GLOBETROTTING Emma Waldek says she has not been put off travelling by her traumatic experience in Australia.

Emma, 21, of Harboro Road, Sale, was forced to escape from an upstairs window when the hostel she was staying in went up in flames.

Fifteen people died in the blaze in June. They were all travellers, earning money by picking fruit in the remote town of Childers in Queensland.

Emma returned to Sale earlier this month, after completing her Australian trip. She told SAM: "I went out there for a break - I'd finished my job and I didn't want another one, so I thought I'd go travelling."

Emma, who had trained to be a nanny at Princess Christian College in Manchester, flew to Australia with a friend, Amy Baker, last year.

The pair went to Childers to earn money before the next leg of their tour. They had to get up at 5am every morning to go avocado picking, and spent their free time playing board games and watching videos.

Emma said: "It was excellent - it was the best place we had been to. There was a group of 10 of us who hung around together, and we had a great laugh. We had Saturdays off, so we spent Friday nights at one of the local pubs.

"It's amazing how many pubs they managed to fit into a small town!"

She had been in Childers for five weeks before tragedy struck. Emma and her four closest friends were asleep in an upstairs room when the fire started in the lounge area downstairs.

She said: "There was a lot of noise, and I heard a girl shouting. It sounded like things were smashing, and I smelled smoke.

"We didn't realise what we were doing - we just piled out over the veranda, and climbed on to the roof next door.

"When we got across the road, the whole place went up in flames. You can't imagine how quickly it went up - the hostel was completely gutted in no time."

Emma lost all her belongings in the blaze, and was left with nothing but the nightie she was wearing at the time. But she said: "The people of Childers were absolutely amazing.

"Everyone came to help, and everything we needed was donated straight away. The Lions Club donated rucksacks, and the two big stores in Australia made a huge contribution.

"Everything we could think of was given to us before we asked for it."

Emma rang home to let her mum know that she was safe before she saw it on the news, but she said: "When I rang, she asked me if I could call later because she was working! I told her I couldn't."

Robert Long, one of the other fruit pickers, has been arrested in connection with the suspected arson.

Emma stayed in Childers until she was ready to move on, and then travelled to Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef. After a spell in Alice Springs, she headed to Perth and flew back to England.

The terrifying experience has not put an end to Emma's travelling. She said: "I"m hoping to go to South East Asia and the South Pacific in January with my sister.

"And I'm going to go back to Australia in a couple of years - I've made some lifelong friends out there."

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