Boating, battling

On Sunday we went boating with Imp and Ed and the girls. It's Royal Hobart Regatta weekend, so we had our own tiny regatta by the slimy sucking mud of Castle Forbes Bay. The plan was to drive down to the Huon River at Franklin and hop in the water there, but there was nowhere for the kids to play safely when not on the water. We went a bit further south, where the river broadens out and there are a few bays. Where we ended up had a couple of little shingle beaches between the expanses of evil mud.

We launched the Tub and the wave ski and had a lovely time taking turns out on the bay. As Elf said later, thank heavens for all the little crabs, or the kids on the beach would have had nothing to do except find oysters to cut themselves on. The Huon Valley is very fetching (mud notwithstanding) and 100 metres out from shore riding a very slight swell, is a terrific position from which to appreciate it. (Note how I'm talking all nautical now, avast).

The girls (very proficient swimmers) wanted to try the wave ski on their own, so we let them have a paddle close to shore. This inspired Marcus to do the same - he handled it very well and I felt very proud of him, scooting around out there. I also took the Tub for a row on my own, which I think is a first - it handles beautifully when you're the only one in it. Well, except for a persistent swerve to port, due to a damaged starboard oar. Michael hopped in for a tour of the bay with me before we packed up.

On the way home Michael had a lot of questions about sea levels. "If the sea levels rise, then all the maps will be wrong!" He is also a bit obsessed with the dotted lines on maps, where boundaries are In Dispute Or Undefined. To Michael, these are "battles", eg India and China are "battling" in the Sinkiang region. He has predicted that with the sea level rising there will be more battles - I think he is imagining a wholesale wobbling and rearranging of all the borders and coastlines. I suppose in the long view he is right. I think Geoffrey Blainey said "no political boundary can ever be permanent".

Meanwhile Marcus is demanding to know where he can see oxygen as a solid.