Loaring Place Bed and Breakfast, Margaret River, Western Australia

Three AM in the morning Chris woke up and could smell smoke. She likes to sleep with the window open, and when she looked outside at the moon-lit forest, she could clearly see smoke.  Her partner said it was probably from burning off somewhere, but Chris could not go back to sleep so she called the local police.  They told her it was from a controlled burn at Nannup and nothing to worry about, so she managed to get back to sleep.  Although she did not know where Nannup was and this was a bit of a worry for her.

In the morning I told her Nannup is about an hour and a half drive away, but that the easterly breeze we have was driving the smoke our way. The Dept of Environment does controlled burns of the forest to reduce the amount of dry wood on the forest floor. This means that if there is a bushfire in the height of summer, it is not as severe and might not spread as fast.  Even though the fire was probably 50-100km away, there was quite a bit of ash deposited on the tables outside and on the car this morning.  Driving to town and to Witchcliffe this morning there were still lots of pockets of smoke hanging about, however, a sea breeze has come in and blown the smoke back inland. However, the easterly breeze will be back again with more smoke this evening.

Yesterday while waiting for the wine tour bus, Chris and David went off for a walk around the block. David had his rucksack on his back, and when they came back to the house, David asked me if Casey (our Australian Shepherd) had a penchant for boots. I said that was highly unlikely, but anyway, he was missing a boot and he thought that Casey might have taken it. I went outside his room with him saying that Casey had never taken shoes as long as I had known her.  I asked David where the other shoe had been as there was one hanging from the back of his rucksack.  He felt around and realised that that was the missing boot. When he had picked up his rucksack, the shoelace had caught on the back of the rucksack.  They had then walked around the 500m perimeter of our block, with the boot still hanging precariously on his back.

Poor Casey was most offended that she had been accused of pilfering a stinking old boot, however, a scratch of her tummy soon made her forget all about it.

I dropped Chris and David at the bike shop in Margaret River as they were going to ride around a bit before catching the 5.00pm bus back to Perth.  Shortly after, a desperate call from David saying Chris had left her camera behind. Fortunately I found it on the back seat of the car, and was able to give it back to her a little while later.