Seeing everyone scattered over their boat decks like ants and all the boats with their pretty little decoration flags on (it’s a bit like party mode on a boat!) certainly get you into the mode of getting ready
Last tradesmen came in to fix whatever needed to be done (thank goodness the coffee machine can be used again! … I was so over bad instant coffee! ) Johann managed to clean the boat twice ! (in spite of the rain) and packed repacked and reorganised every cabin on Scolamanzi at least twice by now! The dinghy engine came off and all possible fuel containers has been filled (900 litres of diesel should get us somewhere where there is land!) and so the list is slowly but surely ticked off.
The one thing that has put a little bit of doubt in my mind is the safety briefing where all kinds of possible disasters (and make do solutions too…thankfully) has been shown on a flat screen TV and discussed in detail! I just did not think that the broken masts, losing all electronics due to lightning and losing your steering device will add to any of my excitement and fun (?) … but I guess they do it for a reason!
One thing that I can say for sure .. Arc Europe is well organised … they have gone through amazing trouble to brief ,educate, support and entertain us in every aspect of it and Andrew, Nick, Kieran and Lyall are making one hell of a team for the ARC Europe!
We have met wonderful people going on this trip and we really would love to keep in touch with Slavko and crew of yacht Irena!... see you in Croatia Slavko!! We said our goodbyes to our temporary neighbours (Mark and Sarah) of Field Trip that left this morning in the Atlantic Cup! It was very exciting to see them leaving … unfortunately in very little wind!
Provisioning is the other party spoiler for me … I just hate doing it … it is boring, leave you open to criticism and blame for not buying certain things or not enough of it! Then… party spoiler two is to find space (logical space!) to stow it all away! Well… it is done now … and I do feel better now that I cannot change my mind and will have to make do with what we have! This time we’ve bought the minimum (seeing that we will be in Bermuda in 7-8 days!!) and not like the first trip from Cape Town (where I have taken enough to feed half the Caribbean … which is exactly where most of the provisioning ended up! HaHa!)
At this stage … 2 days to go …. It looks like we will be crawling out of here … due to very little wind …not a perfect start ….and the conditions over the following few days will certainly eat away the fuel stock slowly but surely … I am sure John (being on the yacht only for another week) would have loved to sail rather than motor! Hopefully conditions will improve as we go!
We are ready … and certainly … 4 days in a Marina is just 2 too many! Time to go!!
“”Kaptein….span daai seile!!””
Henriette