A relaxing and social day

Saxon Blue's Blog
Harvey Jones and Andrea Stokes
Sun 25 Jul 2010 01:48
We had a lovely day today and enjoyed not moving. In fact, after the size breakfast we had, moving was never going to be high on the agenda.

Richard and I got down to some maintenance, fixing a stantion base that we damaged in Illulisat and then trying to sort out the black water tank for our toilet that keeps blocking up. We mixed up a load of epoxy for the stantion but it's taking a long time to go off in the cold temperature. Richard ended up clearing out the tank by disconnecting one of the hoses and pressurising it with the dinghy inflation pump. Dangerous stuff. I was expecting a geyser or poo a bit higher than the mast but was (happily) disappointed.

Kali spent ages filleting the 4 cod that Andrea caught last night. The skills she learned from her dad have really come into play and she's had plenty of practice. I think Andrea has the easy bit of the job, just reeling them in. It was bitterly cold outside this morning and Kali's hands must have been icy cold by the time she'd worked her way through the pile of fish. We ended up with a lovely pile of fresh cod fillets which, as it turned out, was just as well.

Andrea, Kali and I then went for a walk on the tidal island next to Saxon Blue. It turned out to be a bit more adventurous than we'd planned when we ended up above some high cliffs that took us ages to walk around. As we did so, though, we looked down onto the isthmus that separates the island from the mainland. On the North side sat Dodo's Delight and Saxon Blue, looking lovely together. On the South side were 3 sea kayaks. Kali had heard from Bob that there were some British kayakers out looking for mountains to climb so we assumed that it was them. Once we'd managed to walk down to them, we went to find out and it was the same crew so we invited them onboard for dinner. We'd already arranged for Bob's crew to join us and they were busy cooking their contribution to the communal meal so it was going to be a boat full.

Everybody arrived at 7pm and we had a great meal consisting mostly of cod which both boat crews had caught during the day. We talked about climbing and kayaking and sailing and generally messing about and refusing to grow up. It was very funny, three basically British expeditions all meeting up in the same tiny anchorage at the same time. Everyone had enough in common for the talk to flow easily, lubricated a little by Andrea's Gin & Tonics and some pungent brew with a dead snake in it that Bob brought with him (and took back, thankfully). During the meal, Andrea casually caught another big cod and played it really cool while Kali whooped and cheered. A great double-act, those two.

Everyone has gone home now and we're all going to bed. It's a soft, calm night with tiny ripples on the water and thin cloud touching the very tops of the mountains. The occasional tiny jelly fish swims by. Icebergs sit between the rocky islands. It's hard to stop looking and go to sleep.

Harvey

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