Tuesday. 1:45pm. It is just after our lunch break from rehearsals for "The riverboat show". The plan was to actually take a trip on the boat to have a look at the location. The cast and crew divided into car groups, and the notable question was asked: "Who knows where to go?"
"I do" pipes up Jess.
"Right, anyone who doesn't know where they're going follow Jess and we'll see you there."

So Jess's car group including Liz S, Aja, Currie and Neil's group consisiting of Erin, Iris, Kate and Petra set off on the road. After travelling for quite a while Petra pipes up with "Wouldn't it be funny if Jess didn't actually know where she was going!". Earlier Kate had said "wouldn't it be funny if we missed the boat". If 'funny' is the word to describe those happenings, then I would use the words 'fucking hilarious'.

All of a sudden Jess stops and turns the car around, mouths the words "I'm sorry" and zooms off, leaving Neil to stall his car and start worrying about the lack of petrol that he had. Petra thinking she can stall the boat, whips out the phone and the contact list, only to discover that the only people with phones are in the 2 cars that are AWOL. So she calls Jess.

Jess: "Hello"

Petra: "Where are you taking us"

Jess: "I missed the turn"

Petra: "Well just keep in mind that we are 2 cars behind you, and that Neil doesn't have much Petrol"

Jess: "Neil doesn't have any petrol!?"

Jess's passengers: "HA Ha HA Ha HA Ha"

Eventually we find the place (after Jess missed the turn off YET AGAIN and had to chuck another U-ie. Seven minutes past two. Seven minutes too late. The rest of us weren't worried. We were quite happy to just swim and wait for the return of the 6 people who actually made it on to the boat. Jess, however, in an effort to make up for the trouble she was convinced she'd caused started ringing around trying to find out which direction the boat had gone so we could meet it half way and perhaps swim out to it. She succeeded, and so we all jumped into the cars police show style to chase this boat up the river via a dirt track Jess had been told about. Neil suggested that Jess write down the directions.

The dirt track went 5 minutes up stream. And that was it.

Next came the unanimous decision to get out of the 36 degree heat by jumping in the river and swimming until the boat came past again. There were a few concerns about having to swim in clothes since none of us had swimmers or a towel, but they were cast aside - along with the outer layers of our clothing - as most girls jumped in the river in their underwear - much to the delight of the only male present. Jess presented us with a spectaculour entry to the water ( edge...edge...edge...slip. ..edge...slip...slip..."ahh fuck it"...dive)

Here we waited til the boat returned.

And soon enough it did...most of us had forgotten that we had decided to take a video camera on the trip to tape the landscape. So yea, there is footage of the stranded, undressed cast and crew in the water of the Murrambidgee waving to this boat, which promised it would return for us - we weren't sure it would at first - but then our stage manager Zillah jumped from the boat to swim back to us so we assumed it would return.

We gathered our belongings and Jess contemplated swimming to the boat with her keys in the pockets of her cargo pants, which we advised her not to do considering the luck she was having. Eventually the boat returned and we swam down to it - or rather floated along with the current which was very strong - just how strong Iris found out - but Kate was there to hold her up so all was fine. Luckily the boat pilot took us all up the river again and we were able to go on our cruise after all so all turned out well.