Wandoan...and the races. Not just any races, mind you!

Yesterday I wrote a post about our journey to Wandoan this last weekend, and now I'm going to tell you a bit more about what we did there. But first a bit of background...
Last December the family was delighted to find out that DsD1 had found a very special person out Wandoan way...they met through the Apex Club...

The night DH and I met Dan...

Dan fitted so well into our family and the young couple stayed with us in Wanaka this year when we all gathered for DsD2's wedding there.

At the house we rented in Wanaka

Well Dan's mum is a cancer survivor and has raised funds over the years for the Cancer Council. This year the CC invited her to become a Hope Ambassador for the Cancer Council. These people have to raise a minimum of $10 000 which goes to the work done by the CC. So that is how the event, 'The Kaye Bock Cancer Council Camel Cup'  July 6, in Wandoan, came to be. A number of people helped Kaye to organise this huge event including DsD1...it was a real team effort. A number of months ago DsD1 had invited DH and I to the race day... so even though it clashed with the parish Art Show, we were determined that we would go to Wandoan! The action took place at the Showgrounds there...

On the fence are all the banners of the sponsors...a number are mining companies

This is the camels' rather swish transport which brought them from their home in Yeppoon...

 The photo below shows  the mounting enclosure and here are the four racing camels waiting for the first race. These camels had rather special names: Lethal Weapon, Wookatook, Bobby Dazzler and The Wandoan Bullet.

As well as the the 4 racing camels there were 2 other camels there who were for more sedate rides...

The camels and their jockeys are warming up before the first race...

The crowd is starting to grow... it was estimated that the crowd grew to 1000 people approximately.

The mounting yard is near the finish line; the camels and their jockeys are led along the straight to the start. When they get there, the camels are trained to immediately turn around and then race back to the finish line...

Dan's sister rode in one of the races...

This is one of the races...jockeys and camels thundering to the finish line...

Dan's sister won that race and former Aussie cricketer, Andrew Symons presents her with her prize...

Just near the finish line are these tubs which must have some yummy camel food in them!

 Throughout the day there were stalls selling beautiful craft items, food and ice cream vans, children's rides as well as a jumping castle, silent auctions with some terrific items which local businesses had donated,  a regular auction of donated goods, and lots of raffles including a series of multi-draw raffles. And DH won one of the multi draw raffles...here I am in the grandstand admiring his prize! ( it had some wonderful goodies in it as we discovered when we opened it up when we got home to Brisbane!)

Now DH and I were rostered on to do some jobs at this day... I started my job at 2pm selling tickets in the demountable that was the ticket booth. The tickets we were selling were for drinks (not softdrinks which were sold in another place, just the alcohol) We were rostered in teams of 2 or 3...now you can see me here in the booth  with rolls of 'admit one' tickets (with a value of  $2 each ) and a school one metre ruler. It was actually a very ingenious way of working out how many tickets to tear off without actually having to count them. Each ticket measured 5cm, so 10 tickets measured 50cm, 20 tickets measured 1 metre. DH's first wife had come up with this idea when she did the first 2 hours and realised that when counting off 20 or so tickets, it was easy to lose count and have to start again. I told her later that she was a legend in my estimation!! We were mainly selling tickets in $20, $40 and $50 lots so we were busy...

During the day 11000 of those tickets were sold...

DH's rostered job was for later in the day...7pm till 9pm...in the very busy bar. I took some photos of him working very hard...he said that it had been busy the whole 2 hours...

 While DH was working hard, I sat in the grandstand and listened to the evening's entertainment, who were very good!

Just after 9pm,  DH and I went back to our motel but the day continued until midnight for the rest of the revellers and workers. It was obvious to us that the day had been a huge success and such a credit to those involved with the organisation.