© irene waters 2014

We moved into rental accommodation at Old Bar whilst we waited for our purchase of the Barrington General Store to finalise. The house we leased was across the road from the beach, a great position as we could walk out the door and Mungo could run along the leash free beach. The house however was two-storied with a spiral staircase. On the top floor was the lounge room, and two bedrooms. The kitchen, dining room and bathroom were downstairs.

The spiral staircase was fairly typical one made from wrought iron with open-backed, wooden slats. This posed a real problem for Mungo who could see through each rung and the higher it went the more his legs turned to jelly. Try as he did he could not go higher than 5 stairs before he had no choice but to back down nervously. He had met his nemesis.

Trog on the other hand could go up and down at will and loved being the only creature in the upstairs world. We were as distressed as Mungo that he couldn’t be with us and tried to spend as much time as possible working downstairs on the dining room table.

When my mother came to visit we dropped in on a work colleague of hers that lived at Old Bar. Again stairs were Mungo’s downfall. Although these were a straight flight again they had the open back. We managed to entice him up the stairs which he did with a lot of leg wobbling but we couldn’t get him to go back down. After trying we ended up carrying him down which was not an easy task as he weighed 40 kgs and was very, very nervous.

©irene waters 2014

© irene waters 2014

Mitchell Island

Manning River

Of a day we would explore the countryside. Old Bar is located near the mouth of the Manning River which enters the sea at Manning Point on Mitchell Island. One of my kidney patients lived there and having become very close to all our clients (something I was not used to never having worked with chronic conditions before) we would go and visit, taking Mungo with us.

© irene waters 2014
Manning Point

© irene waters 2014
Manning Point

© irene waters 2014
Manning point

Apart from the nights when Mungo was downstairs alone and lonely it was a time where we felt we were on holidays. We had no idea then just how glad we would be that we had managed to totally refresh before we started our next venture.