Ben's in Tassie.

We swapped bikes on Wednesday, trading the repaired VTR 250 for the recently-problematic Ducati. The word 'swap' sounds delightfully simple yet the actual logistics involved trailer hire, a solo attempt at riding a bike up a ramp that resulted in another dent in the tank and a sore back, followed by a 500+km round trip to Lima East and back. By the time I arrived late in the afternoon, Ben was packed and ready leave the farm immediately. We had dinner in the Lakeside Hotel at Bonnie Doon and, in darkness, just after Yarck, he turned east towards Alexandra while I continued south towards home. He stayed near Lake Eildon that night and spent Thursday night camped off a bush track near Warburton.

It was after 2pm on Friday when Ben got a phone call from the Spirit of Tasmania telling him that there'd been a cancellation for that night. At the time, he'd got as far as Warragul and was riding south hoping to find a nice beach. At 4.30pm Tess and I were at Station Pier when he rode in, tired and grubby after contending with strong northerly winds and a low-powered, heavily loaded motorbike. Twenty minutes later a huge thunderstorm broke over the city and rain bucketed down. With the bike safely sheltered, we retired to D'lish Fish for a meal.

At 6.15pm he said bye, got on the bike and rode away as if he was already somewhere else. Ben returns to Tassie, and so does the VTR 250 in circumstances that couldn't be imagined back in May. The red Ducati sits in the Doublecheck Auto and Bike Repair shop. Will the bike ever return to Tasmania? Stay tuned.

Late night postscript: SMS received from Vietnam. air pretty bad in Saigon... can't wait to get home... stay in room with air conditioner all day all night... pretty hot. It's such a good thing that Ben didn't go.