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Rafiki - Past Halfway



Thursday 6th December

Cally writes:

We reached our halfway point at about 3am this morning!

We celebrated this afternoon with a fantastic Mexican meal prepared by
Andy and the kids. They have been planning it ever since Andy first
decided to join our boat and in Las Palmas, Andy and I picked up some
costumes to add to the party atmosphere. Chief Rob was in a figleaf
skirt and flower garland, as was Mini-chief James; Andy, Phil, Emily
and I wore grass hula skirts and flower garlands. Emily and I had
flower bikini tops to add to the look – all very fetching!

As ever on this boat, the party centered around food, so here’s the menu:

- fruit cocktails, served with pineapple slices and cocktail umbrellas
and 2 of which were inside coconut shells;
- starter: nachos with melted cheese, tomato salsa and sour cream;
- main course: mince chilli and chilli chicken with tortilla wraps and
lots of rice

Rob also produced a bottle of champagne and chocolate brownies he had
made earlier in the day from a cheat’s mix we had acquired (made with
much swearing and cursing when Neptune had tipped half a bottle of
cooking oil all over the floor in the galley).

It wasn’t Rob’s best day, poor chap – as well as the cooking oil
incident, on a separate occasion the glass cafetiere jumped off the
draining board when he was washing up. Before that, in the early
hours of the morning, he was sitting on the loo when a large wave
knocked him off his perch, breaking the loo seat in the process. We
have also discovered that in the constant pounding Rafiki is taking,
the (above waterline) leak we had repaired in Las Palmas has not been
entirely fixed – so the contents of Rob’s and my wardrobe are now out
on our bed in the forepeak. In a sense it hardly matters – we can’t
use the bed in the forepeak in any case, as it is too noisy and rolly.
Still aggravating, though.

Also aggravating, is the unsettled weather at the moment. It is
incredibly hot and muggy and the air feels very unstable. The sky is
thick with white clouds that have a translucent, almost
mother-of-pearl quality about them. Every now and again a band of
sinister-looking dark grey cloud appears on the horizon, bringing with
it rain and the threat of (but not always actual) temporary strong
wind. This means we keep having to reef down the sails, but then
often nothing happens and we’ve slowed down for nothing.

The good news is that we are hoping to avoid the worst of a high
pressure ridge, that brings with it a hole in the wind and potential
squalls. We may clip the edge of it, but other boats have been in
thunderstorms and relentless lines of squalls for many hours, which we
hope won’t be the case for us.

In the meantime, tonight’s sunset has been really beautiful, promising
a reasonable day tomorrow…

FOOD TODAY:

lunch – coleslaw and smoked salmon and cream cheese sandwiches
supper – Mexican extravaganza and chocolate brownie


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