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I set the coordinates on my phone and started to walk the 5.2km to a conference allowing about 50 minutes to get to Luna Park. I estimate I’ll arrive about 5 minutes early and see this as a great way to exercise before a big day of learning. I have never been to the Luna Park venue before nor stayed in this hotel and although I am familiar with Sydney, I am effectively relying on my phone to guide me to my location.

The first part of the trip is fairly straight forward as all I have to do is follow a road and make a right turn. It is when I reach a section where there are two major freeways overlapping that I start to find trouble. Because of the layout of the area I am forced to climb a series of stairs and when I come out the top I am in the Botanical Gardens and instructed to follow a path. I’m a little disorientated at this point but none the less trust my phones GPS system to get me through.

After 5 minutes of walking I expect that I will be coming up to a road but there is no road in sight, at least not the major one that I am supposed to be turning onto. Just to make sure I press refresh on my phone to get my current location to discover that I am nowhere near where I thought I was. A little disheartened but with time to recover I turn 90 degrees and take another path so that I will be back on track. 

10 more minutes of walking pass again I refresh my map just to get a bearing for where I am. Being in the middle of a park makes it very difficult to know where I am. The map loads and this time it tells me that I am not even in the Botantical Gardens anymore. I put it down to being in a city area again press refresh. This time I pay more attention to the result it gives me and notice a small disclaimer in one of the corners of the screen. ‘This is your location within 500m.’ In other words you might be in this position but if you are not you are at least in a 500m radius. Not very helpful when I have no landmarks to guide me. At this rate I will never get to Luna Park.

I decide to keep walking in the general direction and after a few refreshes and adjustments tI finally reach the other side of the park. A time check shows me that I am still 3km from my destination and looking at my watch I have about three minutes to get there on time. I message ahead to say I’ll be late and that I’ll find a cab and see them soon. As I so often do as I am walking along, I start to write this blog in my head. The message
will be that you will need to find an expert to get you to your destination….

It is not the first time that I have got lost like this in Sydney and laugh to myself remembering the time that I walked for about 4km and couldn’t find my destination and jumped in a cab and accidently directed them back to my hotel in my confusion. I then gave the correct address and found I was only about 200m short of where I had to be!

Eventually I see some steps that lead up to a bridge between two buildings with a sign saying ‘Cahill Walk – Sydney Harbour Bridge.’  I can now see my goal with the famous smiling mouth of Luna Park across the bay and all I have to do now is get a cab. I come across my next problem, the pedestrian walkway I am on has a high fence between me and the road. I see taxis pass me but they can’t stop and I can’t reach them. Once I was on Cahill Walk there was no going back, I was forced to walk across the bridge and to my destination. Even when I was halfway across the bridge I refreshed my phone and still it had 500m from where I actually was. The difference was that now I knew where I was! About half an hour late I rrive at Luna Park having covered a fair bit of extra distance, but that’s OK as Luna Park is all about having fun! 

I maybe the lesson is that you should find someone who knows the way to start with, and once they have guided you only, then attempt to do it yourself. I know my best results have always come from great coaches and mentors who can show you the way the first time so each time you need to follow that path in the future the task is much easier. 

Chris Bellesini
Remember, You Too, Can
Choose Your Own Success