Susan was presented with a Canon EOS 1100D camera, camera bag and memory card, on Tuesday morning. The couple submitted a photo of Susan holding our March 4 edition at the Orchha Palace in India while on holiday in March and April. 

They began their journey as a three week trip with Intrepid Travel, and then joined a second tour in India for four weeks. 

“I’d been to Sri Lanka before in 1983, but I didn’t get to see much of Sri Lanka the first time I went because the Tamil uprising had just started, so I wasn’t allowed to go very many places. 

“So I got to see everything I wanted to see this time. And then finally got to India,” Susan said. 

The Woods are semi-retired from the farm, and Susan mentioned one memorable exper-ience from their trip which was based on another kind of agri-culture and a very different life to that in Inverell.

“The tea country and the way that people live in Sri Lanka. 

“It’s quite primitive. Steep, like it would be 80 degree hills that they have to climb up and down and they live in what we would call poverty conditions, but they think it’s pretty good. I think they get $12 a day, and they’re happy as.”

She said there were only three vehicles in the valley they trekked, and takes three or four hours to access by road from the largest nearby town, and about eight hours by foot.

“The tea companies do provide a teacher, but the teacher doesn’t have vehicle, so they get out there about two days a week. The little kids are just about uneducated.”

Susan said the child-ren were beautiful and everybody was queuing up to have their photos taken. She sent many photos back to the local guides in Sri Lanka.

“It was a great experience. I loved Sri Lanka. 

“India had some fan-tastic things and we’re going back, because we didn’t get to see enough of it.”