Driving through the great stone gates of the Guide Camp at Mt Keira is like swapping the school run for Jurassic Park. Only cicadas scream in the rainforest, but the gravel track does lead to another era, when children played all day in nature, roaming the bush and paddling in creeks.
It’s supervised, of course – this is 2024 – but the focus at Bush Magic Adventures is firmly on unstructured nature play. It’s not a school – technically, it’s outdoor recreation – but kids may learn lots. They can do archery, leatherwork, knife whittling and light fires with flint. Or not. They’re equally free to collect sticks, build a cubby or potter about in pools hoping to see a yabby.
“Our philosophy is all about the importance of free play,” says Simone Potter, a former school counsellor who founded Bush Magic Adventures with outdoor educator Katrina Venables.
“It’s bringing back that old neighbourhood,” Katrina says, “where you would go off during the day and play with your friends in the creek and build cubbies and just play, and then come back late in the evening. That’s like what we’re offering. But we’ve got facilitators here to keep you safe and make sure it’s all okay.”
Katrina has a degree in outdoor education and parks recreation management. She worked in government, developing and delivering school camps for 18 years. But as her own children grew up, she saw they preferred their fun unstructured.
“I just kept getting pulled into nature play … I knew that’s where the power and the magic was for children.”
Simone spent 14 years as a school counsellor.
“My background is in psychology, human movement and teaching,” she says. “I loved it, but I find that I’m doing more therapy here, in an unofficial way, than I could ever do in a room with four walls. It’s amazing.”
Mt Keira local Simone and Keiraville’s Katrina are old friends – they met when their children were at preschool. So when inspiration struck all it took was a phone call on the eve of Halloween 2021, a few weeks of immensely hard work, and Bush Magic Adventures began just as NSW was emerging from years of long lockdowns.
“Everyone had discovered the benefits of being in nature and how important it is for their mental health. It felt like the right time,” Simone says.
After about 300 people came to an open day in January 2022 and Bush Magic Adventures began the next month with 16 children.
“We were two days a week and we started pretty much fully booked. A lot of the homeschool community were there,” Katrina says.
It’s grown enormously and today Bush Magic Adventures offers many things: a playgroup, after-school bush play, holiday camps and a term-time bush ‘school’ for ages 5 to 13.
“We see roughly 5000 children a year,” Katrina says. “Our holiday program is really, really popular.
“People don’t want their kids on devices in the holidays. They want their kids outside in nature. So we get 50 kids a day when we do holiday program and I’ve got eight or nine staff up here.”
The staff to children ratio is 8 to 1. In total there are 22 part-time staff, all people with a similar mindset from various backgrounds, such as teaching, juvenile justice and nursing.
The Guide camp has been integral to their success. “It’s so beautiful,” Simone says. “There’s lots of trees to climb, open space to play games. In the afternoon we often go down to the creek.”
Katrina says: “It’s sheltered too by Mother Geera [Mt Keira] and the escarpment that goes along to Mount Kembla. When we get that westerly wind, it’s just so calm up here.”
Yet it’s not a cottonwool-safe environment, the bush being home to everything from snakes to giant stinging trees. But in danger lies a learning opportunity. Choosing whether to walk over fallen tree trunks across the creek is one example. Simone says she’d hate to see the first decision a child makes alone being to get into a car with their mates at age 16.
“Part of our philosophy is about teaching kids how to manage their own risk. That, to me, is really important.”
Katrina is both an outdoor educator and a sportswoman herself. “I’m really into archery.
“I hunt deer and feral animals – mostly with a rifle, have done with a bow. I love speaking to the children about that – you know, imagine if there’s not a Woolies… would you know how to source your own food?”
You can’t hunt deer at Mt Keira (it’s national park) but there are plenty around.
“It allows us a really good opportunity to find their tracks, look at their scats, see where they come,” Katrina says.
“We’ve had overnight camps as well, which again is my thing. But Simone’s been doing more therapy stuff and she’s fabulous at that.
“We didn’t realise that there would be so many children who would thrive in this environment who have NDIS packages, who have diagnoses such as autism, PDA [pathological demand avoidance] profile, cerebral palsy.
“So that’s about 20% of our clients now.”
Simone says: “We’ve got lots of kids on the autism spectrum who really benefit. At school they may not have ever experienced success in terms of social interactions, relationships or academics. But when they come here, they’re often the leaders of our program.”
Simone – who also runs another business called Therapy By Nature – is finding local schools increasingly supportive.
“I call what I do nature-based play therapy,” she says. “It’s pointless having them in a room by themselves with four walls and trying to teach social skills… when we’re in a group in nature, you can do a lot of teaching, even therapy on the run.”
In 2024 Bush Magic Adventures is expanding. “We are going to be doing a Tuesday bush school and bush play down at Dapto and an afterschool program. We’re also looking for a site up north for bush play and a playgroup,” Simone says.
They’re also planning a leadership course and incursions and excursions with local schools.
“Katrina and I are very motivated. Because we love it so much, we spend a lot of time working on it.”
Visit the Bush Magic Adventures website
