Hello there, Hope you had a fantastic summer! We had an amazing time while in Australia during July and most of August. We spent the first bit in Tasmania and loved the wildness of that island. We had incredible encounters with wombats and were awed by the beauty of the temperate rainforest. Simon is now a confirmed twitcher (bird-nut to you Americans) and went crazy with all the various parrots that were just roaming around the neighborhood that we stayed in near the University of Melbourne. His experiments went well and he found some interesting results. This was the temperate part of his comparison project looking at oxygen levels versus temperature change in a type of clam. I was helpful as I actually found the little clams because I didn’t want to be knee deep in mud like where we were told to look and ended up finding the clams we needed further up the shore. The best part was this happened while Simon’s boss was there! It was lots of work, digging in the upper inter-tidal for the little clams, but not as steamy hot like it was in Singapore. Simon also had to work lots of late nights but overall a great opportunity for some interesting science and we hope to go back again to repeat the experiment in the summer. We also had some time to explore the countryside a bit and even managed to see kolas, emus, and southern right whales body surfing along the coast! The people were so genuinely friendly and welcoming that Oz is definitely one of the best places we have been to yet! We got back to the UK in mid-August and then I was in the US for two weeks visiting family and friends. For those of you that I missed this time, I am really sorry as I had to cut my trip short for a week as we are having a new bathroom installed this week and I am the ‘project manager’! For the rest of September, Simon will be in the UK and this Sunday I will join a new ship to go around the Channel Islands of the UK and then for a 10 day trip about the Mediterranean. Wish me luck as I am a tour leader (I know, kinda scary!) for a group of Brits but excited about the chance to see more of Europe! So hopefully you will have a chance to check out the photos we posted and I hope to hear from you soonish!! Lots of love, Steph and Simon