We would like to offer our sympathies to the people of Victoria, who have lost their homes and families in the horrendous fires. Just watching it on the TV, it’s quite hard to believe.

As you know, it’s only 6 days ago that we left Victoria as we couldn’t cope with the temperatures there. We deliberated for a long time about whether to come to New Zealand or to ‘push on’ and had devised a route from Melbourne to Sydney which passed directly through the areas hit by the fire. I feel very grateful that we chose to leave Australia, potentially avoiding this awful situation. The people of Victoria are in our thoughts.