What started as a conversation over a cuppa on how to inspire vulnerable kids is now an annual event presenting an opportunity that may have otherwise been worlds away.
On Friday around 40 Indigenous schoolkids from far north-west New South Wales aged eight to 14 stepped off their overnight coach and onto the sand at Narrabeen on Sydney's Northern Beaches - many seeing the ocean for the first time.
Now in its 18th year, Bush to Beach has brought young mob from Brewarrina and surrounding communities to the surf and sand as acknowledgement of their hard work and studies through the school year.
Over the weekend they will learn how to snorkel with accredited diving instructor and Miss World Australia Kristen Wright, hit the waves with a local surf school and tie on swimming caps for a Sunday morning at nippers.
It's a well-earned experience and one drastically different from nine weeks locked down through serious flooding at home endured by some in recent months.
"The trip is a reward for school attendance and an opportunity for the kids to see that there is another world outside their own community and help develop confidence and self-esteem," Bush to Beach founder Jack Cannons said.
"Brewarrina and its surrounding areas, including Weilmoringle, Goodooga and other far West NSW towns are disadvantaged by location, droughts, floods and the extreme heat.
"The trip away provides the children with a special opportunity to explore new places, while learning valuable skills."
Water safety, CPR and basic first aid training is incorporated as an educational component with a team of volunteers, carers and the local surf club on hand at all times.
Risk assessments of ocean conditions are made each hour.
Mr Cannons said the project has been a massive success, made clear by the community leaders and now-young adults going onto great things that were once among the kids jumping into the waves.
It's what he and the late Aunty Joyce Doole, an Elder from Brewarrina, had envisioned when forming the idea almost 20 years ago to combat truancy and give direction to kids in danger of losing their way.
He says now it's not so much the adults encouraging the young ones, but them propelling one another.
"These kids just gained so much confidence," Mr Cannons said.
"You've got 40 kids telling other kids if you want to go to Bush to Beach, you've got to go to school."
Bush to Beach relies heavily on sponsorship and the goodwill of volunteers digging into their own pockets and giving their time, including the local Surf Life Saving Club.
Despite getting the funds together each year Mr Cannons wants to see the idea grow to see so many other communities around the country get involved.
"We look at providing a service for these kids, to give them an opportunity. And look how they're growing,"
"My goal is to go around Australia. There's no reason why every beach in this country couldn't make a sister city with all these little towns in the bush and become mates."
