49.02.2 4.07.0W

Last nights ‘farewell drinks’ at the Club Nautico was a great success with huge volumes of free beer and wine – Betelgeuse crew struggling to resist along with strange Tapas. Speeches hastened a rapid departure for our final ‘meat feast’ at Restaurante Aramara (can’t keep away from it Emma).

The clock really has started to count down as we woke to a grey day laced with showers and strong gusts. Charlotte bravely headed off after breakfast with everyone’s washing – as she finished the rains caught her in mid return, requiring a smart ‘U’ turn to the tumble drier. Richard and Claire did yet another shop – more beer required again and wine! The meat arrived and amazingly Claire managed to squirrel it all away into various hidey holes. The Skipper and Will attended the ‘Skippers Briefing’ to gain knowledge on arrivals into St Lucia and weather – no one knows that we have our secret weather guru onboard – Wills was far too polite to tell them they have no idea – perfect! (Oh, I forgot it’s not a race – just can’t help it).  

Serious stuff after a delicious lunch from Richard. Covered, abandoning ship drills, grab bags, life raft (now no longer padlocked to the desk after angle grinding the padlock off!!). Fitted all life jackets briefed on flares, PLBs, EPIRB, Mayday drills, firefighting, winches, rope work, bilges and much much more – we are getting seriously focused.

Oh, and we now have a new Topping Lift which can be used as our spare Main Halyard – we are on it. Still plenty of laughter and banter and fingers crossed the weather doesn’t stop the fireworks tonight!

Tomorrow we are off – can’t wait!

By for now, Pete xxx