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We leave for the airport on the 4.30am shuttle bus to the airport to catch a flight to Melbourne on the first leg of our flight. There are no delays and the four-hour flight is uneventful. We then face a long process to clear immigration, collect baggage and clear customs. The latter involves sniffer dogs searching passengers for prohibited animal or vegetable products. As we have already declared on our entry card that we have been in fresh water recently we have to unpack all the footwear and clothing we used for our canoe trip on the Whanganui for inspection. Our shoes are taken away to be washed to prevent any possibility of bringing didymo spores into the country. Didymo is a highly invasive brown fungus that chokes fresh waterways and is near impossible to irradicate. It hasn’t reached Australia yet and that’s the way they want it to stay. As we wait for our shoes to be returned we are amazed by the amount of food some passengers have in their luggage particularly in the way of food and spices – bags full! One customs officer is examining a holdall full of bags of powder that have been slashed open spreading powder everywhere. We are also entertained by a film crew filming for a regular TV programme called ‘Border Control’. By the time and have grabbed some lunch, the check-in for our flight to Hobart at 1pm is open. It’s only a short hour’s hop from Melbourne to Hobart and with no further entry formalities we are straight into the arrivals hall where Adrian – looking much the same as ever – is waiting to meet us.

Helen and Adrian are house-sitting a property right on the shore of Blackman’s Bay and the views from kitchen and living room picture windows stretch across the wide expanse of the Derwent Estuary to the suburbs on the other side. The house itself is lovely; full of light and wood floors. Adrian has to return to the office so we take a walk along the beach and up along the cliff walk which runs up from the beach and along the front gardens of the properties that are perched on the hillside. There are some good views of the rocky coastline below as well as the back of one rather modern, industrial-looking house. Mostly he hillside is built up with single and two-storey homes of brick or weatherboard. As we go furthe along the cliff public footpath runs through the front gardens of several houses which is rather disconcerting and as rain threatens we turn back to retrace our steps.

The main reason Helen and Adrian are sitting the house is to look after a rather ancient and rather decrepit Burmese cat with a rather penetrating meow and a sneezing problem. At first we didn’t fully understand Helen and Adrian’s antipathy to this poor creature who seemed only to crave attention. Until, that it is, it sneezed snot over our duvet; the cat is now barred from our bedroom in addition to the living room and has been dubbed the ‘snot machine’ by Andy!. .

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