17:00.81N 61:46.56W

Wednesday 2^nd, Thursday 3^rd and Friday 4^th March

Busy old day sorting Serafina out for our friends (Mick and Dione Roberts) which means once again trying to find new homes for some of the stuff stored in the forepeak (front cabin) so that they can store some of their belongings. Inevitably as soon as Robert and Joyce left us back in the Cape Verde islands, the meagre space we had left for them to use quickly filled up with our odds and ends again.

There is a good chandlery store here (Budget Marine – part of a chain spread through a number of the other islands) and so we were able to get some clips to allow Sarah to put the finishing touches to her rain covers for the hatches... and not before time because it did quite a bit of raining during the day!  Very big supermarket here which was well stocked and had the most remarkable selection of meats which is a little unusual.

The marina is pretty small and strangely pretty empty. There are a few boats coming and going each day, but I had rather imagined that Jolly Harbour would be a bustling busy resort. Certainly it has all the shops and facilities as well as all the housing built around the waters edge like so many other developments these days, but there are few people and the shops as a result are poorly stocked and a long way short of the retail therapy experience that Sarah had hoped for!

We had a real bonus when we were approached by Celia off ‘Alice’ as she and Andrew were flying home today for 3 weeks and so they kindly handed over all their perishable foods. In fact in another of those strange coincidences that abound here, Celia used to work for the BMF as Secretary of the Wessex region. This prompted David from Moonbeam to send an fun email to the BMF in Egham to announce the planned formation of a new BMF Region ‘The Western Atlantic’ with him and myself as former BMF directors, as the initial members and Celia as secretary. Are there any other former BMF members out here?

David and Lyn from Moonbeam came round for supper in the evening and we had a great time and almost persuaded them to stay for one more day as we were sort of expecting Scott-Free to arrive on Thursday from Guadeloupe where they had engine problems and had to be towed into Deshaies by of all the strangest co-incidences, Mark on a boat called Blue Beyond that had just arrived in the anchorage, who were on the rally from the UK to Southern Portugal with S-F and ourselves  back in 2008 and who neither of us have seen since!

During the night it rained as hard as we have seen for years, which at least spared me from deck washing duties in the morning and seriously filling up dinghy. However the rain kept making appearances all morning which made for a hot and sticky day.

Moonbeam left around 0700 hrs heading for Barbuda (an island about 30 miles north of here) but during the morning a boat called Resting Goose arrived and moored next to us. It took about 10 minutes before the owner David, worked out why the name Serafina sounded familiar. He used to co-own a boat based in Antibes with Noel and Heather Ingram who also had a Najad yacht based in Hamble Point Marina and we had got to know them there during 2005/6. Noel and Heather had told David to keep an eye out for us, but to find himself moored alongside us was a remarkable surprise.  He also comes from West Mersea, where by another coincidence it transpired that a great friend of Sarah’s from her Bradwell sailing days Judy Tridini, was the person who redesigned David’s garden!

Then around 1400 hrs our VHF crackled into life and it was Steve on Scott-Free calling us up as he could see our AIS on his chart plotter (we had turned it on so we could spot them first!). He confirmed they were on their way and then at 1445 hrs we watched a BA flight pass overhead which was the one carrying Mick and Dione.

Around 1600 hrs we were helping to tie S-F up when Mick and Dione arrived in a shared taxi. This was all very apt as M & D had brought out various bits and pieces including several things for Steve and Chris.

All headed off to the nearby beach for a swim and a few beers as we watched the sun go down  and in the  evening we all had dinner cooked by Sarah on board Serafina.

Friday morning dawned a lot finer and by 1100 hrs were on our way to Falmouth Harbour. We anchored first in Carlisle Bay for a swim and lunch and then after a nice relaxed beat upwind in just 10 – 15 knots of wind, we made our way into Falmouth and dropped the hook pretty close to the spot we were in only last weekend. The outcome of the very much hotter, sunnier day today was that there were a few hints of sunburn around as we settled down for our ‘sundowners’.