A Lady trip
A Lady
Stephen Hyde
Fri 24 Jul 2009 00:36
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23/07/09 crew... stephen and aileen
hyde, pat and ann lyons.
Greetings again from the lovely A Lady, presently
at anchor beside a beautifull little island called " villa franca" on
the south coast of san migel.
since our last blog we have covered the following
places:-
Sat.18th july.. we all went
on an organised bus tour of the
eastern end of the island, which included old
villages, beeches,and in particular , the now extinct volcano's.
these were facinating, very lush , green,
lots of trees and of course bubbling mud and sulfer springs. the local
restaurant's cooked special dishes in the sulpher springs.
we skipped that bit, sulpher,, yuk yuk
we had a very long lunch and then visited europe's
largest botanical garden, ( We still think fota is brilliant) when we
finished there we passed the islands only tea plantation and factory, but we
still had our ' barry's tea' when we got back to the boat.
sat night , we went to the ' the white horse '
restaurant in santa barbara on the north west coast, again the hospitality was
outstanding, ( just like ireland 50 years ago) Grab this, as we passed the
village houses, the old ladies standing in the doors waved to us, passing
tourists,
the final laugh was our bus driver decided to race
the other bus on the way back to the marina, he took off over the mountain at
100 miles an hour, the road was hardly the width of the bus ,and the villages
became irrelevant, on and on we went at breakneck speed, everyone on board
'shitting bricks', but he got us home first and in one piece. it was of
course a good excuse for lots more pints in the marina bar. all in all , a
very good day.
19th july sunday. we went ashore for breckfast and
then did mass,this is always interesting when no one understands the language.
we( stephen,aileen dermod, pat and ann) hired taxi's to do a tour of the lake
district to the west of the island. oh! my god , orgasmic,we were so impressed,
never saw anything like it before. ( but killarney still looks
good)
Again the hospitality 0f everyone, including the
taxi drivers was such a plesent surprise,
We got back to the boat about 4pm . stephen cooked
corned beef and cabbage. Dermod lovett's favourate, however the corned beef was
tough, I will have to have some words with durcan about this at another time.,
a couple of pints ashore to wash down the food and
wine and then off to the scratcher..zzzzzzzzzzzzz
Monday 20th july.. crew S and A Hyde, Dermod
lovett, Pat and Ann lyons
We got up early, had early breckfast and took the
boat around to the fuelling berth, Stephen had to check out of the Island with
the authorities as we were sailing to Santa Maria, an ajoining island just 50
miles to the south.
the check out took 3 hours.most annoying. when the
boat was fuelled up , and all the paperwork complete, we left ponto delgada in
22 knots sw breeze. we averaged 9knots for the passage, when we arrived, the
roast belly of pork and crispy crackling was just about ready for eating, along
with the roast spuds, apple sauce, carrots. and creamed potatoes,
yum yum.
A few pints ashore with the other fellow I.C.C.
travellers and off to bed again...zzzzzzzzzzz
by the way, we all have plenty of nap's during hese
passages
Tuesday 21st july. crew S and A hyde, Dermod
Lovett, Pat and Ann Lyons
no mad rush out of bed,we were on the new marina, a
super facility, costing nearly 10 m euros, amazing when the Island has a
population of just 6000 inhabitants.
we spent the morning tending the boat, and dolled
up to go for lunch in the local yacht club, all food and drink was hosted
by the island, and again the hospitality was outstanding,
the food consisted of grilled sardines ,
salad and lots of other local dishes,
they also put on a spectactular show of girl
drummers. this brought the house down, the old fellows thought they were going
to get a free meal of young mermaids for the afternoon, but were dissapointed
when this did not happen.
That evening we were invited to a drinks party on '
Pure Magic ' an AMEL super maramu 2000 (54feet) the owners
Peter and Beverly killen were great hosts, later we
retired to the yacht club again for more music and feckin drink,
We cant remember going to bed,
zzzzzzzzzz
Wednesday 22nd july
Dermod got a flight from santa maria back to san
migel, his son (of the same name) is getting married in the U.S. so he had to go
home . we will miss him, and in particular his special wine
talents. At 09.00 hrs we set off on a bus tour of the
island,this island is totally different to san migel, much more barren, but has
beautifull beaches, vineries, waterfalls, etc.
it used to be an american airforce base for many
years, and prospered during that period, but alas, things move on , (as we know
ourselves) the yanks moved out and now they are very ,very ,poor
we also visited the site where Christopher
Columbus got ship wrecked. ( presume the island was named after his ship, 'santa
maria' )
we arrived back to the yacht club again at 14.00
hrs for another free lunch, this time all meat, we had a display of all the
islands historical clothing and culture,
A Lady hosted a drinks party on board the boat at
19.00 hrs for all the I.C.C. and R.C.C. boats that travelled to santa maria, all
in all about 40 guests managed to squeeze onto the boat. a great success. yes of
course we all had to go back to the yacht club for more feckin drink afterwards.
fats mc clement was on fire with the jokes.
brilliant, well done donal.
Thursday 23rd july......Crew S and A hyde, pat and
Ann lyons
Breckfast at 09.00 hrs, cleaned up the boat
after the party, stowed away all the bits and made ready for departure back to
san migel, this time to' villa franca'
The wind was nw 15/16 knts and we sailed along at
an average 7.5 knots ,close on the wind. we all got a great colour, (red) and
saw lots of dolphins, dissapointed we have not seen any whales yet. we anchored
at villa franca at 19.00 hrs alongside another irish boat( not with our crowd)
but from galway.
we tucked into a beautifull spiced beef dinner,
cooked by yours truley ,stephen,( This time Durcan got the meat
right)
Then lots of time had to be devoted to up dating
the blog.
and with a bit of luck, in a few minutes , yep.
zzzzzzzzzz
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