Sharing joy and delight on the roads 

In this personal reflection, Western Australian Baha’is Ian and Mona Bayly share their recent travels across Australia, and how they were able to continue engaging in the community-building work of the Faith while on the road. 

Serving the Faith, and contributing to the community-building work, is such an amazing bounty. So, how can we serve the Faith even after we retire and as we grow older? 

I am in my mid-70s, my dear wife is in her late 60s, and we have been retired for a number of years. We have enjoyed serving the Faith throughout our lives, but as we got older, we had to think of new ways we could serve as our circumstances changed.  

We spent the first few years of our retirement volunteering for Baha’i-inspired organisations in Ghana and Samoa, before offering two years of ‘senior youth’ volunteer service in Yunnan Province, China.  

In 2019, we flew back to Perth for the birth of our grandson. Soon after, COVID struck and we were unable to return. While we settled back into life in Australia, we still hoped we could go back.  

At first, there were only two of us in our locality. By holding devotional gatherings, our next-door neighbour formally joined the Baha’i community and we were able to start children’s and junior youth classes in our neighbourhood. Eventually, three other friends moved into our locality. 

In the winter of 2020, when Western Australia was cut off from the rest of Australia due to the pandemic, we decided to travel to the north of the State to visit Baha’i friends and see some well-known sights along the way. We hired an RV and were able to visit isolated friends and offer our assistance in Geraldton, Carnarvon, Karratha, Port Hedland and Broome. This opened our eyes to the real need to support those who live far from the big cities. Members of Baha’i institutions visit them from time to time, but few other friends visit them. Being retired, we could be flexible and able to respond to the requests of these friends.

By the end of that trip, we had fallen in love with the Australian outback and wanted to continue visiting these isolated friends and have spiritual conversations in these local communities. We could see how much they loved Baha’is visiting and how appreciative they were of any help we were able to offer in holding devotionals, visiting people in their homes and hosting discussion circles on topics of spiritual import. Having our own vehicle and accommodation meant we could be independent and not a burden on them. As a result, we decided to get our own caravan and for the next three winters we continued to travel north to visit these friends. 

At first, not being experienced caravanners, we were not sure if we would know what to do if something went wrong. But we soon learned how helpful fellow caravanners can be and also discovered that caravan parks are wonderful places for engaging in conversations with others because people are relaxed and open to chatting with strangers. Conversations often start with: ‘where are you from?’ and then turn towards places they have visited or some detail about caravans. It is not difficult to bring up a current crisis and find a way to offer Baha’i principles as a possible solution.  

Following our 2023 winter trip, we decided to try something more adventurous and travel around the interior of the Eastern States during the winter of 2024. Our purpose remained the same – to meet the Baha’i friends along the way and to experience some of the amazing sights Australia has to offer.  So, we set off in May, traveling through the interiors of South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland and the Northern Territory before returning home in September. 

Our travels took us to Adelaide, Ballarat, Bendigo, the Murray River, the Blue Mountains, Lightning Ridge, up through to Queensland and across to the Northern Territory and down to the Red Centre – all the while meeting up with friends, old and new, and sharing in stories, prayers, conversations and songs.  

When referring to travel teachers, Shoghi Effendi wrote:  

So, if you are older, retired Baha’is, please don’t feel you can no longer serve the Faith. There are so many ways to be of service. Just pray that Baha’u’llah will show you the way. Not all may be able to serve in this way for financial, health or other reasons, but we decided to share our travel experiences in the hope these may inspire and encourage more older friends to consider visiting isolated believers and travel teaching in their part of Australia. We can assure you that it will bring great joy and delight to you and the isolated friends you meet.