Princes Square

Started again with a Penny Royal coffee over which we attempted to plan our last free day before the competition. Basically there were 6 of us with six different agendas. Rae was keen to step out the route that we would be marching along the next day, so we headed up to that part of town. The route was reasonably long and would require us to do a repeat. After that we met up with the others and strolled around looking at the shops of downtown Launceston before stopping at Banjos for a drink and a light lunch, bumping into lots of bandies who had been gradually arriving. We made our way back to our digs and after a brief stop walked down to Cataract Gorge, quite close to where we were staying. It's sides are quite steep with the Tamar River running down through it. We started from the bridge, walking along the right hand side of the gorge. It is about a half hour pleasant walk with a lovely cafe at the other end, set in the valley. A chair lift goes across, there are peacocks wandering around, with large leafy old trees in their autumn colours. Beautiful!

All had devonshire tea before making our way across the foot bridge to the other side then back across to meet the original path and go back. I wanted to do a bit of practice and have a bit of a rest before going out for dinner. The previous couple of nights had been a bit expensive, so we suggested going down to a Food court we'd remembered from our last visit. The food was reasonable, with lots of choice and of course quite a lot less expensive. In the middle of the court was a small bar, so we were even able to have a glass of wine with our meal!

With the competition starting tomorrow, we were keen to get back, rest up, and have an early night to be in too form! Nevertheless my wrist band told me I'd clocked up 17000 steps for the day!Read more