The journey began long before the actual trip as a lot of training and preparation was required. Ray and I spent Christmas hiking the Overland Track and I used the trip as my official start to four months of Kokoda training. Each Saturday or Sunday we would drive to the Bunyip State Park to tackle the 2.5 hour return hike straight up a steep 4wd track, pack loaded with weights and water. A friend who completed the track a year earlier recommended the route and it certainly was gruelling. We regularly ran into others who were training but who had already been to Kokoda. The cheery comments such as 'this is nothing compared to the real thing!" did little for my confidence. Training through summer and autumn meant we only encountered one wet day, a torrential
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