‘Te-roo-fic' Trip to Taronga Zoo: How our Explore cohort planned a 7-hour roundtrip
The Happy Paws Happy Hearts Explore Program in Hunter Valley is currently equipping 5 ‘paw-some’ participants with skills for employment, entrepreneurship, volunteering, or education.
The Explore program focuses on developing both soft and hard skills for individual success, with HPHH organising diverse opportunities, from work placements to site visits, to reinforce these skills. With the HPHH twist of integrating furry, feathered and scaly friends throughout the program, this can make typically mundane topics, from money management to writing a resume, fun and engaging.
In late 2023, our Explore cohort ‘em-barked’ on a huge adventure together. 'Hopping’ on two trains, a ferry, and a bus to make the journey a reality – spanning over 3.5 hours each way – they travelled to Sydney to visit the iconic Taronga Zoo.
It was a huge day for everyone, with 7 hours of total travel time; most participants slept and ate cookies to pass the time. Program Trainer, Tara Walsh helped the participants plan the trip together for ‘Travel Week’ of our employment pathway program, Explore. This week is dedicated to learning how to travel independently, including using government travel apps, safe travel, and more.
"Prior to the trip, we actually had a lesson in Explore about transport options, and they actually planned the trip themselves, including where to meet, what train to catch, and what time we would arrive and leave,” Tara says.
“I think this helped everyone with feeling comfortable with the trip because they knew what to expect and could feel good about seeing their plan come alive the closer we got to the zoo.”
Visiting the Taronga Education Centre, the participants had a uniquely immersive experience. Taronga Zoo designs its own ecosystems with various species living harmoniously together, as close to the animals’ native habitats as possible.
Most of the animals living in the habitats are endangered or vulnerable and seeing them up close helped the participants learn more about them and educated them on what they can do to help save those species.
“There was a bilby in one of the spaces called ‘spud’ who had been conditioned to approach people. It was AMAZING to see him so close, as this is an experience that unfortunately would never happen in the wild due to habitat loss and predation by feral species such as cats,” Tara says.
“In our normal HPHH sessions, we cover the importance of keeping cats inside to keep wildlife safe, as well as ensuring our dogs and other animals are contained so that they do not have a chance to harm wildlife.
“Getting to see those animals up close really connected the vision of HPHH with the broader mission of conservation, and it was so valuable and special for our participants to have that experience. Massive shout out to Matt from the education department for making this possible!”
In addition to this ‘fur-bulous’ up close and personal experience, the participants strolled around the zoo and saw many animals we can’t work with at HPHH! Some highlights included the lions, elephants, giraffes, penguins and bears.
It was an amazing and memorable day for all the Explore participants, particularly our incredible Brittany who has anxiety and autism. Going on this trip was a huge milestone for Brittany, travelling so far away from home without any of her family members present.
“She was anxious about the trip, but once we got there, she was IN HER ELEMENT. She loves zoos and had already downloaded the app for the zoo that included a map,” Tara says.
“She became the honorary captain of the trip, directing all of us where to go and planning the best routes to see the most animals possible. This confidence is a side to Brittany that we had not yet seen, and it was amazing to see how she came out of her shell!”
In addition to being the honorary caption of the trip, Brittany showed off her photography skills and took some awesome snaps of the animals at the zoo. Check some of them out below!
Reflecting on some notable outcomes from the trip, Tara says that she noticed a huge shift in how comfortable the participants were with herself and Case Manager, Angela Harrison who accompanied them on the trip.
“HPHH is always a comfortable and inclusive environment but spending the day together outside of a ’work’ setting really bonded us and opened up some discussions and sharing that I don't think would have happened without the trip, which led to some wonderful outcomes for this Explore group,” Tara says.
Another standout memory for Tara was that one of the support workers thanked her for allowing the group so much autonomy.
“From planning the transport, to planning their own routes around the zoo, getting to pick what food to buy and deciding what animals to go and see, and even what time to leave. The support worker said that this level of autonomy isn't something participants in her experience have had, and it was amazing to give them some freedom to make their own choices,” Tara says.
A huge shoutout to the incredible Tara Walsh and Angela Harrison for being on the journey with our participants, figuratively and literally in this case, and for all their hard work in bringing this huge trip to life. Their kind and caring hearts are genuinely inspiring, and we are so grateful to have them at HPHH.
To learn more about our employment pathway program, Explore please check out our website or talk to your Program Trainer. Please note that this is an invite-only course for existing HPHH participants.