The June Bairnsdale Probus meeting at the Bairnsdale Club was well attended despite the chilly weather.
The profile speaker was Marjorie Goodwin who gave an interesting talk about her life in England and Australia.
She was born in Manchester and her parents were Colin and Beverly Orange.
Colin was a coal miner in Yorkshire at Grimethorpe Colliery.
During WWII the family home was near the Avro factory which manufactured aircraft and for safety they had to move to a safer location.
In winter she went by bus to school but on pea soup fog days the conductor had to walk in front with a torch to assist the driver.
At age 12 she remembers a special occasion in the school assembly hall where there were huge crates of apples donated by Australian schoolchildren for her school.
After leaving school she became a typist and receptionist, earning five pounds a week and married Peter when she was 20 years old.
At age 29 the family migrated to Australia as part of the Assisted Passage Scheme at a cost of 22 pounds for the family of four.
In Australia at a party she was asked to bring a plate and wondered whether she should bring tumblers and cutlery as well – the start of many blunders as new immigrants.
She worked at the Victorian Hospitals Association in Springvale and they bought a house in Noble Park.
They then built a house overlooking the bay on Mornington Peninsula where Marjorie worked as an office supervisor at a local GP clinic.
After becoming divorced, Marjorie met Paul 32 years ago.
Paul was a bus driver, and she became a volunteer at Habitat for Humanity for 11 years.
Two years ago, Paul and Marjorie moved to Wy Yung and joined Bairnsdale Probus where they met many new friends.
The guest speakers at the June meeting were Peter and June Owen, who gave an interesting and illustrated talk on their recent 138-day Viking world cruise on the Viking Neptune.
There were 940 passengers and 500 crew on board.
They commenced the holiday by flying to Fort Lauderdale in Florida where they boarded their cruise ship.
Peter spoke about the amazing facilities on board such as the two swimming pools, five restaurants and the main one seating 500 guests.
There was also a theatre and spa and sauna. High tea was served each afternoon.
The cruise took them to Mexico, Columbia, Panama and Costa Rica, including travelling through the Panama Canal.
They then sailed to Hawaii, French Polynesia and New Zealand and then onto Australia where they docked at Eden.
While at Eden a group of Bairnsdale Probus members visited Peter and June who showed them over the Viking Neptune.
Leaving Eden, they visited Sydney and then onto many ports in Asia including Indonesia,Vietnam, Singapore and India.
Because of the crisis in the Middle East they were unable to travel through the Suez Canal and instead travelled to Mauritius and then to South Africa and Namibia.
Travelling up the African West Coast they visited Spain, Portugal and the Canary Islands and then finished their cruise in London.
They then flew home via Perth.
They obviously enjoyed the cruise and recommended world cruising to everyone.
Peter said many of the passengers had just retired and said the 138 days didn’t seem too long and they were in no hurry to finish the journey.
IMAGE: Guest speakers for June were June and Peter Owen, who have recently returned from a world cruise. (PS)
