Current Progress
The Voyages of Richard and Amanda
Thu 17 Jun 2010 15:11
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Current progress is still pretty limited. We are
still in Santander Marina and will probably stay till Fri, then move to an
anchorage off a beach near the entrance to Santander before heading NE the 200
or so miles to our first port of call in France. The original idea was to go to
Royan on the entrance to La Gironde river, but it has been suggested we make
directly for Ilse d'Oleron just a little bit further north. There are apparently
some really beautiful harbours and towns very close together in this region and
Royan can be quite tricky with tides and the
Gironde river in flood. We shall see - what is important is that we have a good
sail without too much wind. The forecast for the end of the week and beginning
of next week is actually looking quite reasonable; which will make a real change
because it seems to have been raining almost everyday for the past three
weeks.
Amanda had a bit of a crisis of confidence
yesterday. We met a couple who without intending to just made her question
whether this cruising life was really for her. That coupled with the rain and
being stuck here and being nervous about the whole process of getting home was
enough to make her really depressed about the everything to do with this life
style. So we had a long talk about what we wanted and how it might be achieved
so in the end we ended up in a better place with a clearer view of what we want
to do. Then we spent the evening with Carl and Melanie from Morpheus the boat
next to us in the marina; where the first couple we met were a 'black hole',
Carl and Mel are so inspirational it was like a breath of fresh air to talk to
them.
Mel's life story would make a great book; the
simple version is, she had total kidney failure and was on dialysis for years,
then a friend offered to take a compatability test and when she was found to
match she said once my baby is 4 years old I will donate one of my kidneys.
Nothing was heard till she contacted them to say she was ready, she just had to
loose 2 stone in weight. This she had never been able to do before but she did
for Mel, and 4 years ago the transplant took place and it has been life
changing. As a result they both decided life was too important and you need to
do the things you want to do without wasting time, so they bought a boat,
downsized the house and are now working their way round Spain and Portugal with
the intention of making for the Med.
They have been a real pleasure to know and meeting
people like them is one of the real joys of getting out of home waters and into
territories unknown.
We have had a quiet day today, bacon and egg
baguette for breakfast then a quick shopping trip for some essentials - Scotch,
Dry Martini and Rum !!!. For those of you who know Amanda you will be
impressed to know that we went shopping BY BUS!! an almost unheard of occurence,
not a taxi in sight.
And just to make the day complete the sun has come
out !!!!
Wonders will never
cease..
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