Our Wendish Heritage Society’s 2012 Trek Luncheon was held on Saturday 13 October 2012 at 12.30 pm at Melbourne’s picturesque Austrian Club and Cultural Centre, located at 90 Sheehan Road in Heidelberg West (Melways 19 F/9).

This trek Luncheon enabled the participating diners, including descendants of the many Wagon-Trekking Families back in the 1800s, to recall and to commemorate the many slow and often very long inter-state wagon-treks from one area of Australia to another. Their transport was by covered wagons drawn by horses or bullocks and the large wagon-trek in 1852 from Rosenthal/Rosedale (S.A.) to Portland (Victoria) and the large wagon-trek in 1868-69 from Ebenezer (S.A.) to Walla Walla (NSW) have been deservedly commemorated, fully or partially re-enacted and also recorded in folders and books.

The Luncheon took place in the Main Hall at the Austrian Club. This can seat about 200 people, so there was plenty of room for descendants and participants to recall and celebrate the many interstate Treks and their Trekking Pioneers and Ancestors from back in the good old “horse and buggy” era of the 1800s, well before the advent of cars and trains. Participants were warmly encouraged to make contact with their family members to organize trekking-family tables of ten for this worthy celebration. Stories or accounts known by descendants about the various treks were welcomed at this Luncheon. There was plenty of room for displays of early family memorabilia and posters.