February 1^st.

Things have been progressing quite well in the past 2 and a half weeks (seems a lot longer).

Thelma has finished the varnishing, she has stripped every piece of woodwork, back to wood, sanded and varnished it, several times.

Even the steps on the swim ladder, which were in desperate need of attention have been done.

She has a family to look after and works extremely hard.

We enjoyed having her on board and improved our Spanish as well as helping her improve her English.

Her father is terminally ill and she needs to work to help him, so we designed and printed up some business cards for her, which she started handing out immediately with great pride. We also made her some posters with tear off details on the bottom. I was really pleased to see that she had posted one at Brunos the night I had given them to her and by the next lunch time 2 of the tear offs had gone. We also registered her for an e-mail address, but she is not very familiar with e-mail so I gave her a quick tutorial.

In fact she left us early on her last day as she had to go to Monkey Bay Marina for a new job.   So any sailors out there reading this, who may be heading to the Rio and want to have their boat varnished you can contact Thelma on thelmaboatvarnisher {CHANGE TO AT} live {DOT} com

Dennis is getting on well with all of his jobs, the new seat for the cockpit, the deck box, the cup holders for the binnacle, the table and the dipping stick for the diesel tanks. He keeps popping back and forth to the boat with the table at different stages, teasing me with glimpses of what is to come.

Today we commissioned another Dennis to make a new swim ladder for the dinghy.

Those of you who have snorkelled and then tried getting into a small rib, will know it gets harder the older you get, not to mention more ungainly.

We noticed that Jan and David on Odyssea had a very neat telescopic one on the transom of their dinghy and David made a valid point when he said ‘ we thought one day we’re going to go snorkelling and we aren’t going to be able to get back in the dinghy’ (thought occurs to me every time believe me).

I surfed looking for a similar ladder, but to no avail. Then in true Clyde spirit,( we’ll talk more about Clyde and his amazing boat later)  well almost, I said to Roger, haven’t we got any spare stainless steel  tubing on board? So Roger designed it and then Dennis will do the welding.

Our social life has been quite good, despite the weather. We went to a charity fundraiser at Marios the other night. They were raising money for the rivers eco-charity. It turns out that not only do they protect the river from things like Shell, who have exploration rights, but they also fund security patrol boats, so it was $10 well spent. Roger also won a tee shirt.

The following evening we took a lancha up to the Casa Parico for an ‘all you can eat BBQ for $10’.

Although it was pouring with rain, Roger, myself, Clyde and Mia (Kaleidascope), Jan & David (Odyssea) and Trevor and Sandy (Common Crossing) ventured out across the bay.

It’s a lovely trip as you turn off into the creek leading to the Casa, where the trees cover to create a tunnel and vines hang down.

The last time we went there it was a beautiful starlit night, this time it was raining and the effect was very different, very spooky.

But the Casa is still a lovely place to visit and spend an evening and the food is excellent and lots of it!!

Then yesterday we all went to Kangaroos restaurant, another beautiful creek to explore.

This place is also hard to find, but the creek is just up the river, almost opposite the Castillio de San Phillipe.

Jane & Gary, a couple of Aussie ex pats and their 14 year old son, Dylan run the little hotel and restaurant.

As I am writing this everyone is aboard Common Crossing for the Superbowl. Not my bag, so I decided to take advantage of a bit of peace and quite, which is not easy with the screaming and shouting coming from next door!!

Just have to tell you about Clyde and Mia. They have a huge 105ft catamaran. Nothing unusual there you might say. Until I tell you that Clyde built it himself out of aluminium, in the Mojave desert!!!

He had no experience, didn’t draw any designs or do any formulae, he built this amazing boat by eye.

It is so big, that once built, he had to cut it into 7 parts to transport it to the water (all planned).

 A feat that was recorded for posterity by eyewitness news in the US.

 Then, contrary to what the experts said, he reassembled it in the water!! He made everything on the boat, the lifts, the polishing and sanding tools, everything and that was 20 years ago and she still looks great. He also built her like a house, not like a boat.

An amazing guy, who just decides what he wants to make and makes it himself. Quite inspiring.

Well only 3 days left and we set sail for Texan Bay. We were leaving on the 7^th, but having gathered more local information, Roger has decided we will leave on the 6^th so we can get out in daylight, but more about that when it happens.