A Last Road Trip for Andrea

Hi. This is our daughter, sister and friend Andrea.

Andrea is a fun vibrant politically engaged, girl with a big heart and social conscience. She's a lot of fun. She traveled around Australia twice in a combi-van when she was younger; a time she refers to as 'the best in her life'. It remains one of her strongest memories.

About a year ago, Andrea was diagnosed with Early Onset Alzeimers Disease. Estimations are that she has been living with this condition (and masking it) for around 9 years already.

One of the tragedies of a late diagnosis is that people only have a small window to adapt their behavior to improve their lives and knock dreams off a list, making the memories that will support them in their final years of life.

Andrea's spent her working life helping others in organisations like The Red Cross, The Health Consumers Council, The National Women's Health Advisory Council & Travelsmart in Western Australia. She even went to South Africa to volunteer during the handover after apartheid.

She headed up a social movement to save South Beach in Fremantle from offshore development; and won. She has a passion for the environment and scuba diving in particular and ran an educational program called 'See Reef' educating divers about the underwater ecosystems divers were about to dive on in Indonesia and in WA so they'd be more engaged in protecting it.

Life is quite different these days. She'll still engage you in a discussion about your dog at the pawbeach in South freo', or anywhere for that matter but she couldn't tell you what day it is.

Andrea is unpartnered and has no children. Recently, I moved back to AUS from FR to help her because she can no longer live independently.

These are challenging times for her but I am consistently surprised by the help and understanding that her community shows. 'Hilton!', health professionals say when they hear that she lives here, " one of Perths most socially cohesive communities. She's lucky."

Andrea rarely complains; but not week passes without me hearing her say in her typically joyful, singsong voice, as if she was asking if you'd like a cup of tea... "I'd really like to go to New Zealand before I die".

This week though it drew tears and the resolve to do everything we can to make it actually happen... while the memory of the experience has value and can sustain her through the next difficult stage of her life.

I'd like to fly her and a carer to the land of the long white cloud, hire a camping car- a last road trip.

Realistically, we have about 12 months to make this happen.

Andrea's always done things on a shoestring. I want this trip to be a little more than that. She deserves it.

Please donate anything you can, and share this story. Every little dollar is going to help get Andrea on the road for her last road trip.

Thanks