Where in the world are we now?

WHERE IN THE WORLD ARE WE NOW – IN GLORIOUS SOUTH AFRICA:

As Julie Andrews belts out in the Sound of Music, ” let’s start at the very beginning….”

Well, actually that is complicated. Waggis (the blue boat in my cover photo) was found on a Swiss lake by Michael who was living and working there, went via a flatbed truck to Slovenia, he sailed her to Croatia and then “home” to Malta for 7 years: travelled the Med extensively, the Greek islands, Sicily, Sardinia, Balearics, Tunisia and a whole lot of Italy. Michael got the urge to sail across an ocean in 2008 and off he went to Brazil via The Canaries and the Cape Verdes. Crossed the Atlantic single handed to do this. In 2010 he decided it was time to do another crossing and headed off from Cologna, Uruguay, destination Cape Town which he reached 40 days later. Once again, he did this solo!

He moved around a few South African marinas and eventually settled in Port Owen, about 2 hours away from Cape Town. Very pretty marina although being situated on a river there is always a problem trying to get out to sail when the tide is low.

My husband (of 18 months) and I met Michael when we came to view his other boat, Paper Moon, a 38 foot Camper Nicholson, as we were looking to buy our first boat and sail around the world. Paper Moon wasn’t exactly what we wanted but we found SV Marty Alessa, coincidentally also in Port Owen, bought her and moved aboard where we lived full time for 6 months. That was hard….more on that later. We took the boat to Langebaan, Club Mykonos, in May 2016 to be hauled out, anti fouled etc. sadly, once there we also discovered my husband had stage 4 cancer and in November he passed away. There I was, a woman alone with a bloody big boat I didn’t know much about and wasn’t sure if I even liked her.

Michael, who was a firm friend of both my husband and myself, took me out for my first sail that December, I howled at the moon, ranted and raved at the Universe in general and then decided to give it a bash and moved back on board in January 2017. Stayed in Langebaan for a while then we sailed her back to Port Owen where I am on a lovely private jetty, planning The Trip. I am learning to handle the boat, am terrified, exhilarated, ecstatic and shit scared simultaneously when we sail but I know I have found my passion. What a gift.