Today is our vocational day at Encounter Bay. If you are confused so I am we are in Victor Harbor (spelling correct) but the club is Encounter Bay, the bay is of course Encounter Bay and there is no place of Encounter Bay well there is/was a sort of suburb; so I hope that has cleared that up. Anyway I joined Tom in the morning with Ian the harbour master, although there is no harbour, we drove over the causeway to Granit Island which is now a reserve. The Glacial boulders are 
awesome and the view form the top along the coast was spectacular. We could see a seal frolicking along the outside of the breakwater and apparently a southern right whale had been seen a couple of days ago although it is a bit early for them. We did however get to see the Fairy Penguins they have a centre on the island run by a Lancashire couple (like everyone else we have met here they are free settlers!) We had a run down on the work of a harbour master with no 
harbour; Tom has put in an application! Ian then took us onto the Sea Rescue Squadron another voluntary recue service akin to our RNLI but restricted to inshore and with volunteers using their own boats although they do have a rather magnificent boat of their own. I then left Tom and went onto the Council offices where I met two of the managers who manage volunteers these include the Information centre, the library, the Whale Centre plus a number of social programmes the fact that the council has managers to manage volunteers is in itself very impressive but the training they provide is also excellent . Then I went onto the “Encounter Centre” where I was given the full tour of the wide range of facilities that are provided for a diverse
group of people including mentally handicapped, elderly and the unemployed. In Australia if you receive the dole you are expected to do voluntary work after a period of time 2 days a week if you are over 55 and 4 days a week if you are under. The funding for this excellent centre is made up of 33% State funding, 33% donations and 33% self funding which they achieve through their toy shop which they make themselves their garden centre and other enterprises. I came here wondering if Australian volunteered in South 
Australia it is a culture. Later in the day we all met up for a walk over to Granit Island which was great to stretch our legs and then in the evening another super BBQ meeting our new host club.
awesome and the view form the top along the coast was spectacular. We could see a seal frolicking along the outside of the breakwater and apparently a southern right whale had been seen a couple of days ago although it is a bit early for them. We did however get to see the Fairy Penguins they have a centre on the island run by a Lancashire couple (like everyone else we have met here they are free settlers!) We had a run down on the work of a harbour master with no 
harbour; Tom has put in an application! Ian then took us onto the Sea Rescue Squadron another voluntary recue service akin to our RNLI but restricted to inshore and with volunteers using their own boats although they do have a rather magnificent boat of their own. I then left Tom and went onto the Council offices where I met two of the managers who manage volunteers these include the Information centre, the library, the Whale Centre plus a number of social programmes the fact that the council has managers to manage volunteers is in itself very impressive but the training they provide is also excellent . Then I went onto the “Encounter Centre” where I was given the full tour of the wide range of facilities that are provided for a diverse
group of people including mentally handicapped, elderly and the unemployed. In Australia if you receive the dole you are expected to do voluntary work after a period of time 2 days a week if you are over 55 and 4 days a week if you are under. The funding for this excellent centre is made up of 33% State funding, 33% donations and 33% self funding which they achieve through their toy shop which they make themselves their garden centre and other enterprises. I came here wondering if Australian volunteered in South 
Australia it is a culture. Later in the day we all met up for a walk over to Granit Island which was great to stretch our legs and then in the evening another super BBQ meeting our new host club.
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