Echidna sparks mystery after damaging hotel room at New South Wales country pub
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It is a crisp Sunday morning on the New South Wales Northern Tablelands when cleaner Robbie Lee opens the door to Room 8 at the Bendemeer Hotel.
What he finds inside is a mystery.
The carpet is torn up. Dirt litters the white bed sheets. The heater and fan are knocked to the floor.
Publican Leanne Summers could not understand the state of Room 8 — no-one had stayed there the night before.
"We started to try and piece together the puzzle of who had trashed our room," she said.
"There were no footprints."
Monday is a new day, and Leanne decides to reopen the investigation.
Mr Lee ascends the stairs again to Room 8, and finds the bin on the ground, and the bedside table moved.
He kneels and looks under the bed.
"We couldn't believe our eyes," Ms Summers said.
"I said here, 'Look we'll grab these welding gloves' and between the two of us — Robbie had to lift the bed up, I had to get underneath it and encourage the echidna to come out the side — and then we took him down and released him out in the paddock."
The echidna's jaunt lasted 24 to 36 hours and cost it nothing but Leanne will have to find at least $3,000 to cover his damages.
"It is funny … but it's not," she laughed.
"We're now actually thinking of calling Room 8 the Echidna Suite, in honour of our little friend."
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