It’s been a month since I published ‘The last leg’, promising to update those who might be still interested on the final funding figures.
But more interesting that that is ‘Old Crocks – the movie’ has finally been released. Well, its not Hollywood and it’s more of a stillie than a movie, really, as I’ve tried to sew the few bits of video together to tell the story. If you’ve been following the blog, you’ll have seen some of the pictures before, but in case you’ve got nothing better to do on a wet Sunday afternoon, you can find it here.
Fund-raising? Outstandingly, we’ve contributed between us $18,200 to the GoFundMe site, which is now closed to further donations. The site itself lives on, to show the generosity of you all and to inspire others to follow the idea.
With a bit of juggling, that has meant $4,500 for each of the four charities. That money has now been passed over – directly to the two Australian charities; Mates4Mates and The Smith Family and, for the UK charities, it’s on its way via John, for Combat Stress, and Guy, for Onside. This allows the UK charities to benefit from the UK’s Gift Aid scheme – 25p for every Pound Sterling donated.
Finally, a very sincere ‘thank you’ to you all for reading this, commenting, and all that other support in contributing, sharing the message, and active encouragement in helping set this up.
Particular callouts are to UBH, my former employer, for their very generous early support.
To Morgan, for building the outstanding jerrycan holders – masterful workmanship that absolutely stood the test of time and were much admired by the Land Rover community.
To Jeannie – camping in Sydney is difficult to find – for your drinks and nibbles, and garden and paddock which were a peaceful oasis.
Viasat, too, deserves thanks for their excellent insurance policy of a satphone and data terminal and free airtime to give us option to stay in contact – and for their training to some non-technical old crocks.
The community of Benambra – General Store voted ‘best in Australia’ and showgrounds (one game a year) voted ‘best campsite’ after three days in the High-Country wilderness – the pub was pretty good too!
The mechanics at Quorn and Mt Dare who lent us an oil pump and a grease gun to top up inaccessible bits of Land Rover.
Tobermorey Station for an excellent campsite – literally under the shade of a coolibah tree – and for the campfire and cold beer!
KLR in Sydney, for sound advice about spares and parts to carry, and for swiftly providing a host of bits to make both vehicles work as well as they did.
Everyone at the Esk Show, particularly the wood choppers and lawn-mower racers for hours of entertainment.
All those I haven’t mentioned, above.
And lastly to the English contingent of the Old Crocks for coming out here and facilitating my desire for driving round a large chunk of the Great Australian Farming Assets – and Mandy, my wife, for insisting that I buy a second Land Rover to do it in!
Thank you all so much!