St Maarten

Well, I have finally got to a civilized island that has Wifi, so I shall endeavour to catch up on all our news in the next few days!

After a great time in NZ, we fly back to the boat at the end of February.  The new sails from Doyle arrived about two hours before us and with Justine from Auckland arriving the very next day to fit them, it was a bit of a photo-finish!

Justine working on the mainsail, fitting all the batten furniture.  We had just one day to fit the new Genoa, boom bag and then the Main,  but it all went like clockwork and luckily not too much wind that day.

Daryl and Justine enjoying a cold beer at the end of the day.                                                                                               

The Coppercoat all finished now and looking great, managed to get five coats on in total.                                                                                                            

Another good job done.  Daryl with Vincent and Vivian the painters,  who did a great job on the anti-fouling.    

Hurray, back in the water again.  What a relief!  St Maarten is a great place to get work done, but it always takes more time than expected and  our patience was running a little low by the end of our stay.  The very next day, I checked out and we headed north to the British Virgin Islands and a bit of well earned relaxation.

A break in New Zealand

The bottom of our garden in Kerikeri.  Wonderful to see how green it is again after all the blue seascapes that we usually see on the boat.

Well better late than never I guess!
 

Jay and Lisa looking at our section on Pa Road, where one day we shall build.

Most of you will know that we had break from the boat, over Christmas and the New Year.  I spent the whole time in New Zealand, enjoying catching up with Lisa and Jay. Daryl visited family in England and then spent a couple of weeks meditation in Bordeaux.  He is not over fond of all the Christmas celebrations and so it worked well for all of us.  Then he joined me in NZ for my birthday, before a trip to Oz to see his daughter.

Jay, myself and Lisa managed to get the tree out of storage and had the most relaxed Christmas ever, lots of good food and drink, a few presents.  Enjoyed going for coffee each day in Kerikeri, playing a lot of tennis too.

A couple of years ago, I took part in the Bay of Islands Sailing Week and loved being involved, but it was really hard work out there on the rail.  So this year I volunteered to help behind the scenes and I was given the job of laying the marks on one of the courses.  So together with Kurt, we laid the marks for the three days of the regatta.  Great fun and really enjoyed getting to know Kurt, I think we made a good team and hope to get the chance to do it again.

Whilst I was on the water, Jay had turned our double garage at home into a sail loft!  He was there on behalf on Doyle's in Auckland and was responsible for repairing any damaged sails for the boats in the regatta.

Back in the Doyle sail loft in Auckland they were in the middle of making our new sails, here the boys are glueing the Genoa together.  It is a huge and very impressive loft.

Heading north now the hurricane season is over.

Heading north, this is Tyrell bay in Carriacou, a great anchorage.

Trying out my teaching skills,  As you can see, the children are not taking a lot of notice of me, it's a good job I gave up teacher training and went sailing instead.

Whilst in Grenada, we took part in the Mount Ayrie reading program and a group of cruisers would take a trip inland and help some of the local children with their reading.

Sunday Jam session at Whisper Cove Marina and taking centre stage is our good friend Mitch playing his ukukele.

Daryl happily seating under his new 'Suncode Bimini'  out of the heat of the midday sun.

Sewing a piece of thick leather on the anchor to stop is whacking the boat on the way to it's  resting place.

Prickly Bay in Grenada, our base for the hurricane season.  There was always lots of social activities and plenty of different anchorages to choose from.  Some boats stayed in the same place for months, but No Rehearsal was always moving around.

A visit from Jay

So back to the boat in Grenada, a long flight and delayed in Barbados.

But good to be back on the boat.  Two days after my arrival, Daryl had organized the most wonderful surprise for me, Jay flew in to spend a week on the boat with us.  He and his team had been racing in the States and he had a week between venues, and then he flew off to New York.

Fruit stall in one of the Grenadine islands.

One of the beautiful beaches of the Tobago Cays.

Daryl and tall Jay stopping for a snacket at the local 'French' bakery.

Jay looking every bit the racing sailor.  I think he was rather disappointed  with the lack of  sailing wind whilst he was on board and we ended up doing rather a lot of motoring between the islands.

Malta

I was scheduled to go to Malta and look after my Mum whilst my sister took a break and had a holiday in England with her family.  But Mum needed an operation a couple of weeks beforehand and I decided to head to Malta early.  There was concern on how the anesthetic would affect a ninety year old.  So off I dashed and got the first plane out of Grenada, leaving Daryl on the boat, with Luxor, a local guy that was helping with some of the maintenance jobs on the boat.

Daryl with Luxor on the foredeck of No Rehearsal

Mum and I in the hospital in Malta, we are both glad that the operation is over and she can begin to recover. She was allowed home after five days.  Her first request on getting home was a gin and tonic!  Good old Mum!

My sister, Jane with her children Ashley and Gary                  

Mum and I visited one of the local markets, which was great fun and good to see all the local vendors.                          

Whilst I was in Malta there was the fiesta of Santa Anna in our village of Marsascala.  Here is the statue of the saint being paraded through the streets of the town, being carried by the locals in white robes.  We watched it all from the restaurant and later moved along the quay to watch the firework display.

My sister has a whole menagerie of animals, two horses, a donkey, a mule, goats, rabbits, cats and loads of dogs.  She also looks after dogs for people when they go on holiday.  So whilst I took care of Mum in her absence, her friend Polly and husband looked after the animals.  Here is Polly with Jane's dogs!  One day when I was there, I counted 17 running around.  Utter chaos, but the visiting dogs love it and don't want to leave!

Towards Grenada

From Guadeloupe we cruised south towards Grenada for the start of the hurricane season.  Daryl felt that if he spotted any significant system heading our way, we could always duck down to Trinidad, or even further south, if we needed to.  The general opinion was that this season could be a bad one!  Great!

In Domenica, we took a tour up the Indian River, it was a rainy day, but the river was  interesting, with wonderful tropical undergrowth.  There were lots of land crabs on the shore, and tall crane-like birds creeping along the banks hoping for a tasty lunch.

We didn't stay long in Bequia, just long enough for me to check in and have a walk along the beach and remember the good old days of rum punches at the Frangipani, which has changed out of all recognition.

In St Vincent, we were hassled from the moment we anchored and decided very quickly that we did not like the anchorage either.  With so many islands to choose from, let's just move on.

Are we cool enough yet?                                        

We enjoyed getting off the boat I'm Martinique, hiring a car and seeing a bit of the island.  We visited the ruins of Le Chateau Dubuc, where sugar was produced.

Guadeloupe

Finally we managed to leave St Martin behind and headed south.  What a relief to be on the move again, with the wind in our hair, the sails full and the fishing lines trailing hopefully behind us.

Wow! A huge Wahoo.  Here is Daryl, the hunter gatherer of the family with  a huge fish!  We managed to get about thirty steaks from this fish and gave them out to fellow cruisers in the anchorage.

In Deshaies we visited the beautiful botanical gardens, wonderful orchids and tropical plants.

Wherever  we seem to go lately, suddenly a pair of swallows appear, intent on making a nest in the end of the boom.  We are often still moving when they perch on the leather strapping and peer into the cavity to judge whether it is suitable.