For a four year old, a day living at Bush’s bay was carefree in its simplicity and freedom. However for a five year old, the need for schooling curtailed some of that freedom. It was time for Gabrielle and me to join Erin and David in getting an education. It was out of the question for the four of us to attend the school that I think was at Port Fitzroy in the building that now houses the TIC. Since it was too far away, most mornings were spent doing correspondence lessons sent from Auckland. Our classroom was the small building off the annex that we called (surprise, surprise) the school house. Making sure that all of us behaved and got on with the work for the day was Mum, a hard task mistress! As far as I can recall Gabrielle and I spent a couple of hours on our "studies" while Erin and David, being six and three years older than us, spent more time in the school house.

After our lessons it was back to simplicity and freedom! For the rest of the day it was ours to wander the hills and bush surrounding the homestead and explore the beach and rock areas. Carefree as it was, any rustling in the bush would send us rushing home as fast as our little legs could carry us - in those days the island had a population of wild goats and pigs and our imagination had us being chased by one of these.

One afternoon when David had finished his lessons he told us that he had discovered a smugglers’ cave and he had actually seen the smugglers. To a breathless audience he described them as being ugly and wearing big black hats and long black coats. Of course he offered to show us where it was. So off we went, David confidently leading the way and Gabrielle and I following warily. As we crept into the very dark cave we heard a low growling noise. At this Gabrielle and I took fright and raced home giving our little legs another workout – David in the meantime must have thought it all very funny and his growling sounds very realistic. It took Mum and Dad some time to persuade us that David had been playing a prank. We used to visit the cave a lot after that episode but were never brave enough to go to the back of it.

Although carefree, there were a couple of rules that we were supposed to follow. The first was to lookout for stingrays before going into the water. The second was to be careful when scrambling over rocks - Gabrielle and I weren’t the most popular little girls after one excursion over rocks with oysters growing on them. We followed Mum and Dad’s instructions and knew where to walk. Unfortunately we didn’t keep an eye out for Simon who was tagging along. By the time we returned home his feet were badly cut - Mum and Dad were not at all impressed and gave us another lecture!

Simon was your typical boy: always in trouble or creating it - in most families there is always one child like that. Simon liked nothing more than to tease anyone or anything that happened to cross his path. His favourite targets, after us, were the animals, particularly the drake (Clementine - for a drake’s name?) and our young calf, Heather. One day Clementine said "enough is enough" and decided to take revenge on his tormentor and attacked. Although serious for Simon, the rest of thought it was very funny – here we were, watching a small blonde boy running for all he was worth along the beach with a very angry drake in close pursuit. How close? Well it was flapping its wings and pecking at Simon’s bottom and legs. Simon thought that he had found safety when he took cover in the boatshed and shut the door. However a very determined drake went to the other door and rushed inside to continue his attack. Dad eventually went to Simon’s rescue

That should have been a lesson to Simon but no! His next victim was Heather - fortunately her horns were small. She too decided on revenge and chased him until he dived for cover into an old food safe, rotting and to be used for kindling, lying out in the yard. Once again, unfortunately for Simon he didn’t quite fit in, leaving a little bottom sticking out. Heather took steady aim and gave him such a butt that it sent him through the back of the safe.

Our religious education was looked after by Mum who led us in evening prayers – of course grace was said before the evening meal. On one special occasion I can remember Father Walls, a Catholic Priest paying us a Sunday visit. Our large dining room table was used as the altar to celebrate mass. As I recall, not having attended church for a long time it was a little bewildering to me especially as in those days it was all in Latin. When Father Walls visited us he stayed overnight and he and Dad had many debates about religion!