13th January 2009 

It was a hot Tuesday; supposedly 31degrees Celsius. I thought “gee, it might be warm enough to go swimming”. I’m laughing at the thought now.

Susan and her children, all friends, picked me up, and we went down to Southport beach. I should have realised something wasn’t quite right when I saw this beautiful beach with only one family on it and, I had a strange prophetic reluctance to leave the car.

It was cold. The breeze was from the South West; probably straight off the Antarctic ice. Only Jac, Milly and Ayla (Susan’s kids), and a few others would venture into the water. It wasn’t warm enough for emperor penguins.

But I still got burnt.

We explored rock pools finding crabs, starfish, and these strange things that look like trilobites.

We followed a big ray swimming along the beach; it was only five metres away.

Thanks Joh for upgrading Poohduck; I think it looks great.

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