23-28 March, 2026

"...for those who believe personal transformation and systemic change are inseparable, and who are ready to use their practice as a tool for social and ecological healing."

- Dianne Dredge - Learning Lead, Tourism CoLab + Place Ecologies

UNDERSTANDING LEADERSHIP THROUGH NATURE

Up The Creek CoLab

Join us on a journey where time slows, breath deepens, and discovery unfolds at nature's pace. This is an invitation to step away from the noise of everyday life and into the best classroom in the world, the living, breathing landscape of Bung Yarnda.

Here, on the water and under open skies, you'll learn not from books or screens, but from the patterns of creek lines and the quiet intelligence of the more-than-human world.

This is a space to pause, to listen, and to remember what it means to be fully present.

Over five transformative days, you'll paddle through ancient waterways, gather around campfires, and engage in embodied practice that connects head, heart, and hands. You'll explore what it means to be a good guest, to place, to community, and to the earth itself. And you'll discover how personal transformation and systemic change are inseparable.

Nature's Classroom

Our learning journey weaves together regenerative thinking, ecological leadership, and the art of showing up with intention. We leave behind rushing to solutions or ticking boxes. It's about sitting in the questions, breathing into the uncertainty, and trusting the emergent wisdom that arises when we slow down enough to truly see. This is leadership.

Nature provides our classroom, embodying a commitment to flexibility, flow, emergence, and adaptation.

Come with curiosity. Come with an open heart. Come ready to be changed by the land, the water, and the community that gathers here to reflect on what ecological leadership is when we are not seperate to but part of nature.

Sometimes, the most profound learning happens when we stop trying to get somewhere, and simply allow ourselves to arrive.

Ecological Leadership in Action - FLOAT

FLOAT demonstrates regenerative leadership through its role as a living laboratory for place-based, community-led transformation in East Gippsland. FLOAT embodies flexible, emergent and adaptive responses to community undergoing deep economic and social transition. It serves as tangible proof that regenerative business development works in practice, providing soft infrastructure whilst fostering self-organising networks and distributed leadership.

FLOAT will be our classroom for the last part of our journey, when we come together to consider what's next in our leadership journey.