Day 1 (Friday 31st May) Settling in

First day in Australia - last day of Autumn.

First stop - Bucklands Retirement Village 

Signing the Visitor Book at Buckland Retirement Village where the first visit of the day was to Dorothy Stirling, mother of Mama Wendy.

Greeting the staff outside  Dorothy's room

Dorothy first met Ise-somo in 1989 in Zaire.

Ise-somo with 4 generations of the Stirling- Toulmin family - grandson Matt Toulmin, great granddaughter Ellie,  long time friend Joy Wells, Dorothy and daughter Wendy.

Ise and Mrs Greed, another resident.

 2nd Stop - the Church office

Marie, Ise and Karen 

Ise jokes with staff - Youth Pastor Dave McPhail and Senior Pastor Steve Young

Next stop - an interview at the Local Newspaper - the Blue Mountains Gazette - with Brenda Cunningham-Lewis.  John Lambert, representing Springwood Rotary joined us for the interview.

After the interview outside for some photos

John Lambert, Ise, Steve Young, Graham Toulmin

 4th Stop - time to buy some warm clothes for winter starting tomorrow.

 Then time to wander around Springwood

 5th Stop - the local police station - they loved the story of the Random Breath Testing

6th Stop at the home of Ian Harrowell, seen here with builders Brett Langworthy and Nathan Wheeler.

 Back home at the Toulmins with nextdoor neighbour Joanne Toohey

 Afternoon tea and short expanation of why he was back in Australia and an overview of life in DRC

With Eddie and Sally Kopiec

Barbecue - from left, Louis Maule, Matt Toulmin, Josh Maule, Bryce Mclennan,Ise, Andrew Schmidt and Pam Maule.

 

Meeting Warren Irwin

With Jacquie Thomas, her dad - a missionary in Zaire/Congo for 28 years, Howard Wilson, Neville Thomas.