It was up early this morning after a restless night in
Strahan. I think the ghosts of the past in the jailhouse had the pups' nerves
on edge and they kept me up too. Jazzie seemed like she’d prefer to spend the
night out on the front lawn, though it was icy and I almost froze bringing her
back inside. A quick cuppa, pack up, and then a hurried drive back to Corrinna
for our cruise on the Pieman.
It had been a lifelong dream of the Bandycoot (my boyfriend)
to take this cruise and we were both excited that it was actually happening. By
some miracle it turned out to be the best day, weather-wise, that Tassie may
have ever had. It’s a small operation and the flirty receptionist convinced the
Bandycoot to carry the milk on our way to the old-fashioned cruise boat for the
guests’ morning tea.
We sat waiting to board in the sweet morning light admiring
this beautiful wooden vessel, the Arcadia II. We later learnt that it had been
built from the local Huon Pine for cruising in Tassie just before the Second
World War and was quickly commandeered to the Navy service around Papua New
Guinea.
The water was so crystal calm that we could see the
magnificent vegetation and blue sky clearly reflected in the river’s watery
mirror. We learned about the native trees and history along the cruise before
being dropped off on where the river meets the ocean to have a brown paper bag
lunch. There were miles on logs washed up along the beach and shore, a fresh
remnant of the recent devastating floods. I could see the Bandycoot was trying
to work out some way that we could get some of that timber back to the Old
Dairy.
We sat out on the deck most of the way, but towards the end
of the cruise we went inside to admire the old wrought fixings and imagine the
stories this boat could tell.
We picked up the pups in Corinna and drove them just up the
road to ‘stretch their legs’ when we stumbled upon a couple of abandoned shacks.
I guess they had belonged to some old fisherman who no longer came down to try
his luck at the banks of the Pieman River. I guess we’ll never know!
We continued our journey on up to the Tarkine Drive but a
cool change in the weather drove us home. We walked in the backdoor, exhausted,
only to discover a mini flood inside the Old Dairy. Water has seeped through
the house but we can’t work out where it is coming from. The Bandycoot suggests
it may be our front-loading washer but declare ‘it can’t be, as the washer is
empty. I grandly swing open the washer door to demonstrate my point, only to
unleash a tidal wave of water spilling through the house. After my initial
panic, we grab every towel, tea towel and cloth in the house and spend the next
few hours mopping it up. I’m terribly apologetic but my lovely man just says:
‘these things happen..’.
