2023 Variety, the Children’s Charity Fundraiser

BSM is proud to sponsor another year of the Variety – The Children’s Charity

This year we successfully completed both the Variety Bash and 4WD events.

The Bash from Toowoomba to Cairns via Mackay, was pretty dry and dusty after the last few very wet years. There were about 120 cars and support vehicles on the event and we raised a total of $1.61m.

It was particularly tough on 30 year old cars with a lot of suspension and drive train issues. Our 1978 ZH Fairlane is pretty strong and made it, but we still had a front wheel bearing failure and have a lot of bushes, springs and and shock absorbers to replace.

We were voted best team by the bash participants, which is a wonderful award to win.

The 4WD was held in the Victorian High Country in November with 47 vehicles. This was the first real test of our 1999 Nissan Patrol with the Ford Barra Turbo engine conversion. (You may recall that last year we blew up the engine on Day 3 trip to the Cape and could not complete the trip in our car). The Patrol was awesome with heaps of power and torque to make it up some pretty challenging terrain. The car is certainly much more capable than its driver!. We do have to sort out some heating problems, at low speeds (below 30 kph) the engine runs hot and has to be managed carefully.

The 4WD event raised $330,000 for Variety.

 Our kids

Our focus this year has been to support 4 kids individually and to help plan and manage the Braille Music Camp for V.I. kids (Visually Impaired) .

The Music Camp was a 4 day event held in April at Nudgee College for 32 kids from around Australia.

The kids had lessons on Braille machines and theory, computer skills on music applications like Garage Band, Logic Pro, Braille Music Editor, and a lot of time in rehearsals in bands (Rock, Jazz, etc) before our final concert on the last day. It is an amazing time, the kids learn so much and get so much personal development from this event.

We have supported 4 kids with Variety Heart Scholarships,

Isabella, Dom and Sunny with Music Scholarships, and Lilly Grace with a Performing Arts Scholarship.

William (who we have previously sponsored), Isabella and a couple of kids from the Music Camp have formed a band called “Clear Vision” and performed a couple of gigs around Brisbane, which is particularly exciting as they get started on their musical careers.

So well done to Team Aussie Rock