On Sunday 12 April 2026, around 70 hardy souls took part in our first ever “The Amazing Science Race” – our take on the reality tv show “The Amazing Race”.  The event took participants from Civic Park in Armidale, around the CBD, to four other locations to complete six challenges. After completing each activity, teams were given a clue for finding the next location.  Once found, they were provided with instructions on how to complete the challenge.

We had beautiful Autumn weather for the event, and while the wind was a little hectic for some challenges and the corellas also made in impression, we commend all teams on their magnificent abilities to complete all our science challenges.

Our first challenge was in Civic Park where competitors completed their first challenge to build a small boat from paddle pop sticks to successfully float a mini Lego figure (complete with life jacket) in our “Armidale Sea”, a rather large tub of water, for 20 seconds. Our harbour master was on-site to ensure all boats were floated correctly. Some teams demonstrated some very creative engineering!

Teams were then given their clue to find our chemistry activity which was being held in the Armidale Town Hall. This was a pH matching exercise and then finding clues from the periodic table to find other safe, household chemicals in the room to solve the puzzle – almost an escape room style activity, but not quite.

The next challenge was to find Central Park and locate the String Telephonics challenge.  Here’s where the wind and the corellas really made this challenge interesting.  Teams were tasked with making their string telecup phone and then speaking to each other down the line to decode a message. Our facilitators took on the roles of Chief Cipher Solvers to oversee this challenge. The decoded answer took participants down Faulkner St to the NOVA office where they then had to solve a small mystery coding one our BeeBot robots.  What a buzz!!! (pun intended).  Thanks to our lovely Bee on duty, Jules, for dressing up to play the part.

Teams received their next clue and had to find their way back to Rusden Street and the area behind the Council offices where they were tasked with making ice cream in a bag.  We felt extremely sorry for Nat who was our chief ice cream taster – someone had to do it!!!!  Once the ice cream was the right taste and texture, teams were on their way with a clue to return to Civic Park for the last challenge.

This one was an interesting variation of an egg and spoon race – contestants were given a piece of paper and they had to make their spoon under the guidance of our most Egg-sellent Spoon Technicians!  The paper spoon had to be strong enough to carry an egg in a short relay, carried by one team member and passed to the next, without touching the egg, until all team members had completed a leg of the relay. Some very fancy origami spoons were created and no eggs were broken in the race to pass the Chief Race Judge/Omelette Chef.

It was all so much fun!

The day wrapped up with a sausage sizzle barbecue by the Armidale Lions Club!  We wish to thank all teams for participating, as well as our super volunteers and staff who helped us make the day and all the challenges such a wonderful success.

We would like to thank Inspiring NSW for supporting this event. As part of our National Science Week funding in 2025, we were able to transfer the event to this year.  We would also like to thank Armidale Regional Council for their in-kind support for this event. More information about National Science Week here.

Watch this space – we might need to make it an annual or biennial event!