A team of four of us participated in Oxfam Trailwalker Melbourne (a 100km team endurance walk within 48hrs, held annually in cities around the world) in March this year and it was an experience we will never forget for all the right reasons.

We knew we were signing up for a physical challenge, but we didn’t realise the extent to which it would provide us with a mental challenge, team building experience, and how much we would really contribute to Oxfam. As an organization, Oxfam are committed to fighting poverty & injustice in Australia & around the world, and Trailwalker is their major fundraising event.

By February and many training kilometres later we were starting to see the benefits of the team training sessions. We were discovering each others’ strengths and weaknesses, senses of humor (or lack thereof), tastes in music and aptitude to get really silly when the occasion called for it! And we were all also enjoying the chance to get outdoors and see parts of Victoria that we might not have ventured into otherwise.

Just as important as the fitness, we also committed to reaching a fundraising goal. This was an amazing opportunity to get creative with baking drives, wine drives, and a chocolate raffle. Best of all was the support we got from family, friends and colleagues. At times it was hard to tell who was more excited – us or them! We know that our contribution of nearly $6000 will be well used by Oxfam and feel an immense sense of contribution to their cause.

The event itself was incredible. It was everything we imagined – exciting, fun, long, exhausting, tough – but overwhelmingly it was quite simply “awesome”. The sense of personal and team achievement was more than any of us expected.

Would we do it again – without a doubt – and we hope to inspire people to join us.