Wednesday 1st August

Walking along the cold and wintry Hobart streets after five, when the offices disgorge their weary workers, is a funny time to have Deep & Meaningful Chats with our fellow Tasmanians, I would have thought.

Last week I was accosted by a bloke who was out of breath and fairly distressed.  He needed to know if he had gone past Weld Street, and was very relieved when I said no.  He walked with me and told me his tale of woe.  He had been in the State Library for ten minutes earlier that day, and when he came out, his motorbike was gone, along with his helmet, goggles, leather coat.  All vintage!  (WWII I think he said but it might have been even older.)  He had bought this beloved bike when he was 16, 40 years ago, and it was his pride and joy.  As well as this, he had arrived back in Tasmania after a few weeks away to find his long-term girlfriend had done a runner and had let out their apartment to a gang of students.  So…he had no transport, no place to live, and no job, because on top of all of this he had broken his little finger and was off work until it healed (he is a tradie.)  We got to his street and he looked at me speculatively.  “I suppose I will meet a lovely new woman some time or another.  I don’t suppose…???”  Well no… I didn’t suppose anything of the sort, and I indicated the presence in my life of a perfectly nice man.  He sighed deeply and said, “Probably I’m not a very attractive proposition, with no money, no house, no job, no transport.”  He was getting a ride down the Channel and was going to sleep in a tent in somebody’s paddock.  And it is so cold at night at the moment!!  Possibly – I have no illusions - what was so attractive about me was that I looked like the sort of person who would have a warm and cosy place to live and a pot of tasty hot dinner ready and waiting…

Tuesday 31^st July

More travel stories from Chris and Angela…

While they were in Florence recently, they went to see – Madonna!  Along with 85,000 or so very thrilled and excited Italians, in a huge stadium.

Madonna is now 53 but has lost none of her shock value.  In fact, said Angela, she was totally outrageous and as shocking as could be.  I asked if she had shown her bottom to the crowd, because I had seen a (shocking!!) photo of her doing so to the (shocked) inhabitants of St Petersburg.  Yes indeed!  She showed her everything!

She sang old songs – Like a Virgin, very s-l-o-w-l-y and erotically, and new songs Bang Bang (You Shot Me Dead), I think was the charming title, and the song came complete with a gun and filmscreens full of splattered brains and gore.  (NO not the old Cher song, equally charmingly titled Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down) – I did ask…)

Angela tried to take photos of Madonna on a high wire, Madonna leaping and prancing but, she said, Madonna moved too swiftly, like a rattlesnake.

The concert finished close to midnight and they very sensibly caught a taxi back to their hotel, where their three friends, Jim, Liz and Susan were waiting, very sad that they had chosen not to attend the rattlesnake spectacle.  But…the taxi driver was not particularly interested in them or in their exact destination.  He let them out on a dark street and whizzed off.  They didn’t have a torch and had NO idea where they were, so they hopped from foot to foot, laughed a bit, and trudged around the empty streets until eventually, they found a nice warm welcoming bar where they could regroup, slake their thirst, and then formulate a plan to seek out their accommodation and their friends.

Monday 30^th July

Coming back down the East Coast this morning it was obvious that we were more comfortable in the wheelchair van than we would have been out at sea.  But…only just!

It was all very beautiful, with rainbows, the odd low-flying sea eagle and black cockatoo, and big, brilliant rainbows.  But it was windy – not comfortable, for a big van – and very cold. 

We passed a few mysterious incidents.  For example, why were there police cars, with about three civilian cars, all pulled up on the side of the road, with everyone out of the cars peering up and down the verges, beating at tussocks with sticks.  WHAT were they looking for? A small lost poodle??  A fearsome, if small, weapon?  Presumably…we will never know!

Pete got up at about 4am to watch some swimming races.  I didn’t have the energy to move out of bed, but I did listen, with half an ear.  Oh dear the poor men’s relay team…SO devastated not to have got a medal at all.  They tried to interview them straight after the race and poor James Magnusson, who had, inexplicably, swim very s-l-o-w-l-y, was incoherent in his distress.

Why do I enjoy watching the Olympics at all?  It is so very stressful!

Sunday 29^th July

A beautiful East Coast day.  Cold but…glorious!

Headlam Family Weekend festivities all day long.  Pete and I have eaten SO much I think our scales will tip over and fail to register anything but Shock And Awe when we get back to Hobart…

In between eating, drinking, chatting and quizzing, we have been catching glimpses of the Olympics.  So sad!  Stephanie Rice sobbing bitterly – oh the grief, the embarrassment, of coming sixth… And the dominance of the Chinese!  I imagine that in a few years it will be nothing but Chinese winners in every category.  When we were watching the Opening Ceremony parade, I was looking at a few tweets on my iPhone.  One tweeter (twitterer?) wrote, when the Chinese contingent marched past, Have they brought the WHOLE country with them??

Our Opals, mind you, are looking pretty damn fine.  At the moment... they have not yet come up against The Chinese!!

After a brief adjournment between breakfast/brunch/lunch/afternoon tea Pete and I trotted off back to the main resort area to have a G & T.  We took Pete’s mum with us, in her big wheely chair-bed thingy.  There were a few children playing, very sedately, in the children’s play equipment pen, and one of the mothers (very friendly Julie) came up to apologise for “the noise.”  We laughed and said that we didn’t mind at all and that in fact very shortly our group would be increasing “the noise” exponentially.  And that in fact quite soon there would not just be an old lady in a wheely chair bed thingy with two sedate looking grown-ups.  There would be 42 humans, nearly half of whom would be - under ten. 

And indeed very soon in came Grace, Olivia, Matilda, Ella, Holly, Tessa, Sam, Evie, Olive, Oliver, Alexander, Sebastian, Solomon, Josh, Alice, Harry, Lizzie, Sophie – the under 10s – with all of the attendant parents and grandparents.  I could see Julie’s eyes widen as the ground trembled beneath their feet…and the playground suddenly turned into a primal pen full of fun, laughter and occasional…TEARS!

Saturday 28^th July

Up the beautiful East Coast on Saturday morning.

But…not on 2XS, as we did in May last year.  This time Pete and I travelled in a big van fitted out with a big ramp and wheelchair facilities, with his mum securely fastened in the back.  I sat in the front next to the very capable driver/carer, Leanne, while Pete sat, a bit cramped, in the back, with his mum.  Who, amazingly, stayed wide awake until the very last few minutes when we arrived at White Sands Resort, north of Bicheno.  She was actually in fine form and only really blotted her copybook by deciding , quite firmly, that my name is Beryl.  It could hardly be worse…maybe Doris, or Beris…but some of Pete’s younger relatives – and I am looking right at you, Michael Agnew!  thought this was MUCH too funny and I very much fear that, to him and his family, I will forever more be…Beryl…

We are here for the annual Headlam family weekend.  42 humans, many of them under 10, all, more or less, related…all massed together in one very nice resort.  So far so good!  The young cousins all thrilled to see one another; the older ones equally so.

Pete and I started the day very early with…of course…the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games!  So amazing!!  We decided that if we hadn’t had Our Eddie telling us what was what, we would have been totally bewildered…but it was all a great and enthralling spectacle.  Is it now revealed that Our Queen Liz is really M?  How funny was Rowan Atkinson aka Mr Bean, playing with the London Symphony Orchestra?  WHY weren’t the Spice Grils represented?  Or maybe they were, after the parade…we and to leave at the letter M - by the way, how very many countries start with the letter M??? -  to go and meet Leanne and The Van…

Friday 27^th July

This has been a very busy few days at work.  Lots of coming and going, sitting in hearing rooms, sending emails hither and yon, changing and rearranging this and that.

One of the things I am always sure of doing is to alert everyone in the hearing rooms that they need to turn off their mobile phones.  (Yes especially me!  I never again want to hear the Rolling Stones booming out This Could Be the Last Time in the middle of solemn proceedings.  Well certainly not when it is MY phone and MY fault.  I am sure I would find it all very amusing if it were somebody else’s phone and somebody else’s fault…)

Yesterday I was going through my usual spiel and one of the lawyers told us that they are very stern indeed about mobile phones in the other courts and tribunals he attends.  In the High Court, any phone which rings out of turn is immediately confiscated.  Permanently!  And apparently there is a gallery where the hundreds of phones are on display…pour encourager les autres!  Oh the horror!

Thursday 26^th July

Chris and Angela had another boating adventure on their recent European Adventure.  They went on a twelve day Baltic cruise which sounded like SO much fun.  But…so much EXHAUSTING fun! 

The boat would travel all night and disgorge their passengers at 7am to go sightseeing.  They went to Helsinki, Stockholm, Copenhagen, St Petersburg, (NO not in that order!  And more cities which I can’t remember…I will extract more info from them this weekend.)  After a day of sightseeing they would get back to the boat, have a shower, and be ready to watch an informative power point presentation about the next day’s activities.  This wasn’t just for entertainment, this was full of need-to-know information about timetables and Survival Abroad!  After that it was dinner, in one of the seven restaurants, then FUNFUNFUN – cabaret, magic, dancing, music, quizzes, you name it!  It was all GO!

On one of their rest days – there were one or two – they did a tour of the kitchens.  Oh the logistics!  There were about 5,000 on board – 1,600 crew, 3,400 passengers.  So the kitchens served up 17,000 meals EVERY day!  This many meals because a lot of the passengers had more than three per day – afternoon tea, morning tea, supper, snacks.  Chris and Angela said the food was absolutely delicious but that people ate FAR too much.  Great big heaped plates three, four, five times a day.  Everything in the kitchens was made from scratch – huge vats of tomato sauce on the boil, groaning ovens full of bread, rolls, cakes, croissants.  Imagine being the head caterer…the lists, to be made, the possibility of error!  The temperamental chefs, the sobbing kitchen hands, the scurrying waiting staff…I have worked in kitchens and I know how high-pitched it can get.  At sea, with these huge numbers, it must be hell!

Wednesday 25^th July

On Sunday Pete and I did different activities with various offspring.  I went to MONA with my three daughters, and we had a most wonderful time looking at the new exhibition – lots of stuff unearthed from the TMAG (Tas Museum and Art Gallery) and so beautifully curated it took my breath away.  Plus Picasso’s Weeping Woman, just casually hung on a wall, with no security cordons, no anxious guards.  We had NO children with us, other than Rose in a pouch.  She slept happily, waking occasionally to peer out at the world in great delight.  Hello!  I didn’t know you were here!  Oh wow what’s THAT!  She is, I told Katy, starting to develop a personality (she was born not very long ago…29^th Feb…) and Katy said, Yes, but a very limited personality so far. She has two moods – Happy, and Hungry.

In the meantime Pete was out on the river with James on 2XS.  The plan is for James and some friends to take the boat up to the Whitsundays, some time around March next year.  Then in April Pete and I can step gracefully onto a plane and fly OVER Bass Strait, and past the East Coast, ie past all the cold wind and weather…We can spend a bit of time in the gorgeous Whitsundays and then…sail north!  For this plan to succeed, 2XS has to be in tiptop condition, and so does James.  Pete through it would be a good idea to go out for a few hours, so that James could practise parking, ie getting 2XS in and out of its tight pen at the marina.

I got home about 3.00 and put a defrosting leg of lamb in the oven, not sure how many people were coming to eat it but fairly sure that it needed to start cooking.  About 4.30 in came a very despondent Pete…had he been having FUNFUNFUN out on the river?  Well no…They hadn’t got very far, and were just starting to drive around a buoy in the bay when…the steering stopped working, on the port side (I think.)  Much the same as our near-disastrous breakdown in Coff’s Harbour.  Poor Pete, poor James, poor 2XS.  They had to limp back into the marina, using the outboard from the tender strapped onto the back deck on a plank.  James drove the little engine, Pete drove the starboard steering, and they managed to get in, to the astonishment, said James, of all and sundry out for a Sunday walk on the Lindisfarne waterfront.

They cheered up later in the day when it was time to eat the roast – yes good thing I put it in, and good thing I held off on peeling the veg until I knew how many people were coming - along with Martin, Kate, Harry and Lizzie, who all, fortunately, were happy to watch Masterchef with Pete and me.  (So close to the final, couldn’t miss it…)

Yesterday Pete sent an email to our friend James Miedecke, who is now working on an engineering project in Borneo, so I will include what he wrote in case I got things wrong:

The bad news is....after travelling all the way back to Tassie, after our very successful sail drive repairs, I took son James out for a bit of manoeuvring on Sunday and the same problem has raised its bloody head.  Now need to have an exhaustive mechanical check, or perhaps a new sail drive. Muchos money involved there I tell you!!!

As they say, BOAT stands for…Bring Out Another Thousand…

Tuesday 24th July

Toilets are always a big issue, when travelling.

We were lucky in that we had our own facilities with us at all times, on 2XS.  A few slightly awkward moments, when close in to shore and unable to use our flushing toilet because we, like the houseboats and barges on the Canal du Midi, don’t have a holding tank… I won’t go into details but suffice to say the port-a-potty on deck was all very lovely but sometimes – just a bit – ahem – public…

Apparently most of the public toilets in New York City have been closed, to discourage the homeless – well to discourage them from using the facilities, I suppose!  The results are not pretty.  My friend Chris was walking in Central Park one day, enjoying the ambiance, when her eye was drawn to a large woman peeing in the middle of a flower bed.  The woman saw Chris looking her way and started to shout, “Do I know you?  What are you looking at!” and Chris fled, showing the whites of her eyes, down a small pathway lined with petunias.

Monday 23^rd July

Chris and Angela are back from Abroad, where they had an inordinate amount of fun.  They came back glowing and…exhausted!

They thought France was absolutely beautiful – we know this; we have been watching Le Tour!  Their weeks on the Canal du Midi were memorable and pleasurable, ambling down the waterway, eating and drinking very merrily with their friends.  One big BUT…none of the canal boats have holding tanks.  This means that…all of the toilet waste goes straight into the canal.  It wasn’t particularly stinky, they said, but it was very dirty indeed.  They were told to be very careful not to fall into the water.  And if anyone did fall in, to make sure not to ingest any of the canalwater.  Totally yuckypoo nd full of toxic diseases!  And of course…their friend Liz did fall in… She managed not to breathe and therefore is still alive and healthy, but she did batter and bruise herself quite badly in the process.

I am going to have to ask them a lot more about France.  After three weeks of following Le Tour, Pete and I are quite exhausted, and also very impressed, yet again, with the extreme beauty of the French countryside.  And all of those glorious little towns and villages, with their beautiful soft colours – grey, ochre, beige.  Not a hint of garish advertising, all totally TidyTown.  James Headlam is bewildered by all of this.  He scans the rural landscape with an experienced farmer’s eye and says to Pete, in his inimitable fashion, “OK Dad, where are all the shitters?”  And indeed where is the crappy housing?  The outskirts of these towns are pristine; no shabby (shitter) houses with saggy old brown couch on the veranda, no beaten-up cars rusting in the fields.  No bogans, no poverty, no advertising, no discordant architecture, just gentle, lush prosperity.  Another world altogether!

Sunday 22nd July

Last week I was chatting with a friend…at the pub…yes, my spiritual home…

We talked about jobs, and how so many jobs in the modern world are totally obscure in their meaning to us.  When we were on our sailing adventure we met lots of people who sail around endlessly, and seem quite prosperous and well-fed in spite of having no visible source of income.  “Oh,” they say, airily.  “I work two or three hours a day on my computer.  I am a Sociothumpian Data Program Analyst.  It pays very well.  Sociothumpian Data Program Analysts are in high demand nowadays.” 

Oh good.  I would train to become one of those…if I had any idea what it means!

In New Caledonia we met a very nice Canadian man, sailing for a year with his wife and teenage children.  I did understand what his job was – translating official documents from French-English or English-French for the Olympics.  That did make sense!  He also had another string to his bow and I had NO idea what he was talking about…but it did sound lucrative!

Saturday 21st July
I was reading this week about the gorgeous and glamorous CEO of Yahoo who is seven months pregnant.  She confidently asserts she will take two weeks off for the baby, and then will be running the business again fulltime, no probs.

She hasn’t – ahem – had the baby yet…

We will see!

I had coffee recently with a friend, and we discussed, not maternity leave, but sick leave, and the concept of “mental health days.”  She thinks it is only people under 45 who take this sort of sick leave; those of us born in sterner times are much less inclined to take any sort of sick leave at all.  A friend of hers has been working in the USA, and in the past 18 months she took 3 days sick leave, to care for her children, who were home from school with some ghastly affliction or another.  At her performance review, her manager pointed out these three days, and said, “You seem to be taking quite a lot of leave, one way and the other.  Is there a problem?”  She was quite taken aback; three days would be considered to be a very moderate use of personal leave, in Australia.

Friday 20th July

We had lunch with our friends Lorraine and Larry last week.

Lots of catching up on DelhiDays – we spent a very happy week there with them in 2006, in their beautiful apartment.  So hospitable they were, so knowledgeable!

They have had lots of adventures since than, and have spent quite a lot of time recently in Papua new Guinea, again for Larry’s work with what I can only think of as the Hydro.  Lorraine had actually worked there in 1969 as a young school leaver, in the public service.  Port Moresby is very different now.

Everyone says, basically, don’t go there.  When we were in the Louisiades we heard dire warnings, both from locals and from people who had sailed too close to The Mainland and who had suffered for their foolhardiness.  The DFAT website says: Crime rates can be high and opportunistic crimes should be expected.  But Lorraine and Larry had no such tales of woe. 

They lived in a big, secure apartment block, right on beautiful Ela Beach.  Every morning Larry would leave for work at 7am and Lorraine would walk from one end of the beach to the other.  Sometimes she would stop and talk to an old lady mending fishing nets, but basically she would just wander along, all alone, enjoying the beauty around her. 

One morning she was quite a long way from her apartment and she saw a gang of young men coming down onto the beach and walking purposefully towards her.  Rascals??  She was a teensy bit nervous and thought maybe she should have heeded all of the warnings.  As they came closer, one of them came right up to her and said, a bit sternly, “You’re late!”  She blinked a bit and he explained that they watched out for her every morning, and they had been worried when she wasn’t back right on schedule…

Thursday 19^th July

Heather and Tony are just back from nearly three weeks of glory in the Cook Islands.  They particular enjoyed being at a small resort on Aitutaki, and Heather has sent me photos which make me weep with longing as I sit at my desk… This lovely island is being featured on Island Feast tonight on SBS, at, I think, 8pm, so – watch it if you can!

She also sent a photo of a big, muddy 4WD vehicle covered with hand-written advertisements which say:

CRUSHER NITECLUB – THE PLACE TO BE!!

This, apparently is…the island police car…

Wednesday 18^th July

I have a bit of a cold at the moment and it is indeed quite unpleasant.  But I am amazed at the number of people who say, “Oh you poor thing, you have the flu.”  No I don’t.  “The flu” is a very horrible illness, with much fever, aching, nausea, and people with the flu can’t get up and walk around and make themselves cups of tea and use their computers and watch Masterchef etc etc.  Some of my poor darling family members actually do have The Flu and very miserable and couch-bound they are. 

But I just read a very funny comment, re our First World wussiness:

I’d like to offer the services of my mother, an ex-nurse, in order to teach when it is appropriate to whinge about feeling crook. The basic rule is; you’re allowed to whinge if your illness has, in fact, killed you.  Mum wouldn’t keep us home from school for anything less than Ebola virus.

(Disclaimer – of course this is all tongue-in-cheek and it is very horrid to be sick and to have no sympathy from those around us…)

Tuesday 17^th July

Listening to everyone’s travel stories on their return to Hobart… Lots of fun to be had, out in the wide wide world!  But not everyone likes Abroad!

I was talking to a woman in a meeting recently.  She was telling me, very sadly, about her 20 year old daughter who had left the weekend before, for a year’s exchange, in Paris.  She had a scholarship to the Sorbonne, and a great place to live, right in the centre of the city.  I was sympathetic to this poor sad mother, and said, cheerily, that the time would fly past and that her daughter would be home in no time.  “That’s just it!” she said, with a mournful sigh.  “She got off the plane, looked around, hated it, and came straight home!”

When my Claire flew off overseas, all alone at the age of 20, she might have had a very similar reaction when she got off the plane in Edinburgh and smelt the alien air of Abroad.  But…she had been so sick on the plane there was no way in the world she was going to get back on and fly back to Tasmania.  By the time she had recovered her equilibrium – she was having FUNFUNFUN!

Monday 16^th July

Not sure why I am so drawn to the theme of…spiders…but I read this on twitter at the weekend and it amused me no end:

I just encountered a spider bigger than my desire to be man of the house

In the past, whenever discussion has come up about overseas travel, and which countries people are particularly drawn to, I have always said, “I am happy to go anywhere EXCEPT Papua New Guinea.  Because…they have the biggest spiders in the world – bird-eating spiders, in fact…”  So when I was in the Louisiades I very happily closed my mind to the fact that…I was actually…in PNG!!!

Sunday 15^th July

Very wintry weather, with sleety squalls blasting across the foothills of Mount Wellington.  A very nice day to stay inside and do…nothing much at all, really.  Pete is working on his accounts and I am…cooking beef, onion and Guinness pies.  In between following the (Masterchef…) recipe, I am sitting comfortably on a recliner, reading.  Life is good!

This time last year Pete was also working on his accounts, on board 2XS, in the marina in Noumea.  I spent my days very happily pootling around on my bike, sitting in the Café au Bout du Monde writing emails and battling with the very temperamental WiFi, and foraging for food.

I have been the cause of much unholy merriment in my work place. 

If I had made a list of Eleven Things I felt the world needed to know about me, I might have put: I am very obliging and am not a particularly forceful person.  Not always an advantage, in life or in the workplace, but them’s the breaks.  Over the last few weeks I have been working through old files which are sitting patiently in my filing cabinet waiting for whatever comes next.  I have come up with a polite but formal letter, requesting a status update so that I can set matters down for further hearing, or close them down for good and all.  Off go these letters, mostly by email, to various individuals and organisations.  It has been very satisfying, in a mild way, to get prompt responses and to be able to finalise this and that longstanding matter.

Last week we were told that my formal little requests have caused consternation and panic amongst…well amongst people who don’t know me… One of the union officials who does know me came in for a visit and made both Tim and Allan laugh very heartily when she told them that one of her colleagues in another union had said he had received communications from the ball-breaking associate at my workplace.  They stared at her, uncomprehending, for a few minutes, then said, “Marguerite??  Really?” before bursting into unseemly fits of laughter.

Saturday 14th July

QUATORZE JUILLET…

Bastille Day! 

This time last year we were in New Caledonia, watching a street parade in Noumea where every single person in uniform came out, on foot, on a bike, on a horse, in a tank.

This year our lone sailor friend, Greg is there, anchored happily in the Baie de Prony with his little cat Ede.  I shouldn’t think he will be involved in any festivities, bobbing about on the sea…

Katy and I have been watching a program on SBS (Monday 8.30) called Tribal Wives.  Very much…Anthropology Lite…

So far we have seen two episodes.  The premise of the program is to send out various pleasant, slightly unhappy British women to live in remote tribes for a month.  The first one we saw could have been anywhere in Central or South America.  I have just looked it up and it was in fact in a remote part of northern Mexico, “on the rim of the spectacular Copper Canyon.”

This week Our Girl Becky was in Kitava – I have googled Kitava:

Kitava is an island in the Trobriand Islands group of Papua New Guinea. The inhabitants of this island and their diet and lifestyle have been the subject of special study …due to their reported excellent health and traditional diet.

So there you go!  It was a lovely island and the people made Our Becky very welcome.  The headline, when I googled this episode, said, in breathless tones: Never before seen make-up!!  Well golly and gosh!  (I told you it is Anthropology Lite…)  Not quite true, mind you…they had lots of elaborate face-paint and were very much into ceremonial costumes.

Poor Becky arrived the day before one of the yam festivals.  She was expected to dress like a tribal wife ie grass skirt, a rudimentary wreath or two, face-paint…and bare breasts.  The poor girl did try, but she chickened out.  “I can’t do it!” she cried.  “I am English!”  So they let her make a most ludicrous bra out of coconut shells, and very silly and self-conscious she looked.  On her last day there was another even bigger yam festival.  Her tribal “father” nominated her to be the VIP of the event and this time, yes!  She went without her coconut shells.  But…she did have a LOT of wreathage around her neck…

Friday 13th July

“Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.” - Andre Gide

I just found this quote on the internet while I was waiting (patiently..) for people to ring back/email back/make some sort of signal that they are alive and paying attention to my plaintive attempts to set dates for hearings.

Very true, this quote, literally and figuratively. 

Most people, when they ask me about my 2XS adventure, assume that I am an established, experienced sailor, especially as I am – a Harmsen, and Harmsens, well my siblings, (Pete and Chris), at least, are fantastic and fabulous sailors.  Both of them have sailed triumphantly into Hobart on winning Sydney-Hobart boats, Pete wielding a camera, to add to Degree Of Difficulty.  And Chris has been on winning boats maybe four, maybe five times – on Tasmania and Wild Oats.

But me…well no… When I was eleven Dad took me out on the Derwent with a friend of his, another teacher from Taroona High.  All I can remember about him is that he was a kindly man and had what seemed to me a very big chin.  I enjoyed it immensely, Dad not so much.  It was all peachy and sunny and calm but a squall blew up and we had to ride big waves in the tiny boat to get back in to shore.  I don’t think Dad has willingly or happily set foot on a small yacht since. 

My second sailing experience was to go out on an old wooden sloop, Sandra, with a friend who was hoping to restore this boat to former glory.  We slowly crawled out to the middle of the Derwent and…stopped.  Becalmed!  We sat there quite happily for a few hours then limped back in to Marieville Esplanade.

My third sailing trip was on Freelance, with Chris and Angela Wood, sailing in Norfolk Bay over the March long weekend about five years ago.  Weehee I loved it!  We had two nights on board and cruised from Lewisham to Slopen Main and thereabouts.  All very pleasant.  And…all very close to land…

So until Pete and I got to Sydney on 2XS last year and turned right, towards Lord Howe Island, I had never been out of sight of land on a yacht.  It is quite a different sensation, having a watery horizon all around.  Quite wonderful, really.  I loved it and didn’t feel as intimidated as I thought I might by the fact that there would be no possibility of swimming in to shore if one of us fell overboard.  Our aim at all times was NOT to fall overboard!  Pete is always very stern about this, when he gives visitors to 2XS The Safety Talk.  He basically says, If you fall off the boat in the dark, you are a goner!  So don’t fall off!

(This reminds me of a story a friend told me once, about flying in China.  She noticed there were no seatbelts on the regional planes and said, “So what happens, if we crash?”  The flight attendant looked at her expressionlessly and said, “We crash, you die.”)

Thursday 12^th July

Last night at the Republic Bar…does this sound like the beginning of something very out there and maybe a bit risqué?  Well it wasn’t.  It was a very pleasant couple of hours spent in a very nice pub with very nice friends and the possibility of being at home watching Masterchef (on magical TV delay) at 7.30….

So to begin again…

Last night at the Republic Bar Pauline told us that there is a new treatment for motion sickness, a sort of program run, maybe by physiotherapists, and involving eye movement exercises.  Or something.  It sounded all very wonderful – if anyone knows about it…a sometimes seasick 2XSsailor needs to know!

We also talked about our seventeen year old selves…oh what intellectual snobs we were!  Pauline, who now loves a romantic comedy and a bit of pop culture, would only go to see films with subtitles, at seventeen.  I can remember being a bit the same… In first year uni I earnestly sat through a whole week of very old crackly Japanese films with very old crackly subtitles, all totally mysterious and peculiar.  The most memorable one was about a poor man in a remote Japanese community who was ostracised because of his extremely bad breath… Whereas now, what I expect from a film is…to be entertained!  And without being required to perform too much in the way of mental gymnastics!

Wednesday 11^th July

Last Thursday I rang Pete to see if he wanted me to bring food – sometimes I go out foraging at lunchtime and arrive at his house to find he has already prepared a delicious meal.  Waste of resources!  This time, I could hear exhausted groans over the mobile phone lines, from Pete, and shouts of enthusiasm and laughter, from James.  “Dad’s having a great time!” said James.  “No I’m not!” said Pete, “My hand is hurting!  And I have been working on the farm ALL DAY.”  He started to list all of his activities but then said, “Well yes I suppose if you don’t bring food, there won’t be any dinner…” 

I was quite happy; I had a brand new Donna Hay recipe to try out (pasta with cauliflower, prosciutto and Brussels sprouts.)  I suppose I now have to admit I am totally addicted to the new series of Masterchef… I am finding it very entertaining, but also quite inspiring.  I was in the lift at work yesterday with two very efficiently dressed women (grey suits, high heels, white shirts,) and we just happened to glance at each other’s shopping bags… We had all been…foraging!  I muttered something about the pasta & pizza episode on Masterchef and they both said, “Oh goodness, isn’t Masterchef INSPIRING??” and we had a lovely cosy chat about who our favourite chefs were (Jamie Oliver) and weren’t (Heston Blumenthal.)  My Kafka-reading TV-eschewing seventeen year old self would NOT have been impressed!!

When Pete staggered in the door, close to 7.30, he was very happy to find my weird combination of ingredients pleasantly combining away on the stove top.  He had, I think, had a lovely day with James, but was totally whacked, and his hand was hurting very badly after lots of heaving of gates out of the scrub and digging of ditches and … ummm maybe I didn’t listen all that carefully but it was a whole list of heavy duty work, all very difficult for a man with a totally ruined hand.  The totally ruined hand responded very well to sympathy, food, beer, and a liberal application of Nurofen cream, so now…all is well!  (We had both been just a bit worried that the totally ruined hand would make it impossible to sail off on 2XS next year.)

Tuesday 10^th July

Dad handed me a shabby file of papers, typed on an old-fashioned typewriter in the days long before word processors or computers.  At some stage I must have had some spare time, during which I transcribed excerpts from my diaries in 1967.  It is more than a bit confronting, to read messages from a seventeen year old self… A lot of blogsites and magazines are doing a theme of What advice would you give to your sixteen year old self.  I feel as if I am getting the opposite; a clear world view from Miss Smartypants Seventeen. 

In 1967 I had a wonderful opportunity to travel in Europe (Germany, Holland, Belgium, France, Greece, Italy.)  No this was not wasted on me; I revelled in every minute and spent a lot of time absorbing culture, going to galleries, trying new food – Galettes!  Pizza!  Brioches!  Pain au chocolat!  (And in fact it is noted, in my clear diary entries, that I expanded rapidly from eating such delicacies… After a month in Holland with kind elderly relatives feeding me vegetables tenderly mashed in butter and cream for my main meals and chocolate every time I might be getting just a teensy bit peckish, I could no longer do up my skirt and had to enlarge the waist band with a large nappy pin.  I am glad to say this all improved after living in Greece and spending as much time as possible in the Mediterranean with my new BFFs, Snork and Flip.)

But what amazed me most, from re-reading these messages from the past, was how much I read!  Smartypants indeed!  Orwell, Kafka, the Russians (Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov,) Dickens, Camus, Colette, whatever science fiction I could get my hands on, Dickens and…Tolkien.  (The Hobbit had just been released and oh how I loved it.)  I must have read at least five books per week; how things have changed… I still read, of course, but nowhere near as voraciously.  Time just whizzes past, and my days, like those of Calvin and Hobbes, are just packed.  At seventeen I must have been able to spend many hours every week just curled up, lost in a world of fiction.  And do I now pick up Kafka, the Russians, George Orwell, for a bit of light reading?? Well…no…my smartypants days are over…

Monday 9^th July

Oh deary me too much sport…I am exhausted!  Just from sitting on the couch then lying in bed, watching Wimbledon and the Tour de France, with Pete the Remote Control Master flicking fearlessly from one to the other.  Not sure which was more stressful…poor sad Andy Murray and the entire British Isles in mourning!  So close and yet so far… I was very torn; I love Roger Federer and was very happy for him to win this resplendent victory but…I also wanted Gloomy Andy to win.

As for the Tour – how pretty are those villages, so neat, so harmonious with the landscape.  And how horrible are those bike crashes!

My brother Pete has created a very attractive webpage,if anyone is thinking of having a video made.  He does specialise in adventure sports….writing about the Tour reminded me… I will put his link here so you can admire his beautiful photography.  And maybe have a film or two made!

Hi and hope you've all had great week,

As difficult as it is to write about yourself as a self promotion tool, I have joined the world of self marketing to try to attract new business.

There are some who say this is a necessary evil, and they would be smarter, and younger, than me.

So get yourself a glass of wine, and click here.

http://www.peteharmsen.com/

Then, try it yourself, it's not that easy you know!

Of course if you have any friends (or enemies) who need a video made, send the link.

Cheers.

Sunday 8^th July

Yesterday we drove to the Cenotaph and caught a bus to Bellerive oval.  Sounds simple and efficient…well it wasn’t really, either coming or going.  It was a beautiful day and we did enjoy the bus trip, when the bus finally got there…we had stood very patiently for about half an hour with a group of equally patient non-complaining would-be merrymakers. 

The river looked wonderful, adorned as it was with several glamorous tall ships – Windeward Bound and Lady Nelson, cruising back and forth under the bridge.

But our goal yesterday was not the river...it was…the footy!!!  Two mainland teams were playing (North Melbourne and West Coast) and we had arranged to meet a selection of eager primary school boys closely related to me.  Pete was also going to watch Harry play with the Sandy Bay club at half time.  He watched, Proud Grandfather, from our muddy little encampment on the Hill, and pointed him out to Gavin and Jeff.  They all agreed that yes indeed, that was Harry, eight years old, tall with bright red hair.  Well done Harry!  Pete rang Martin, Harry’s father, to say that he was watching, all agog with admiration, only to find that – ahem – Harry was on the other side of the ground in red, not straight ahead in blue… Never mind…

Hobart is – apparently – starved of football and the game was completely sold out days ago.  17,000, a capacity crowd.  Gavin and Jeff had got there early and had staked out a position where we could sit, thank God.  Pete and I stood for a while in a dense crowd.  I knew I would be able to sustain enthusiasm for about three minutes at the most so I was very glad when Jeff found us and led us to the comparative comfort of his picnic rug.  It was all very pleasant, everyone so enthusiastic, no real animosity.  I did hear two pleasant-sounding woman behind me, discussing one of the players on The Other Team who had crashed to the ground.  “I don’t have anything against him personally,” said one of them.  “But I do hope he is badly injured.”  Oh.  Nice!

I did enjoy being with my boys.  As far as the game is concerned – well Aussie Rules is a great spectator sport, so swift, so athletic.  But it is much easier and more pleasant to watch it from a comfy couch, with close-ups, a nice G & T, and a heat pump churning out warm air.

Saturday 7^th July

Pete had a very late night – the annual game dinner at the Tasmanian Club.  A whole bunch of happy men, all resplendent in back tie, eating, drinking, telling jokes, catching up.  I had offered to be chauffeur so I watched TV until – well until 2.35am… I saw all of the Tour de France, right up to the very last man, who rode in, miserable, in the drenching rain with his lycra ripped to shreds and his skin equally ripped and bleeding.  Nobody commented on his arrival; he was one of the survivors of a crash about 20ks from the end of the race.  A few people clapped, but mostly the crowd was more interested in the prize winning ceremonies – awards of green, yellow, white, and spotty outfits, and of big bunches of flowers – and in going home.  I then watched, faute de mieux, half of an ancient episode of The Love Boat which was quite astonishing in that…the acting was so very bad.  A great relief when Pete rang and said he was ready to come home!

Friday 6^th July

Happy birthday to Hamish, 12 years old today and well on his way to saving up for a road bike.  Tour de France - here he comes!

I have been nominated for a blogging award – many thanks to Enid – read her blog, it’s great!  (http://enidbite-em.blogspot.com.au/).  I love her blogspot; she writes about books, roller-blading, children, life, fun.  And – Enid Blyton.  I haven’t done anything about the award yet – it involves quite a few multiples of eleven.  For example, I have to find eleven things to reveal about myself.

Umm…

Not so easy!  So I will reveal just ONE thing.  I am a knitter.  In fact, I reckon I was the only person knitting in the Whitsundays, the first time I went there with Pete on Eroica about four years ago.  (Eroica deserves a whole blogpost; will do this next week when my brain is not full of cottonwool.)  I love knitting; it is very good for me because I am a bit speedy and prone to rush about.  Knitting is such a pleasant, contemplative activity.  The past two years I haven’t done much at all.  I started getting RSI and thought it was time to give it all a big break. 

I belong to a knitting circle, a group of old friends who are all very fabulous and adventurous knitters.  They meet every Thursday morning, and once a month or so on a Sunday.  While I am a member, I never actually go…my life is too full of work, family, other things.  But…I am there in spirit!  And recently Elsa suggested that we could have a Knitting 2XS Day.  I think this is a great idea.  Pete was all in favour and said that I could take the boat out.  By myself!!!  With my trusting friends on board!  Well I don’t think that is going to be a happening thing…I think my knitting friends will be much happier and calmer if Captain Pete is at the helm!

(So..watch this space re knitting2XS as the days grow longer...)

Thursday 5^th July

For today, a non-sailing Travellers Tale…

Someone to whom I was once closely related is at present drifting around Spain and Portugal.  Mainly having a wonderful time but…with a few glitches.

His first mishap was that his one and only credit card was swallowed by an ATM, never to be seen again.  Katy received a panicky email and stepped up to the mark, as she does.  She got a new card and sent it to Chile, where Pepa is preparing to leave for Spain in a few weeks.  Thad actually does have enough cash on his person to tide him over, but having one’s credit card chewed up never to be seen again is always an unpleasant experience.

I think the next mini-disaster is best if I leave it in his own words

Having taken a very early, pre-breakfast bus from La Alberca to Bejar yesterday, I decided to find something to eat here in Bejar, but with the place seemingly shut to almost anyone needing sustentance, I resorted to a bar where I could have breakfast mussels, blood sausage or octopus with a coffee.  I chose octopus, just a tapa size amount (which is small) and when finished strolled about to see what delights this town had to offer, and the sad reality is very little.  The locals all say it is too quiet.

A couple of hours later, my stomach felt unusually squirmish and I retreated to my room to chill out and see what happened.  It got worse and I thought that I might actually be hungry so I went off to get some bus times information and something to eat.

The cafetería was nearly empty, with no cook, so I ordered another coffee, a glass of water and some kind of apple slice.

Next thing, I was feeling seriously weird and I suddenly turned on the perspiration tap on my head, wetter than in a shower!  I could tell I was going to chuck, so I stood up to go to the loo, remember two steps and the next thing I know about was a collection of worried people standing around my sprawled out body.  I managed to sit up, drag myself to the loo and emptied myself beyond the scientifically possible parameters... and then found a paramedic standing beside me.

When we went back out, I discovered that on the way to hitting the floor, I had vomited and the floor was covered in blood.  I had landed hard on my right elbow, stripping a bit of skin which later had to be stitched and on the back of my head which was the source of most blood.  Anyway, I knew the symptoms and what had happened and especially when the relief after throwing up was so instantaneous.

Into the ambulance, off to the hospital and there I met the best crew you could meet... and luckily, I spoke Spanish because none of them spoke English to a useful extent.  We looked at my travel insurance and discovered that the medical cover was for accidents only and I explained that eating poison octopus was always an accident... which they liked.  But it didn't technically count, they simply said don't worry, we will fix you anyway free of charge and that was that.  When I offered to get some cash, they refused!

Ok, got my elbow stitches and my head wound cleaned and dressed, then time to sit around being observed and after a couple of hours, I thought I would be fine to go back to my room.  Well, I got halfway and found myself again on the ground with another guy calling an ambulance and a pool of blood from another head wound, which this time needed stitches as well.  Because it was second time, they electrocardiagrammed me, checked blood sugars, asked if I was out in the sun in the heat, which was no since I take a siesta then and we returned to hospital.

I got put on a litre of electolytes in a drip, sewn up and set aside in a cool place for quite some time with very gentle, regular and good attention. About 6 hours later, at 10.45 pm, I was judged ok to go again and this time I made it.

So at the moment, I have had a night of no sleep because every movement woke me up, elbow, bum (which I landed on the second time since I was propped at an angle against a wall resting) and shoulder which took a huge impact in one of the falls, though I don't know which.  There are no breaks anywhere, no different sensations that could come from either the bum or the shoulder landing and no concussion.  The doctor gave me strong pain killers, but I said I would use them if needed after monitoring for concussion for 12 hours or so, which he thought a highly intelligent thing to do, and was surprised that I knew how to monitor things.  Good stuff those old first aid and then remote area first aid courses.  Everyone should have some of that in their background.

Anyway, I haven't eaten a thing today except a peach and two apricots and I just went back to the cafe where it all began to show the waitress that I was ok, and to have a coffee.  Then I walked around a bit before returning to my room and I can tell you, I feel a hell of a lot better, except for the bruised bits and that will take some time to change.  I'm expecting deep bruising to come out in the next few days.
It all sounds too awful, doesn’t it?  But he has taken it all in his stride and I think he is enjoying his Spanish/Portuguese adventure immensely.

Wednesday 4^th July

When I was a schoolgirl I boarded, freezing like Jane Eyre, at Newnham Hall.  One of the sub-matrons (there was a very stern and imposing UberMatron) used to say, every week, “When Wednesday’s done the week’s done.”  This concept seemed to make her very satisfied.  And I suppose living and working with a whole pack of ungrateful shivering schoolgirls can’t have been all that much fun… So today is Wednesday and indeed the week is almost done…and the year is rushing past!

On Sunday Pete and I talked a bit about plans for the next 2XS Adventure.  We hope to go back to the Louisiades, hopping from island to island from the far north of Australia.  Next year, maybe in April.  Ages away… But the way the weeks are speeding past – is my life on Fast Forward mode?? – it isn’t all that far away at all.  As I tried to go to sleep last night, I made many lists in my head. 

• Food for us!  Lots of it – maybe dried food this time instead of trying to freeze things and have the poor freezer unable to cope in the tropics. 
• Gin for our very welcome daily G & Ts (I think Pete’s supremacy as a G & T maker is still unchallenged among the Pacific Island yachties)
• Food to give our islander guests – los of popcorn, always a crowd pleaser.  Dried fruit?  And wouldn’t the kiddiewinks just love aeroplane jelly…
• Books!  Audiobooks, podcasts, ebooks….
• Things to trade for fresh fruit and veg, for painted crayfish, for coconuts
• Balls, toys, books to give to the children
• Sewing materials and a hand-cranked sewing machine for Lyla on Bagaman Island

I can just see poor 2XS about to sink into the sea under the weight of all of this STUFF.  Let alone my poor brain…