Trek for Naduri

Back Track community unites for a healthy Naduri

Located halfway along the Kokoda Track, Naduri is home to the Back Track Adventures Trek Crew. Our team are descendants of the original Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels and proudly guide our trekkers safely across the track, year in, year out…until COVID-19 swept the globe, closed borders, and pressed pause on the trekking industry.

The community of Naduri is part of the Back Track Adventures family and although we cannot be together until our world starts opening again, we remain connected and care deeply for our extended family.

Our hundreds of crossings and visits to Naduri have taught us one thing - walking is the only way in and out of Naduri, which make accessing vital services - like healthcare - difficult for the local community. During the pandemic access to healthcare is more critical than ever; a vital source of COVID-19 awareness and hygiene supplies, while maintaining essential health care including treating common diseases, maternal and neonatal care, emergency response and preventative education.

Our friends at Kokoda Track Foundation (KTF), an Australian NGO that's been working with the communities living along and around the Kokoda Track for over a decade, operate a network of aid posts across the region, including the one at Naduri Village.

The Naduri Aid Post provides essential healthcare to Naduri and the surrounding mountain villages of Maraba and Kagi via weekly remote patrols.

We've been moved by our previous visits to the health centre and the difficulties faced trying to operate a medical centre in such a remote part of the world. So, we have joined forces with KTF to support the funding of the Naduri Aid Post.

With a changeover in Community Health Workers posted to Naduri, the Central Provincial Health Authority is poised to appoint a new CHW to the post, and we want to help KTF ready the post for operations when they arrive.

We want to help cover wages, maintenance, COVID-19 hygiene and vital medical supplies, including antibiotics, malaria treatment and birthing kits. Our goal is $20,000 to cover the operations of the Naduri Aid Post for a year. We know that’s a big number, but every dollar helps and if the Back Track community unites to help, little bits add up to a whole lot.

And one thing is for certain, it will make an incredible difference to the lives of the people of Naduri - our family.

Join us as part of the ‘Trekking for a Healthy Naduri’ community.

Donations to Kokoda Track Foundation (KTF) under this appeal will be applied to KTF's Healthy Communities Project for the operations of Naduri Aid Post in Papua New Guinea, covering health worker wages, medical and COVID-19 supplies,which will provide critical hygiene supplies.

In the unlikely event of this fundraiser being oversubscribed, donations will be directed to other Health Communities activities to the greater Kokoda Track catchment area in Oro and Central Provinces in PNG.

Image credits:

Background image - trekkers walk through choko vines along the Kokoda Track, Papua New Guinea.

All other images - Naduri Aid Post, operated by KTF

Images all KTF