Behind the Scenes with our Australian Team
Usually, the Patch team are busy bees organising our guests to get away on their trips, but we all took some time out recently for a cheeky little group adventure of our own…with an Australian team meet up in Melbourne!
This wasn’t just a Patch party though!
Joining us were our awesome Australian team mates from Leatherback Travel’s sister brands; Olivia & Sophie from Camino Women, Amie, Gillian & Matilda from Magnificent Rail and Lou from Fencox, as well as Mat, our co-founder, our Head Trip Designer, Lisa, and the glitter that keeps all of our brands sparkling – Bree and Madi from our Trip Ops team.
Front row: Alicia, Mat, Lisa & Justin
As fully remote workers that only get to see each other from the shoulders up on Google Meets across the week, I can’t begin to tell you how excited all 17 of us were to finally meet each other in person and discover we all have legs. Cries of ‘Oh, look how tall you are!’ and ‘I had to remember not to wear pyjama pants today!’ got us all cracking up over breakfast and spectacular city views from the rooftop of our hotel for two-nights, Melbourne Place.
With early flight times (red-eye early!) for many of the Patch crew flying in from the Central Coast, NSW – Day 1 meetings were kept light in anticipation of a Day 2 that we’d been forewarned was jam-packed with team activities.
So, what do Patch BM’s do when we’re unplugged from our laptops and headsets? We explore!
First order of business was a self-guided foot tour of Melbourne’s famous arcades and laneways before escaping the heat to sip icy-cold drinks over the water at Italian inspired Capri beach club, Afloat.
The only thing hotter than the afternoon breeze was our regret at not having brought our swimsuits for a dip in the aft-deck pool. Oh, how her turquoise tinted waters beckoned us to dip anyway in our non-pyjama pants! Note to self: Always pack a swimsuit on a Patch Adventure!
Then, much like Day 1 of a Patch adventure, it was time for our Welcome Meet at the hotel! What a great couple of hours we spent chatting, switching seats every so often so we all could get to know each other better. Let me tell you, our online meetings are usually peppered with fun between the serious business of running group travel adventures, so in person – the laughs were long and loud!
No stranger to a Patch Welcome Meet for reals, it was a brilliant introduction for our newest Patch Booking Manager (and Silk Road September 2024 Patchie!), Tricia, to meet the team. We can’t wait to share more about Tricia and her journey to becoming a BM with us soon…you’re going to love her!
With our Welcome Meet winding up it was time to let our tastebuds lead the way to dinner. Melbourne is famous for secret little spots squirreled away in laneways and with no particular place in mind we let luck lead us down one such alleyway, through a very unassuming door, into a very un-inviting concrete corridor (the kind your mother warns you about), before bursting into an underground carpark and onto the streets of Bangkok, Thailand at Soi 38!
At Patch, our adventures are all about finding out of the way places to have truly authentic experiences and this was one such spicy little find. We feasted! Steamy ramen, slurp-worthy soups and zesty larb arrived lightning quick from the micro-community of street stalls backdropped by mural-painted walls around us, and as the chili factor kicked in, the marinated beef brisket wasn’t the only ‘Crying Tiger’ at the table. (Three cheers for coconut water…’Hip-hip-hooray!’).
With tummies full and tear ducts emptied it was time to call it a night, having been forewarned that Day 2 activities would require both physical and mental stamina, in a highly competitive arena on the streets of Melbourne…
With a strict meeting time set in our WhatsApp chat for 9.15am in the hotel foyer (hey, even Patch BM’s have to toe the line!) we divided into two equal teams across all of our brands, eyeballing each other as Lou from Fencox dished out instructions. Behold, a treasure hunt was afoot…the race was on!
You can tell by Mat’s laser-focused stare that we’re not a competitive bunch at all, but what followed was a mad dash of deciphering clues to finding and photographing ourselves with 4 iconic statues across the city and performing a flash-mob-esque rendition of the ‘The Village People’s’ song ‘YMCA’ – much to the amusement of Bourke Street Mall shoppers. For the sake of our credibility, I’ve spared you the video footage!
With a strict ‘2-stop only’ tram ride permitted and with no sign of the opposing team in sight, Team 2 stormed across the ‘Cow-in-the-tree’ finish line at the Docklands to claim a convincing victory. Though Team 1 took a much better photo…
With everyone now gathered portside, speculation and stomachs rumbled, hungry for lunch and for Lou to share what was next on our mystery day out…
What floated into view was 2-hours of pure sizzling hamburger hilarity, soundtracked to our own ear-splitting karaoke anthems of the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s, whilst drifting around the harbour in Aqua Donuts barbecuing our lunch.
Again, I’ll save us all the humiliation of capsizing our careers by sharing video footage with you, so let’s just say that Dirty Dancing’s ‘I’ve Had the Time of My Life’, saw us hit the high notes in our team bonding experience.
Safely back on dry land, it was time for a barbecue of a different kind…
Plans often change when working in adventure travel – take last minute amendments to an itinerary for example. Whenever we hit a roadblock in our day-to-day, we apply what we call our ‘Tunisian Barbecue’ principle. It’s where we take a problem and look at it from different angles to solve it. Essentially, we ‘barbecue’ it, cooking it on different sides until we’ve found a solution. Which is exactly what we needed to do on our next activity – an escape room!
Against the tick-tock of the clock, the teams were TRAPT inside darkened rooms filled with various objects and clues that required lateral thinking to unlock boxes, wardrobes, padlocks and combination codes to solve a mystery and save the day. How did we do? Well, ‘Kiss the Cooks’ because we barbecued the heck out of those rooms with minutes to spare!
In a weekend chock-full of fun surprises there was just one final thrill to unwrap.
Seated at long timber tables in the courtyard of the 150-year-old historic Captain Melville pub, we called for Mat to take centre-stage. Not only to collectively thank him for the epic team meet up that we’d all just shared, but to present him with a special gift for his recent milestone birthday.
What was his reaction to the gift in the bag?
A diminishing cry of ‘Oooooooooooooooooohhhhhh!.’
Almost like we’d just pushed him out of a plane. Ironic, because that’s exactly what we gave him. A 15,000ft skydive and a rainbow unicorn onesie to do it in.
Needless to say….
This crazy bunch of Leatherback Travel unicorns from across all our brands can’t wait for our 2026 Australian Team Meet up at the airstrip to watch him land!