As ever the end of our sailing season seems to pass in a blur and we are now back in Europe and settling into in Val d'Isere for a few months.  We have received several "where are you now?" emails in recent weeks so thought we had better log off (or should that be "blog off") for the winter.

 

We have left Bamboozle in Shelter Bay Marina, close the the Caribbean entrance of the Panama Canal just across the bay from the less than salubrious twin cities of Colon and Cristobal.  Whilst downtown areas are not at all nice or indeed even safe the marina and boatyard are on the site of an old US military base and are surrounded by the jungle of the San Lorenzo National Park.  Although you can see the huge expanse of grotty industrial docks dotted with cranes and stacked with containers just 4 or five miles away across the water Shelter Bay is itself quite a peaceful spot and a gathering place for cruisers needing to get work done or preparing to transit the canal.  Whilst we had planned a quiet 10 days to do as much work as possible on Bamboozle in preparation for next year and the Pacific, we were soon swept up in the social mayhem that seems to occur where-ever you get more than a few yachties gathered in one place.  Despite several late nights we did manage to get most of the jobs done and Bamboozle was safely settled in the secure yard in time for our departure by taxi to Panama City and our trip home.

 

We didn't fly straight from Panama to the UK but stopped for a few days in Florida to visit my brother Mole and his family.  Ft Lauderdale is one of the biggest yachting centres on the planet so I spent a very happy couple of days with Mole gathering together mountains of spares and sailing supplies to ship down to Panama over the winter.  It is always a shock to move straight back into the environment of hot baths, endless tap water and whatever you want in the shops and we were wonderfully looked by Mole and Mandy as we tried to make the transition back to the "real world".  After a busy two weeks in England racing around to see as many family and friends as possible we drove back out to Val which is already deep in the clutches of winter.  There is lots of snow with temperatures well below zero and the white circus of the men's World Cup is in town for the weekend.

 

Whether your Christmas is going to be hot or cold, north or south, salty or snowy we wish you a very merry one and all the best for 2010.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

See our posting "Flash, Bang, Wallop!" (2/10/2009)