In mid-November I was a guest of the Mount Roland Folk Festival, there to deliver a presentation on the relationship between folk music and the bardic tradition. The talk was spattered with several of my own poems, these underscored in their rendering by the gentle guitar of the wonderful Daniel Townsend. I had a great time.

And then, on January 5, with my marvellous collaborator, Bert Spinks we resumed our periodic renditions of ‘A Tasmanian Map’. Bert was fresh from sojourns in both Crete and the Tasmanian high country, since we last performed (in September, in Wynyard). This time we were at Dennes Point on Bruny Island, and an extraordinary crowd of 70 people squeezed into the café, Bruny Island Wild. They were entertained by the brilliant Bruny jazz guitarist, Julius Schwing, after which Hay and Spinks were in harness. The 70 included my Sydney family, down for the Tasmanian summer, and in my humble opinion we gave them, all 70 that is, a fine old time. Bert was his usual charismatic self, and I like to think I did pretty well too. It was tempting to make comparison with my memorable Spanish shows with Paul Gerard, back in the day, but those events were exceedingly different to ‘A Tasmanian Map’, so I resist making any such comparison.

We’re next in Swansea on February 19. Should be a beauty. In due course there’ll be a formal notification – but put the date aside and get yourself along.