Boat jobs

Once David had settled back into marina life, we got on with boat jobs and school. We:

●  bought and fitted a radar set (it sees ships and land before I do, especially at night)

●  bought a (nearly) new 13.5 hp, 2-stroke outboard engine

●  made an outboard engine bracket for the gantry

●  made an inventory of our boat stores (we were out of coconut milk, but still had plenty of dental floss) and shopped for more stores

●  got some repair work done on our spinnaker, storm gib and spare genoa

●  revised the sail locker hatch and fitted an inner forestay

●  refitted the Aries wind-steering gear

●  mucked out the library (lifting our waterline a few inches)

●  reorganized the lockers (again!).

I’m sure there is a clean pair of pants in here somewhere...

Bryn’s cabin after Mummy’s hissy, spitty fit.

Diving

Beth, Bryn and David went on a PADI diving course and are now qualified Open Water divers.

Bryn, Beth and Rita at the dive site in Sardina.

What do you scrape your bottom with? David putting his new diving skills to good use cleaning CAPE’s bottom with a kitchen spatula.

Birthday bonanza

September was a busy month for birthdays. We celebrated David’s birthday (delayed, as he was at sea for the actual event), mine and Bryn’s.

David’s pressie (with handmade wrapping paper).

For my birthday meal we went to an Argentinian steak restaurant.

Blue on blue; Argentinian steak and boy in blue shirt.

We explored some of the deserted and Spanish bits of the sunny end of the island and went snorkelling. Marjolein made me a delicious Dutch apple birthday cake.

An undeveloped bit of the sunny end of Gran Canaria.

38 today (well 48, but there were no 4 candles in the shop)!

For Bryn’s birthday we staged the Las Palmas Beach Olympics on Playa de las Alcaravaneras. The kids from CAPE, AQUAMARIJN, THE LED SHOP and AFRICAN QUEEN battled against each for first place overall in the Olympic events:

●  potato-and-spoon race

●  sailing welly wanging

●  long jump

●  boulé-in-the-bucket

●  kayak dash.

And they’re off!

Alexandria wanging the sailing welly.

Mummy being really organized and officious with a clip board.

Marjolein wondering whether to aim for Dave or the bucket.

Monty making a 1-leg landing.

Senne getting airborne.

Marijn at the point of take off.

Some of the big kids couldn’t resist having a go...

Geronimo!

Oh no! Who didn’t clear the dog poo from the long-jump area?

The stopwatch function of the (birthday) watch being used to time Senne’s kayak dash.

It was interesting to see various skills emerging and how each event brought out the best in different kids. Just for the record, Bryn and Marijn tied equal first. We retired to CAPE for pizza and cake.

In between the boat jobs and birthdays

We had the odd pontoon BBQ now and then to celebrate people coming and going, Anne’s visit (Dave’s cousin) and to fill in the gaps between birthdays.

The HEYMEDE ‘Boatie-Bar-B’ and ‘Bar-B-Dangle’ tools (supplied complete with lanyards to prevent loss of implements at sea).

The BBQ spread balanced on two black buckets and a bit of ply.

Petra in the foreground with Dave and Ton discussing the merits of the HEYMEDE ‘Boatie-Bar-B’.

We squished a lot of people into the cockpit for a little night music; Monty and Ramona (AFRICAN QUEEN) play timple ? a traditional (tiny) Canarian guitar.

Squished in the cockpit at the flapjack point in the evening.

We swam (well David and I did anyway) a lot of lengths in the Varadero Club pool; we had it to ourselves a lot of the time.

It had to be done! And yes it did (well for at least 5 minutes anyway).

Sorry Michelle ? I only got about a third of the way through The Floating Book before giving up. [Please note that no wanton littering was performed during the making of this photo; we fished the book out and recycled it afterwards.]

The arty bit at the end

Imagine, you are a trainee on an Italian Tall Ship. You are coming into the port of Las Palmas, fully dressed (the boat that is) with all signal flags flying. You are all still drunk from the night before and someone has the bright idea that everyone should stand on the rigging ? without holding on! Great idea!!!

There is even a person on the top of the middle mast!

Leaving Las Palmas

On Thursday 29 September we tore ourselves away from Pontoon R (before we were thrown out to make way for the arrival of the ARC boats) and went to anchor.