Thank heavens it was confirmed this morning that it was Derek causing all the noise during the night. Mick thought Derek was up sawing down some of the gum trees during the night, but he hadn’t left his room.

While the boys enjoyed a big breakfast of bacon and eggs, I went for a walk along the river bank, it was beautiful and luckily there was a road which I followed so I would not get lost. The only other living things I spotted were a pair of kangaroos – interested in what I was doing. Once back on the boat, the motors were fired up in readiness for the next part of our trip.

This is when things started to take a turn for the worse. One of the motors would not keep going.

A fuel problem perhaps but none of us could work it out so several phone calls were made to the company we hired the luxury boat from, and after a little over one hour we got some help and got going.

While we waited, Derek got started on preparing dinner as it was his turn. He had chosen a lamb curry and had purchased a shoulder of lamb, planning on dicing it up on the boat. But, the biggest complaint about the boat (other than the fact one motor didn’t work today) is the lack of sharp knives. The ones supplied won’t even cut bread.

Mick oversaw the dissection, unable to leave poor Derek alone. Steve was worried, not about the meat but about his favourite filleting knife that Derek was using.

Derek eventually resorted to his Swiss Army knife. Mick made a joke that the Indian Curry may taste a little “Swiss”, and we all laughed.

This process kept Derek and Mick busy for almost the whole hour we had to wait.

We headed off around 10.00am and travelled just over two hours. We tried more than five locations before we found a suitable mooring point for the day. We realised how lucky we were on our first day to find a spot on our first attempt. Many spots were too shallow.

While travelling along and enjoying the scenery ……

…..turns again were taken to drive the boat…

….and prepare food for lunch. It got a bit crowded at times in the kitchen.

This is the map the boys use to work out where we are. We travelled around Bertha’s Bend and stopped a bit after Arthur’s Bend.

There would be no fire tonight as it is too dangerous getting on and off the boat.

We then enjoyed a fabulous lunch on the top deck before retiring for a nap in readiness for the evening ahead.

The restful afternoon was broken by the sound of a falling fishing rod. Mick was all over it and pulled in a 46cm yellow belly on Steve’s line.

Dinner was fabulous.

We all had seconds and Mick even tried to scrape the bottom of the rice saucepan.

The rule has been that you must clean up after you have cooked. Derek did extra well in the regard too.