The week trundles on with me going to work at the local pub to upload and download e-mail, etc. David always wants to come with me – just to make sure that I come back he says! We have updated the list of things to do on the boat, and David and Lawrence were dispatched to Cork on the bus (under the care of Bethany and Bryn) to source the various bits of hose and screws to mend the leaky bits (I stayed on the boat to work). They came back with an Irish SIM card each (Lawrence and David) and some pick’n’mix (Bethany and Bryn) but not a single screw – it’s amazing what you can buy in a chandlers in Ireland! Considerable time has since been spent setting up the ‘phones and working out how much it costs to send and receive calls… Never mind, it beats the discussion and fury about how much it costs to send and receive calls with a UK SIM card.

School is back on the agenda every morning. So far, since we arrived in Ireland, Beth and Bryn have done:

·         times-tables, multiplication and long division (working out how far it is from Crosshaven to La Coruna, how long it will take us if we travel at an average of 5 knots, and how much water we will need per person and in total – including measuring out the recommended 5 litres/person/day and learning that this is about the average single toilet flush…)

·         reading (about the Beaufort scale to find out the wind speed in the gale 8 we had from Aber to Neyland, the instructions on the chick pea packet because Bethany wanted to make humous, and their chosen reading books)

·         calculating angles in a circle, addition and subtraction (working out the degrees making up the points of a compass, N, NE, E, SE, S, etc., changing course by adding and subtracting degrees, drawing pictures of the compass rose and colouring it in).

David and Lawrence seem to be enjoying the practicals that accompany the school work – not so sure about Beth and Bryn. Today David and Lawrence spent some time teaching Beth and Bryn how to take compass bearings before letting the children test the accuracy of their ‘passage plans’ (from the boat to the loos along the pontoon) by pacing their plans out blindfolded. You'd have thought that the kids would have twigged when David and Lawrence put on pirate gear and made the kids put on their wetsuits and lifejackets before the test…

Bryn didn’t make the length of the boat before his passage plan went wrong, and Bethany refused point blank to test hers!

David and Lawrence can’t wait for school tomorrow…