Groundhog Day

Blue Sky's Voyage
George & Michael
Sun 23 Jul 2006 13:21
Dear Friends
 
Here we are again, not much has changed in the last week.
 
Yanmar and the local marine engineers conspired between them to do absolutely nothing. Despite an engineer having confirmed nearly 2 weeks ago that the parts were ordered and I would pay, they did nothing. It was only when they sent a photographer (seriously) round last Tuesday that we found out that nothing had been ordered. As those who know the skipper might imagine, his advice to the photographer was direct and unambiguous, not least as there was a 25 knot wind trying to push us on to the dock at the time...
 
So we've fallen back again on the excellent team of friends in Plymouth and spares are winging their way here from the UK and due tomorrow - we shall fit them ourselves.
 
We did have a successful 'fishing' trip earlier in the week. Following the sight of a yacht on the beach (see last week's blog), we reckoned that there might be a spare anchor going so we had a good snorkel off the beach and found a 60 lb plough. This was much too large for the yacht we saw and even for us, but we managed to barter it with the marina staff in exchange for 2 nights berthing.
 
Pic (right to left) a nautical interpretation of "The Anchorage Bar and Grill" for our friends in Greenwich.
 
 
This morning we had another snorkel ("la chasse des ancres") and found a medium sized Bruce which would be very handy. It is rather firmly wedged into a rock and is at the limit of George's free diving at about 9 metres down, so we'll save it for when we get Blue Sky repaired and have a tug with the yacht. The locals seem a little bemused at us on a rather posh looking yacht going off on salvaging expeditions, but it keep us and them entertained.
 
We were further entertained by the local fire-fighting aircraft doing practice runs - seriously close to the beach as we hope can be seen from this photo. They were virtually picking up water between the swimmers - no worries about health & safety here.
 
 
Lukasz left after his scheduled 2 weeks, sadly with rather less sailing than we had hoped and is now working on securing sponsorship for a China expedition from his university. He will definitely be back to Corsica though.
 
And the other really good news is that after two and a half months, Michael managed to get the satellite system working on his computer. This means of course that the blog will continue, wherever we are.
 
As I write, we are waiting for Diana to arrive and looking forward to repairing the engine and exploring Corsica with Di.
 
Best wishes
 
George and Michael