A day out today other than some email in the early hours. I had made the mistake of complaining at the seminar on Thursday that I was stuck in Canberra for three days. I argued that it would have been better to get me up to Brisbane on Friday or better still to stay in Melbourne and make a day trip to the ACT. Now I should probably not have said this in Canberra and Nerida and Siwan decided to take me in hand and re-educate me.

I was collected at midday by Nerida and taken on a long swinging road trip through the countryside around Canberra to pick up three alpacas, one of who is called David, after my good self, David Gurteen and David Williams. I am still not sure if its a compliment or an insult by the way. Either way for those interested photographs of David, including some undignified man handling can be found below. If I learnt one thing form the day it is to avoid alpaca spit at all costs. We just caught the sunset (see above) delivering them to Nerida's home and adjacent paddock. The baton of responsibility was then passed to Siwan who collected me for a wonderful evening meal with her family who are Welsh and also welsh speaking. Great conversation and wonderful hospitality all round so my thanks to both.