, no matter what, Like,
(08:45):
no matter what, they're going to be exposed to the
rawness of kakoda. Like there's no way, there's no there's
no nice motel to kind of escape the rain, or
there's no there's no easier option instead of going straight
up the hills. So no matter what, you're going to
experience the full experience. There's nowhere to hide. So I
(09:09):
think just having that mental grip, I think I love
that people experience that like that the push you know
where on day three or four when you're feeling a
bit tired, Like you can see it every time when
people just flick that twitch and go, you know what,
(09:30):
I can actually do this and I'm going to make
it to the end. I think everyone needs to experience that,
but they're going to get it no matter what, because
like it slaps through the face.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Yeah, I think with the day to day trekking and
the hills, and you're right, you can't escape it. If
I could add in one thing, it would be take
time to get to experience the local people. And I
don't just mean importers. I mean I see people get
into villages and they're just tired, and even if it's early,
like two or three in the afternoon, we kind of
just lays around and recover. And I think even if
(10:02):
you spend thirty minutes doing that, but then go for
a walk through the villag go and talk to the kids,
going if you've got a footy, kick a footy. You
don't have to have a full football match. You have
to injure yourself, which is always a risk, but just
get out and walk around, ask questions of the locals.
Partaking the bigger villages like your manaris and the fogies.
The locals love to have a chat. You know, they'll
(10:22):
pull you up and they'll have a chat about things.
You can ask them questions and because all of a
lot of people just trying to preserve their energy as
best they can. And then at the end, I think,
I imagine just had a little bit more engagement in
the villages rather than just walking through them. So that's
probably the only thing I would really adding, because you're right,
the rest of the experience just it hits them, whether
they like it or not.
Speaker 4 (10:44):
Yeah, No, that's absolutely right too. Yeah, if you don't.
And I think I found that on my first trip,
because it was over that five day period, I got
back feeling a little bit empty, like thinking, oh I
could have I wish I had to spend more time
or had more time to spend in the villages to
really soak up that environment. I guess we're so spoilt
(11:06):
now that we get to go back over and over
again and we know the locals and by name, and
I actually get so excited about going back to the
villages and seeing the kids that you know, there's a
couple of kids that I've been watching grow up now
for three or four years, and they always remember my
name and they'll come running over, normally wanting lollies or something.
But yeah, it's a really special thing to be able
(11:28):
to keep engaging with those kids. And the checkers don't
get that because nine times out of ten they don't
go back. So yeah, it's definitely important to stuff and
really get involved in the in the community, I guess
and talk to the locals, which.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Kind of segueys me into the next series of questions,
which around leadership and impact. And I want to ask,
what does it actually mean to you to be a
leader on Cookoda? And I'm not just talking like the
logistics of running a trip, which is good to know,
just emotionally culturally, like for you personally, what does it
actually mean to you to get to lead people on Comkoda?
(12:03):
Because I know it's something we talked about, then it's
something that happened, and then obviously COVID and all that
in the middle of that, but once it started to happen,
and now that you're you know, you're not too far
of hitting double digits and so on, so you need
getting all of this experience. What does it actually mean
to you? To lead people on kakoda.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
I think that's a really good question. Another one, I
think it's my own like I love like we talked
about this in the last podcast. I love the self
growth and the challenge I get from helping other people,
(12:42):
and it's become, I guess, really relevant. It's funny as
you get older, you kind of think, oh my gosh,
what was I doing back for when I was twenty
or why did I study that at school? And you know,
I think I've always been drawn to doing something like
in this way, and then all the little pieces come together,
(13:04):
you know, Like I studied geography at school, loved it.
I wasn't good at like many things, and geography is
quite a difficult subjects, but I was really good at
it and I loved it. I did indigenous studies, you know,
so I've always been really interested in different cultures and
indigenous history. So the little things like that that you
think back twenty years ago, why was I even studying
(13:27):
that or why was I interested? And then all of
a sudden, I'm here, and you know, I'm helping people
achieve this amazing thing, and I get to do it
over and over again. So I think it means to
me personally a lot of self growth and development, and
I keep getting to do that. It's like anything, if
you don't do it all the time, you know, you're
(13:48):
not continually stressing and have it stressing you know, your
mental growth and getting that development. So for me to
be able to keep going over there, you know, I'm
bring every time I bring back a little bit of
extra mental strength. You know that I've can put into
my business here or try and put into my family relationships,
(14:09):
and you know it just it gives me the opportunity
to keep growing and keep developing and whilst you know,
getting that fulfillment of helping other people achieve their goal.
It's a pretty special thing to be able to do.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
So leadership, this is in my experience, leadership isn't something
that's taught very often. We get put into leadership roles
by virtue of how long we've spent in a job,
for example, and then we slowly move up the ladder
and hopefully we've had some good leaders to learn from.
But even then there's very little formal processing, whereas in
the military, obviously, the processing for how we develop leaders
(14:45):
is very structured and there's things that they need to
know how to do, and we do courses on it
at every level of leadership. But out in the real
world that's not a thing. So Kakoda or any sort
of adventure leading, but particularly Kakoda, it's pretty intense as
far as you know things that can happen and think
people that you have to manage, and you really get
put in into a strong leadership position and maybe nothing
(15:08):
goes wrong, but if it does, that's when your leadership show.
So this next question is how has leading people through
Kakoda shaped your own leadership style or your own leadership philosophy.
Speaker 4 (15:24):
I think it's been life changing. I think the opportunity
to be taught I guess leadership skills by you and
you know, we've been friends now and you've been mentoring
I think with eight or nine years or something and
a fairly long time now, and just being surrounded by
(15:46):
you and people that you know that are in your circle.
It's taught me, you know that ultimate you know, becoming
the chaos, I guess, and you know, and even having
those skills or some of those skills, and I guess
I had a perfect I guess to practice those skills
(16:08):
which I didn't always get right, you know, either here
in you know, in my own personal life at the
time or on the track. But having you, I guess
to guide me and learn those skills I think just
being you know, then learning to be that calm and
the chaos. You know, I was. I was brought up
(16:29):
in a family of you know, hot heads, you know,
we were. I was that was a proper hot head.
And I see it now. I guess in my you know,
I've got one child, particularly who's quite hot headed, and
I stayed him. I was exactly the same and it
gets you nowhere. So I've learned those skills that I
(16:50):
und back even into my parenting that you know, that
I can be the calm and the chaos and just
tackle anything that that kind of comes along with a
little bit more emotional maturity.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
Yeah. I like that you mentioned parenting because my personal
belief is parenting is the most leadership, you know, the
most important leadership thing will do. But a lot of
us don't realize and a lot of people and we're
segueing a little bit away from Kakoda, but a lot
of people try and be best friends with their kids,
which is fine at different points and time, but they
also need leadership, particularly, you know, as they sort of
(17:26):
start to mature an age and start making their own decisions,
and we need to give them opportunities to grow. And
that's really what I've done with you guys who I
train as adventure leaders is I can be harsh in
my feedback sometimes, but the intention is always good, and
it's so that you make better decisions next time. And
I've certainly seen that develop in you. And as you know,
(17:46):
we deal with such different personalities and sometimes you get
a trip where all of those personalities are on one trip,
and as a leader, you've got to manage that because
if we don't, it affects the experience of everyone else
on the track. And I'm really big on that. I
don't want one or two big personalities overshadowing the whole experience.
And when I say big personalities, I mean positive or negative.
(18:08):
They can totally overshadow everyone's experience. And as leaders, I
like to just temper that a little bit, just to
make sure that you know, everyone's getting the experience that
they want to have, so.
Speaker 4 (18:18):
They're important.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
This next one is what impact do you hope each
trek has on the people who join you? So I
guess what I'm asking here is we know cocurata has
an impact on people, obviously, and when it's done well,
which we pride oss Alls on, then of course it
has an impact on people. But I'm more specifically wondering
what you would hope the impact that they have of
(18:40):
trekking with.
Speaker 4 (18:40):
You good one. I think I want people to go
home with more self belief. You know, you see it
all the time, especially young the youngest female generation, even
like you know, even the middle aged men. I think,
(19:04):
you know, they come over there and everyone's so nervous,
and then when they go home, they've just they've done
this huge thing. It's massive, They've accomplished this massive thing,
and all of a sudden, you see this self belief.
And you know, when you've got confidence in yourself, well
then you're more likely to be successful in everything you do.
(19:27):
So that's what I really like people to take away
from it, is that self belief that they can achieve
something that they think is probably a little bit out
of their reach. And then you know, then they take
that back in their own life and they might try
something else that they think is a bit out of
their reach, whether it be physically or mentally. You know,
(19:47):
then all of a sudden got that self belief to
try and tackle something else that they thought that they
weren't really capable of.
Speaker 2 (19:54):
We see that all the time too, where you see
people in particularly that around that day sort of four
or five, when they start to realize if they've struggled
with it, oh I've got this, and you start to say,
and then you see and walk through those arches and
you just wonder, wonder what else I could achieve based
off what I've just done?
Speaker 4 (20:11):
Yeah, Yeah, very cool.
Speaker 2 (20:13):
There's two different things that you mentioned. There's like young people,
and I also enjoy that journey of young people because
you're putting them into really uncomfortable situations, which in this
day and age is rare. We get the capacity to
control a lot of our experiences, and there's a high
levels of anxiety in young people today, and a lot
of that comes through wanting to control everything. They'll research
(20:35):
the hell out of things before they know. They need
to know the answers before they do a thing, which
means they also want to be good at stuff before
they do a thing, because they don't want to look
silly or and this is not a theory for people listening.
I've put over threeenty eleven to seventeen year olds through
youth development program, so this is what I've experienced in
a very large number of people. But then I also
think that when you're to a middle age A lot
(20:57):
of people I've had experience with on the track have
come over and they don't know why they've just it's
always been in the back of the mind. I always
thought they'd want to do kakoda, But when you talk
to them later and sometimes years later, they'll say, you know,
I was going through some stuff at that time, and
I feel like I almost needed Kakoda, and I had
no idea at the time what it was going to
change in me. And I've had that from one of
(21:20):
my best mates who was in the SAS, who's actually
very well known essays soldier and the emotion that he
got hit with that he didn't expect and he had
to do some healing. He's a very very tough human,
but he had to do some healing around one of
his best mates who was killed in Afghanistan, and he
got really emotional up on Brigade Hill and his wife
at the time, and they've been together since they were fourteen,
(21:42):
said I've never seen him cry. His kids had never
seen him cry, and he was actually annoyed with himself,
and he's like, you know, I don't like showing emotions.
But then when I talked from after everyone else that left,
it just brought up the emotions of his best mate.
He'd been killed, and he hadn't really processed that up
until that time, because you push that stuff away. So
I've had a business owner, a very good made of
mine down in Bendigo. He runs a good side business,
(22:05):
had it for nearly thirty years. He went through a
couple of years of struggle. He did Kakoda and Dosi
ten and he said, I look back now and I realized,
once I've done Cokoda, I needed something else, and he
did oz He ten. He's since done Colakoda two or
three times. He's done ez He ten three times because
it just helps him process all the stuff that's going
on in his business. And now he's at the other
stage where he's he's exiting out of his business, he's
(22:27):
selling it and moving into retirement. But there was a
stage where it looked like he was going to lose
a business, and he never told me that at the
time that he come and did the tracks, it was
just that he was looking for something. So I've had
that feedback a lot, and generally you find something. And
that's the old cliche that whatever we're looking for is
inside us. But the truth is you don't get much
(22:48):
chance in modern society to just sit down and look
at what's inside it. You're too busy doing, doing, doing,
Even you and I at home where we try and
connect to do these podcasts, it's four o'clock in the
morning as we record this because we're both doing, doing, doing,
and sometimes it takes us two or three days even
catch up on a phone call. But when we're all Lakota,
everything stops and all that matters, Like I said before,
(23:08):
is where your feed are. So yeah, it's pretty powerful.
And people who are coming on the track or are
looking to do the track, you might think you're going
for a physical challenge, or you might think you're going
for military history, or you're going to get physical, mental,
and emotional. You're going to learn things about yourself and
you're going to grow as a result of the experience.
And that's just what I've experienced over the years I've
(23:29):
been doing this. Yeah, absolutely, So I have three questions
that I want to go a little bit deeper on
the why for you now. One of them I feel
like we've already answered, but you know on the last
podcast in particular, but forget about leading trips and even
forget about the local customs and culture. For you on
a personal level, what's why do you continue to walk
(23:52):
just kakoda? And also why do you want to go
and do all the other things, you know, like because
you're going to lead eventually Killemannjarro's and every space camps
and you're going to be continually doing adventures stuff, So
it's not just coacoda. This is a deeper why on
adventure in general? What motivates you? Because you're very busy,
You've got businesses, you've got the farm to look after,
(24:13):
You've got, you know, children who are fast becoming adults.
What is it for you that adventure brings out of
you that makes you keep doing it?
Speaker 4 (24:23):
I really think it's just that that self belief. You know,
every time I come home from somewhere, I feel more
confident in myself. And we touched on this it's a
little bit low in the last podcast about like people
from the outside, I think that she's this really super
confident person, and I should be. I don't know, mentally
(24:47):
I should be more confident than I am. But I've
always struggled with my own self belief. And I actually
had this deep conversation with my mum not that long ago.
And I was always the kid that stood out, like
I was a bit of a black sheep. The rest
of my family, you know, my just to work quite
as physically active, and I was loud, and I was
(25:10):
a pinionated and like just you know, maybe a little
bit adhd. But back then that wasn't a thing.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
You know.
Speaker 4 (25:17):
I struggled at school a lot, and I was young
for my age, so I went to school when I
was only four and a half. So I think I
was probably emotionally a little bit immature, but that was again,
it was something that parents just did back then because
it was cheaper than pre school and just send them
off to school. So I think, and I think socially
(25:37):
at the time, I did quite well because I was
loud and I was outgoing and it didn't didn't really matter.
But once I got to high school, everybody else was
so emotionally like more mature than I was. That I
really struggled, and and I think people would constantly say,
get back in your box, you know, not in that way,
(25:58):
but people would constantly say to me, you too much,
you know, you need to slow down, or your own business,
or you're not allowed to have that opinion or and
again it was that was also a bit of a
generational thing. But you know, Mum especially I remember it.
She used to say, to me, so far up yourself,
you think the sun shines out your arm. So I wasn't.
(26:19):
I wasn't allowed to be a ray of sunshine, you.
Speaker 2 (26:22):
Know, like and almost that aness is probably a mask
when you are younger and you've got to try and
step up with I mean a year and a half,
say four and a half year into six year old,
a big, big gap.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Yeah, massive, massive, And I think I mean, I guess
I already had that personality before I went to school, so,
you know, because Mum thought I was confident enough to go.
But it wasn't until like I said, it wasn't until
high school. But I kind of realized that I was
a little bit emotionally different. Everybody else will our cot
(26:54):
with things, and I was a hot head. So you know,
if I had a bit of a disagreement with the teacher,
it was there was not a little disagreement. It's a
big disagreement, and you know, I'd wag and all sorts
of you know, just silly stuff. And I think so
as an adult now looking back, I can see exactly
where I went wrong. And then I guess, you know,
(27:15):
not having that confidence in myself in my own personal
life with my parents. My parents by then a divorced
and whatever, and I was a bit lost, I think.
And then I moved away at fifteen. My mom dropped
me off. I guess I'd be another thing too. Mom
just let me move out when I was fifteen because
she's kind of had enough of me. And I moved
(27:37):
to Scone and worked on horse studs.
Speaker 2 (27:41):
That adventures is somehow reconciling all those experiences, now, is that.
Speaker 4 (27:46):
What you're Yeah, absolutely, I think just that lack of
self confidence as a kid and not having a direction,
you know, and being so unsure of what direction I
wanted to go in life because my environment was so
hectic and chaotic, you know, because I I've never really
given that permission to be a leader or be confident
(28:09):
or be allowed to have an opinion that I guess
now as a leader. And I think I naturally wanted
to be a leader when I was younger, Like you know,
you look back and I owned a dance school, and
then you know, then I had a gym, and like
and I've always wanted to be a parent. That was
kind of you know, and like you said, it's the
(28:31):
biggest leadership role we can have. I always found myself
drawn to leadership roles, but because of my upbringing, I
never had the confidence to actually follow through with it,
you know. And I see some beautiful young kids coming
through now that have amazing leadership skill, and I just
think if we could nurture that, or if mine had
(28:52):
been nurtured, you know, I might already be, you know,
on my fiftieth trip. But life experience too can just
I guess, teaches you that there's a journey and you
can't rush these things. You've just got to sit in it.
And now I get to continually do these trips and
continually become a better leader for myself even and now
(29:18):
you know, we talk about the youth development space and whatever,
and I can turn around it with you help those
young leaders as well make a difference. I think it
just continually allows me to have personal growth, you know,
in a world full of people that want to shadow
people with biak opinions and be dreams and goals especially
(29:43):
you know, we talk about this a lot. Living in
scoring as a small town and there's a lot of
small ideas here and so being surrounded by yourself and
given the opportunity to take other people across the track
and continually expose myself to people and places that have
(30:03):
big ideas allow me to have so much personal growth
and continue to have that growth. So I guess this
makes me super excited about what's in the future. You know,
where where do I go from here? And how many
cool how many really cool things I'm going to get
to do in the next thirty years.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
Hopefully this isn't one of my official questions, but just
off the back of listening to you answer that, do
you find it surreal that you can do this as
I know it's sort a full time job as yet,
but that you get to go on adventures and lead
people through pretty amazing experience. Because after the first one,
two or three, it's no longer about us. It's now
(30:43):
about them. I mean, it was always about them when
we leave, but once you've had enough experiences under your
belt to know all the things you need to know
on Kokoda in particular, now it is fully about other people.
Do you find that surreal that you get to do
that as a job.
Speaker 4 (30:58):
Absolutely? I find it. And even when I find myself
telling people, people are saying, oh, so what do you do?
And I am a very busy people person. I juggle
a lot of different balls and you know, but then
when you say at the end, there's all the other
things I do, they I'll be like, oh yeah, and
I also work part time as an adventure to a
(31:19):
guide And they're like, what what do you mean by that?
And I was like, oh, yeah, well I just tracked
Kakoda for fun. You know. We take people and they're like,
what you know? So, and then then I feel guilty
because I'm bragging.
Speaker 2 (31:32):
Then I also think about it from a point of
view that Kakoda is a pretty tough experience for a
lot of people, and I'm not for a second disrespect
that it is. Don't ever underestimate it. But we get
to go and do something that is bucket list for
a lot of people and that is really intense and
they have to prepare for and we get to do
it multiple times. I find that quite empowering for myself,
(31:54):
no matter what's going on in life, even as I'm
getting older and I'm in my fifties now, and I'm
still able to be doing this, and I think to
myself at some level, maybe not as many as I
do in a year, but I'd like to be doing
this for another twenty years. And that's pretty cool because
when I first started trekking Kakoda, I was in my
late twenties and it was I was always one of
the youngest people on the trips, if not the youngest,
(32:17):
And now I'm getting a stage where I'm generally one
of the oldest. So I think on this trip coming up,
like I'm the only one that doesn't have a personal border,
and I think I'm one of the oldest or if
not the oldest, on the hen trips. So that's a
real shift over the last twenty years for me that
it helps me to maintain my physical health. I think
it help me maintain my mental health anyway. But just
(32:39):
by being out there, I feel more relaxed and more
I process a lot of stuff you know, that I'm
then working on when I get back home. But yeah,
I do. I feel very fortunate that this is what
I get to do for a job. And I just
got a young bloke who's just signed up to the
Adventure Leaders program yesterday actually, and he's already partially doing
this for a job and working for another company, not
(33:01):
working for us. He's already doing Kakoda's but he wants
to learn all the other trips and stuff as well.
And it's kind of cool to because he said, I
look at you, and I think I didn't realize you
could actually do this for a job. I said, yeah,
it takes time, but you're on that path, and you know,
if that's what you want to do, if you want
to do it full time, it's it is possible. When
I first started doing it full time, I didn't know
(33:23):
it wasn't a thing. So an example of that is
when I saw people walking Cocoda because I'd been in
the Army and the Army was my job. And then
when I see people walking Kakoda as a track leaders,
I thought, oh, this must be what they do for
a job. But most people have to have another job,
and I was in a village. I was in Minari
for the first ANZAC trip this year and a bloke
(33:43):
come up to me from another company and I hadn't
met him before, which is rare actually, but he was
very personality and he came up and having a chat.
I said. He asked me what I'm doing and you know,
and I said, I'm doing back to back. So he goes, oh,
it must be you must have a good employer to
give you time off to do that, and I said, no, no,
this is this is what I do. And it's what
do you mean. I said, Well, I'm my employer, this
is my job. This is what I does. I said, yeah,
(34:06):
so I don't think I've ever met anyone that does
this full time for a job. So that's a pretty
cool experience for me to know that you can create
something yourself, doing something you love that impacts a huge
amount of people. You think about our Anti trips. We
employed all up over those two trips, ninety boys from
the villages. So it's ninety people we've impacted. On a
financial level. We impacted you know, thirty thirty five trekkers.
(34:31):
We impacted ourselves as track leaders. It's a pretty powerful thing.
Speaker 4 (34:36):
Yeah, absolutely, definitely.
Speaker 2 (34:39):
I know you've had a bit of experience now and
I never want you So this next question is around this.
I never want you to come home any of you
trek leaders come home from a Cocoda trip and go right,
that was just co Coda, put in a bucket, come
back and pick it up next time. I want to
know how does Kakoda itself affect you after a trip,
as in long after, for days, weeks or months after
(34:59):
you finished trips. How does it have some sort of
positive effect on you.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
It's just that that empowerment, like you talked about saying,
when I come home reset and people say to me,
you know, how do you keep going back over and
over again? And it's a little getaway for us as well,
you know, because we're so busy in our in our
life running businesses and looking after kids and whatever it
(35:26):
is going over there, and yet yeah, yeah, it's still
a very serious role where we've got where we're looking
after people and making sure everyone's safe and get you know,
kicking boxes and you know, like you talk about all
the time. On the top, it looks nice and smooth,
but there's definitely some feet paddling underneath. And so yeah,
it's a very important role when we get over there,
(35:49):
but it's still a reset, it's still away from the
grind of life. So it gives us that time to
reset as well. You know, when we even have a nighttime,
when we go back into our tents and whatever, I
listen to books or podcasts and stuff that I don't
actually get time to do over here, you know, because
we are so busy that you kind of you do
(36:10):
you unload, you know, lots of things, and because you're
unplugging and you're you know, doing all those things where
you're not distracted by having at the moment, I'm just
like an uber mom. I've never stopped just driving some
sport or whatever. So over there you've got the sign
to just strip it back and analyze what's going on
(36:31):
in your own life. Even when you're walking. We tell
people there's just so much time to think, so much
time to get up in your own head and really,
you know, break down what's going on in your own life.
So I think every time I do that and get to,
you know, go over there, I come back so empowered
by what I've done, but with so much clarity around
(36:53):
the direction I want my life to go. So that's
definitely what I get out of it. It's just clarity.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
As we record this, I've done ninety five trips and
that doesn't change if I'm honest. Like I come home.
When I had the gym, and you know, I had
a few staff in Messiah and Jaden and those guys
working there, they said, it's almost intimidating when you're away
because we know you're going to come in with all
these ideas that you've had time to process. So I
come over and right, we're going to do this this this.
I sit and I write into my just notes and
(37:21):
my phone. I write on business plans and structures around
what I need to do on this and that and
the other thing. And then I come home and go, right,
team are doing this. This is like, oh crap. So
it's good for us, maybe not so good for around
this My final question for this series, and I have
also written out some rapid fire questions, which are short,
(37:42):
sharp answers whatever comes ahead first. But before that, what
legacy do you want to leave through your work on Kakoda?
Now to me, just want to give this some quantified
question a little bit. Legacy for me personally is what
we do with the local people, how we trek through
the local villages, even I always want to be respected
(38:03):
by the villagers as someone who respects them. I want
to provide I personally have a goal of wanting to
spend a million dollars a year in the local community.
So that's not about the dollars we bring in as
a business, but I would like to put that much
money across the track through employment at some point. And
we've never hit that number. That's a big number, and
(38:24):
that's two million keener, but that's always been a goal
of mine, and somewhere in my next twenty years, I'd
like to achieve that because I think that's legacy. It's
not giving handouts to people, it's them earning money, which
I think is very empowering to then go and do
the things that they need to do in their village,
as opposed to us going right, here's a thousand bucks,
you know, or here's donations crows or which we do
(38:45):
all of that too. But my personal legacy I want
to leave is that a lot of people and young
people coming through on the villages, in the villages as well,
get employee employment from us. So that's one of my legacies,
and then my other legacy for me personally is what
people take away. I like it when in five and
ten years people come back and go, you know, that
(39:05):
changed my life. Kakoda was so empowering for me. And
I've got a maid of mine who's coming over next
year for my one hundredth trip, who did Kakoda with
me twenty two years ago and we're still mates today.
And he's a very big businessman, like a huge businessman
here in Queensland, and he's bringing his family and he's
bringing kids and his brother and partners and all these
(39:27):
people are coming on this trip, you know, twenty something
years later. So to me, that's a legacy when someone
wants to do something all of these years later that
they don't have to do, but not only that, they
remember an experience from twenty something years ago and they
want to bring their family over. That's that's my sort
of legacy. I want that long after I'm gone, people
remember the experience that they had. So for you, what
(39:50):
legacy do you want to leave through your work on
the Kamkata track.
Speaker 4 (39:56):
I don't know how I follow that.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
I shouldn't have done that. It was just me thinking
out there.
Speaker 4 (40:03):
Can I just say I haven't really given it much thought.
To be honest, I guess like eight Trips has kind
of crept up on me a little bit.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
You know.
Speaker 4 (40:17):
You start out thinking, oh, no, it's just you know,
two or three trips, and then and then it's kind
of just snowballed into you know, and I do it
all the time, Glenn, when my next trip, you know,
when am I going against? So I guess eight Trips
has crept up on me that I haven't really given
it much thought. But it's it's definitely similar to yours.
(40:38):
You know. I want to be remembered as someone that
definitely impasted the country and the people in a positive
way and impacted my trekkers memorably, like in a in
a positive way. I guess the same as you that
(40:59):
I want people to think back and go, you know,
Heidi took us across and damn she did a great job.
She did such a great job that I want to
take my whole family back and I want them to
have the same experience that I had. I think, you know,
that's that's what it's all about, I guess, is have
(41:19):
it giving those trekkers that memorable experience that they feel safe,
and it's because it's not a fig holiday, it's not
it's not like anything else anyone will ever do. So
supporting people through that it's just such an important role
(41:40):
that I guess I just want people to look back,
like in twenty years and go, yeah, this was that.
That was an epic trip. And I want I just
think I want everybody else to feel like we feel,
you know, I want them to have that each that
that it's an amazing place, that it's amazing people and
(42:01):
it's the amazing history and and that's that's so important
as well. I want to be remembered as someone who
who kept the history alive, you know, that that didn't
let it die. It was really interesting. And every time
I go, every time I speak to someone about doing
kakota Is, I learn more about the history. And it's
just it's just an ever evolving story of what actually
(42:26):
when when I'm on over there, and you know, I
guess that's as a whole, it's pretty much the same
as yours.
Speaker 2 (42:35):
This next section is ten rapid fire questions, so short,
sharp hands. Whatever comes to the head, and if you can't
really think of ananswer, even we just move on. But
it's and it's Look, it's definitely stuff we've covered in
the mini podcasts we've done together. I thought I'll just
keep this one short and sharp, so you're ready to go.
Speaker 4 (42:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (42:53):
What's the number one thing people underestimate about Cocoda?
Speaker 4 (42:59):
The weather?
Speaker 2 (43:01):
Yeah? Well, I love when people get you think it's
going to rain against P and G. It's it's a
very good chance is going to rain, rain that we
don't understand.
Speaker 4 (43:09):
Yeah, well you know, and then when the boys are
digging motes around your ten so that the water doesn't
come into it. Yeah, Oh gosh, I'm terrible at this.
I could make a whole conversation out of that question.
Speaker 2 (43:21):
What's the most emotional moment you've witnessed on the track?
Speaker 4 (43:25):
Oh? Myself trying to read that poem on Brigade Hill
the first trip.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
How do you handle someone who wants to quit part
way through the trip?
Speaker 4 (43:35):
Depends why they want to quit, but probably just no.
Speaker 2 (43:40):
Yeah, I'm pretty tough on that. I don't let people
quit on themselves easily, just because I know that once
they often, once they get through that, then they're going
to be good. What's one item that every trekker forgets
but absolutely needs. Oh I don't have every treker forgets
an item. But you know what's something that you regularly
see people forget that they probably should have bought.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
Baffling. There's a lot of people don't take vaccaline.
Speaker 2 (44:06):
Yeah, and for those that I don't get our packing
lists or vasclines for putting on your feet, just a
light layer of vasseline to give a bit more water
resistance to your fee which stopped the breaking down, which
stops you getting foot right, which is actually a pretty
painful thing if you get it. So yeah, vaseline, Yeah,
vasoline is a good one. How do you mentally prepare
for each crossing even after eight times across the track?
Speaker 4 (44:32):
Well, that's a that's a good one. I I do
have to mentally prepare every time. I think that's something
that trekkers don't realize is that we feel like every
time like I'm super always excited, but we still have
to like take a few deep breaths and go right
(44:54):
times and knuckle down and get just done, you know,
like the first day where you know, or two days
where you're getting your trekking legs on. It still hits
us hard every time.
Speaker 2 (45:04):
You know, I think what helps in that situation for
us is that we've got them to think about. So
we've got all these other things we're thinking about, whereas
for the teker, they're just thinking about what they're experiencing.
So I reckon having other people to think about actually
helps us. So but I agree, even for me, you've
got to mentally prep every time. Question number six, what
does the spirit of Kakoona mean to you personally?
Speaker 4 (45:27):
The spirit of Kakona? Oh, well, that's really that's a
deep one. Findship.
Speaker 2 (45:38):
Yeah, I was going to say, if I had to
rapid fire that it's just mayship for me. Yeah, I
think of the place of this rapha, but mayship in
particular just helping your mates get through.
Speaker 4 (45:47):
Yeah. Yeah. And you can be on the trip with
like most and a lot of people do, come with
no family or no friends, and by the end everyone
because you've stripped it back so raw and everyone's in
such a vulnerable place that by the end of it
you come out of it with some best friends. Then
you know, like you said yourself, friends that you'll have for.
Speaker 2 (46:07):
Life, favorite village or section of the track.
Speaker 4 (46:11):
And why, oh that's impossible. My trek Is always laugh
at me because I'll say, oh, this is my favorite village. Well,
this is my favorite village. Yeah, yeah, I mean I
love HOOI beautiful, like picturesque, but like and you normally
(46:34):
you get there, especially if we stop there overnight, because
you get there, we keeps the time. You can have
a swim. It's before you've done any real physically hard work.
You know, people think, oh, because it is hot. By
the time we get there. If we stop there, you've
checked in the heap, so everyone has a beautiful swim
and thinks, oh, this isn't too bad. But hoy is beautiful.
(46:55):
I love era of hour. I think, yeah, you know,
looking out over that ridge line and watching the sun
goow down. No, when you've only got depending on how
fast we're going, but you haven't got far to go,
you can kind of see the finish in the distance.
I think that it's a beautiful place. They're all beautiful.
(47:17):
I don't know, I.
Speaker 2 (47:18):
Really I don't know why, but I always enjoy that waterfall,
climb up out of up into Lanumu, and you know,
I always enjoy that section, no matter how hot or
wet or whatever's going on. I don't know why, but
I've always enjoyed that section.
Speaker 4 (47:33):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, everyone, I guess terrain wise, that's definitely
the most beautiful section of the track.
Speaker 2 (47:40):
What's the toughest day on the track physically or emotionally?
Speaker 4 (47:46):
Oh, I reckon for Trekking and Beer at a Ridge. Yeah,
because you're getting close to home, you're fatigue. We kind
of talk it up a little bit, and it depends
on which way you're going to. Yeah, yeah, you know
(48:06):
when you go on the other way, that climbing Brigade
Hills pretty tough.
Speaker 2 (48:09):
So long, is it?
Speaker 4 (48:11):
Yeah? But yeah, no, I definitely think Him and a
Ridge is because it's just so short. I mean it's
not I mean it is short. It depends on how
slow you go, but it's so steep and it just
seems like it keeps going and going going, and go
around the corner and it goes up again. And because
there's normally, you know, because we let people kind of
got their own own speed up there, there's a little
(48:33):
bit of expectation around sometimes how quick you want to
get up there, and you're so close to the end,
I think everyone's just a little bit drained, and yeah, and.
Speaker 2 (48:44):
We talk about it for days, leading him up to it, so.
Speaker 4 (48:48):
That another anticipation.
Speaker 2 (48:50):
Number nine, Have you ever had a trek, a specific
trick that changed you? And how.
Speaker 4 (48:56):
Track or trek no trek?
Speaker 2 (48:57):
So out of your eight tricks or kakodas, has there
ever been one specifically that you feel changed you? And
if so, how, No.
Speaker 4 (49:05):
I don't think there's any one specific crossing that's changed me.
But there's definitely been specific moments across the tracks that
have changed me, like in different different which I guess
is so rewarding because it's nearly every time I go,
whether it's a conversation I have with you, or a
conversation I have with a trekker, or it could even
(49:30):
be a conversation I've had with one of the locals.
There's so many distinct moments across the track that I've
had that have changed my life completely.
Speaker 2 (49:41):
Now, this last one, I think is a good way
to end an episode, and this has been a really
good episode. I love the way to be honest, I
said this gave you his feedback last time. I love
the way you answer questions so deeply now, and you're
very confident when you speak, which is I think a
change over the years that I've seen you, because you know,
years ago, as you said, there was I don't know
(50:01):
if lack of confidence as the right word, but kind
of that feeling of you've got to be in your
box and if I step outside of that, you feel
a certain way. You've definitely changed in your calmness, of
your leadership and the way you're doing things. And that's
after only eight trips, so I can only imagine how
that goes. So this has been another really good episode,
but the last one, which is a great one to
finish for people listening who are thinking about Kakoda. What
(50:23):
would you say to someone who's scared that they're not
capable of doing this?
Speaker 4 (50:35):
Well? I guess that really depends on the situation because
if they're not like Chip, there is a few circumstances
like I'm not you know what, just have a crack.
Have a crack, right, What have you got to lose?
Speaker 2 (50:51):
Yeah? I think about I think about Michael, who you know,
who did our second antic trip and diagnosed with Parkinson's
and you know, sixty years of age, a fit sixty
years of age. But then when you have a diagnosis
like that and still was willing to give it a crack.
And yeah, there were some tough days in there and
some tough moments, but there was never a stage where
he looked like quitting.
Speaker 4 (51:12):
You know, he was never going to quit.
Speaker 2 (51:14):
And that's I've seen thirty year olds, you know, kind
of go through some mental stuff or just feel like
they're not sure, and you go, man, you can do this,
because I've seen people you know, do this who are
older and younger and have certain issues and they just
pushed through it. Anyway. So the thing with what I
love about Michael, and I'm going to do a podcast
with him soon, is when he got diagnosed and he
(51:36):
said to his doctor, I've always wanted to do it,
and he had been booked in pre the diagnosis, but
you know, am I able to do it? And his
doctor said, yeah, I think if it's been a life
long dream, you should have cracked it because this Parkson
is going to get worse, not better. And yeah, Banging
came over and had to crack it it.
Speaker 4 (51:51):
Yeah, And I think my thought process when You're just
asked me that question was, you know, straight away my
head went to, you know, well, I guess if you're
in a wheelchair, but it's Actually that's not even that's
not even a reason. If there's something in the world
that you want to do bad enough, you'll find a way.
Speaker 2 (52:11):
Just find people that will help support that goal and
dream and companies like us that go, okay, well it's
not easy, but is it possible. I guess let's work
it out.
Speaker 4 (52:19):
Absolutely, And what's you know, the worst that can happen
if you prepare, prepare yourself well, get the right people
around you. Anything possible. So there's actually no real reason
not to just have a crack.
Speaker 2 (52:34):
And once again, that's a Kokoda lesson for everyone listening
that you'll carry into life. If there's something you want
to do, just put the right people around you and
then have a crack. And that's such a motto for
success in life. Everyone's looking for the shortcuts or the
hacks to success, and to me, it's just surround yourself
with people that are willing to believe in the dream
(52:55):
and willing to work it out with you. Not people
that go, yeah, it's one hundred percent, but people will say, okay,
well let's work it out. You know, when Alissa wanted
to climb mount ever since she was fourteen or fifteen,
at the time, I didn't say there's no chance to
get out, or maybe one day I just say, Okay,
I don't know enough about it, let's work it out.
And you know, as a result, you're still on the
top of that mountain twice. So you need to be
(53:16):
surrounded by people in life that believe in you, because
there are so many people that are willing to put
doubt in your head. There are so many people that
are willing to tell you, even if it's out of love,
all the reasons why it's too risky or you shouldn't
do it, or and I don't know. History is not
written by those people, and legacy is not written by
those people. And for every one of you listening as
(53:36):
an individual, I don't care how old you are. Your
Kakoda trip is your personal experience and it's your personal legacy.
We're not all going to be legacy like Nelson, Mandela
and Mother Trays. Have it your own personal legacy, even
if it's just your kids see you go and do
this thing and go, hey mum, that's pretty cool. That's
a legacy right there.
Speaker 4 (53:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (53:57):
Absolutely, Hi, it's another great episode. Thanks for coming on
the show.
Speaker 4 (54:02):
No worry us of these.
Speaker 2 (54:09):
Elassy Harpuzas to be free racing Bondvisari.
Speaker 3 (54:28):
So the bond between Ossie's and the people of Papu
and New Guinea was forged in war and it endures
in peace. We felt that friendliness, that special connection in
the comforting presence of our porters and in every small
community along the Kakoda Track. Who we are and as
(54:56):
we are free.
Speaker 2 (55:06):
Okay, guys, thanks for tuning in. It would be awesome
if you'd share this with anyone you know that's going
to the Kakoda Track or there's been and has a
keen interest in the track. It's people and those that
choose to track it. The pillars of is Sharaba say, courage, endurance, makeship,
and sacrifices great words to live by, and this podcast
will often makeshift and a place for those that live
and love the Kakoda Track experience until next episode, live
(55:28):
a life that inspires you and those around you, and
remember to take time out to think about what's really important,
what's really important?
Speaker 4 (55:35):
What's really important?
Speaker 1 (55:38):
Thanks fellowstak to the Kakoda Track Podcast. To get it
touched or stay up to date, go to Kakoda Track
Podcast on Facebook or email Glen at Adventure Professionals dot
com dot ah. Don't forget to subscribe and share.
Speaker 2 (55:52):
With your friends.
Speaker 1 (55:53):
Let's keep the spirit at the Stories of Kakoda, at
the P and G people alive.
Popular Podcasts
Bookmarked by Reese's Book Club
Welcome to Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club — the podcast where great stories, bold women, and irresistible conversations collide! Hosted by award-winning journalist Danielle Robay, each week new episodes balance thoughtful literary insight with the fervor of buzzy book trends, pop culture and more. Bookmarked brings together celebrities, tastemakers, influencers and authors from Reese's Book Club and beyond to share stories that transcend the page. Pull up a chair. You’re not just listening — you’re part of the conversation.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com