Hi Gang

Well 3 places in one day – Marken for breakfast, Monnickendam for lunch and Volendam for the evening – a journey of almost 7nm, but with all the tight manoeuvring  you gat pretty good at boat handling, so it’s good experience.

In Monnickendam we had more water than we were used to with almost 2.5m, right up until we berthed on the pontoon in 1.8m, well at least it’s only mud and when we came to leave we could take the lines off and she never moved, makes life very easy. As soon as we arrived I got the RIB out and went for a blast – there seems to be no speed limits (as we came through Alpha A/D Rinj a couple of 5m – 6m RIBs with 2 x 200hp outboards came past at 30kts+)

Not sure how they get this huge motor yacht out of here – we have seen others that they put on a floating pontoon and then take them out to sea – I can’t believe this guy draws less than 2m.

We went to the large chandlery and Suzanne went into town for fresh provisions and we met up at a conveniently located wine merchant on the quay where we stocked up on beer and wine and the guy gave us some steak tartare and white wine to sample.

Then after lunch on aboard off to Volendam for the evening where we had a walk around and then a couple of beers in the bar (where the guy  had run out of most of his beers) and back to the boast for our meal before joining Kaikoura for the latest episode of Howards Way

See you all later