Finally had chance to get to a computer - this is my first day off for 2 weeks and it's been much needed. We spent the 10 days following my last blog at Mellish Park, the other property that the Webbers own, mustering up there. It's about 1h30 in the car, but I was lucky enough to get taken up there in the helicopter with PJ, so I could see the area, which was so nice, and only takes 20mins direct, although we did have to do some mustering in the chopper on a neighboring property on the way. Once we arrived it was a case of bagging a good spot for your swag - in my case see where everyone else goes then choose the best of what's left, as they've all been sleeping in the same places for years. PJ reckoned I should sleep outside by the rainwater tank, so we set up a bed there (there are lots of bedframes kicking around, and you just unroll your swag on one), until Anne arrived and said when she'd slept there she'd ended up with 2 snakes in her bag, so she moved me inside to the lean-to shed. That worked out well in the end - once I learnt never to put the light on or you spend all night being attacked by bugs.

Mustering is a lot more difficult than I ever thought it would be. Basically, depending on how many men you've got on horseback, you have one rider in the lead for the cattle to follow, one on each side on the wing, ideally with another behind them further back, to keep the cattle from running out sideways, and two on the tail to keep them moving forwards. I was on the tail, which involves much zigzagging across to chase them all up and much shouting of "hey hey" or whatever else you decide to shout to keep them moving. Also the back end has a habit of ending up very wide so you have to keep pushing the corners in, which is an art I haven't quite mastered yet although I'm getting there. When we're mustering, initially you pick up a few cattle and then walk them about while you gather more and more. We use choppers to muster as well, which makes life a lot easier as they find the other cattle and send it in to the mob that we're holding, rather than us having to walk the mob miles to find the others. Generally we were mustering every other day up at Mellish and picking up mobs of about 800 or so, often spending 11h30 in the saddle a day! Touch wood, so far I've avoided chafing and too many sore bits, but I did spend a few days just aching all over.

The worst muster we had was the second one, as we had to go right up into the hills, and picked up some feral cattle who were just completely crazy, as they had never seen people or yards before and had no idea what we wanted them to do. The bulls especially were nutters, with huge horns which they knew how to use. I was told before we left that if one of them came at me or my horse we should just get out of the way as quickly as possible, if that meant galloping away from the mob, so be it, as they can do a lot of damage. 3 of them had to be thrown in the end as they were too wild. That involved the boys chasing after them, running them down until they'd lost some of their energy then jumping off, grabbing it by the tail and pulling to throw it off balance so it falls over then gets tied up and taken back to the yard on the Toyota. PJ was lucky not to get badly hurt, as one of them was chasing him round and round a tree and ended up with a horn each side of the trunk!

Lots more still to say but I should really let someone else use the computer so I'll carry on when I get the chance.