HALIBURTON ROTARY TOURS

Each year Rotary International holds its Annual Convention in late May or June. Host cities include Melbourne in 2023, Singapore in 2024, Calgary in 2025 and Taipei in 2026.

Back in 2022, members of Haliburton Rotary approached TravelMaven about creating a sightseeing tour either before or after the Melbourne Convention. After some discussion, they decided to expand the idea to before and after, make the tours fundraisers, and invite Rotarians from across Ontario (and beyond) to join them. The result was a 17-day pre-convention tour of New Zealand and an 11-day post-convention tour of eastern Australia.

Most significantly, after that successful first year it was decided to make Haliburton Rotary Convention Tours an annual event.

For Singapore 2024, TravelMaven created three offerings for Haliburton Rotary: a 10-night pre-convention tour of South Korea; a 7-night convention package in Singapore; and a 15-night post-convention tour of Vietnam. All three tours proved popular with Rotarians from across Ontario, Alberta, Michigan and even Australia joining the fun.

As a next step, Haliburton Rotary will offer its first Service Tour to South Africa in February 2025. This tour will combine the fun of travelling with other Rotarians with the satisfaction of taking on a project in the destination country. Haliburton Rotary is currently working with several South African Rotary clubs to plan meetings, identify potential projects, and figure out how all these things might be undertaken during our 19 day visit.

Calgary (scheduled for the end of June 2025) posed a unique challenge. Obviously, the regular model of "taking Canadian Rotarians to far-away places in May and early June" didn't really fit. However, rather than skip the year entirely, TravelMaven found a place few Canadians have visited: Haida Gwaii and the BC Coast. This tour will begin with a voyage up the BC Inside Passage from Vancouver Island to the remote island of Haida Gwaii.

In April 2026, Haliburton Rotary will offer its first Fellowship tour to Scotland and Northern Ireland. This tour is scheduled around the biennial Rotary International Curling Bonspiel being held April 3-10 in Stranraer, Scotland. In addition to the regular 13 day tour, bonspiel participants also have the option off adding 4 nights in Northern Ireland to their curling trip.

For Taipei 2026, things are back on the regular track. A pre-convention tour will be offered to Japan, a Convention Package will be available in Taipei, and a post-convention tour has been organized for Borneo.

Looking even further down the road, conventions will be in Honolulu in 2027, Manilla in 2028 and Minneapolis in 2029. Believe it or not, but plans for those are already in the making, with the plan to release them at the preceding Rotary International Convention.

Please send any inquiries about Rotary Conventions to haliburtonrotary@gmail.com and those regarding tour logistics to barry@travelmaven.ca.