Resort and Hospitality Management’s 27th annual Wanderlust once again was a grand success — actually, a 200-grand success.
The dinner-auction fundraiser at Hyatt Regency Coconut Point Resort & Spa in Bonita Springs on March 19 attracted more than 300 guests who ponied up almost $204,000 — $58,000 more than last year’s event collected. That money goes to provide financial assistance, scholarships and resources for the Florida Gulf Coast University resort and hospitality students who will become the industry’s leaders of tomorrow.
One of those students, Paige Martin, who teamed with fellow RHM students Sabrina Bracken and Todd Reed as this year’s Wanderlust event-planning interns, already is putting the proceeds to good personal use simply by valuing the experience of staging an event of this magnitude.
“This was not only a unique learning experience, but a truly rewarding event to be a part of,” said Martin, a junior who moved to the Wanderlust team after working as an intern in 2015 with the Lee Memorial Health System’s special events coordinator. “I learned a great deal about how our RHM program got started, the kinds of opportunities it provides us students with and how much of an impact the Wanderlust proceeds and RHM staff members have on the students and alumni.”
In keeping with Wanderlust’s 2016 safari theme — live entertainment included a traditional African dance routine — the big game in this hospitable hunt was a $12,000 winning bid in the live auction for The Fish Bowl, literally a bowl full of donated packages and services tossed together and auctioned as a lot.
A package called A World of Choices — a build-your-own trip deal that
offered a choice of Interval International-managed properties — brought in the second-biggest haul with a $5,000 bid, while an Hawaii excursion billed as Aloha Relaxation and a tour of California wine country collected $3,900 and $3,800, respectively. The silent auction’s top moneymakers were a Palm Beach getaway that went for $1,650 and a series of Orlando adventures that collected $1,500.
That’s a tough act to follow for Wanderlust 2017, but the RHM students surely will come up with yet another grand plan.
- See a Wanderlust photo album