Updates and a new visit to La Linea

We are starting to get some certainty now and plans are finally firming up. Sadly, we are not going to get away this year now but should be away next year now. Details will follow on the specifics of what happens early next year but …

We have booked a long weekend for the end of September – the primary purpose of that will be to install the Windmill which we have now christened Don Quixote and the newly acquired chart plotter. We will then take a week or perhaps two near the end of November for a holiday. I am hoping that we can get down to Morocco and perhaps do a series of day trips from places like Smir though it would also be good to get a little bit further afield.

Next year, however, is now taking shape. We will most likely go to Jamaica in February for a two or three weeks. Then it will be a mad rush here in the UK to get the house finalised and rented. Then another mad rush to get Sarah G dealt with for an April departure. We will work our way along the Costa de Luz and the Algarve before kicking off from somewhere like Lagos for the Azores.

The routing charts seem to favour heading for the Azores around the end of April. I like the idea of spending a couple of weeks visiting the islands and then making our way back to mainland Europe late May/ early June. We can then make a decision about whether to come back to the UK for a winter fit out or carrying on south again. If we do go south it will be with the intention of carrying on across the Atlantic to the Caribbean.

All very easy to type now and looking at the nice pale blue on the Atlantic routing chart from Imray or the wind diagrams in our wind atlas. What we actually encounter and what we like or dislike is a completely other affair. Still, it feels like a nice idea now.

Easyjet will be getting more of our custom anyway but I won't be sorry to leave the Gibraltar area in the end.

Sarah G will have to spend some time out of the water over the winter so we can do below the waterline things - check seacocks, change anodes and all that sort of thing.

Here in London, we have continued our surprise at the success of the Olympics and Paralympics. Last Thursday, we went to the Wheelchair Basketball semi finals where we saw a Canada v Australia final be set up and a US v GB play off. Tonight we have tickets for the final and play off. Never have I been so pleased to have to eat my words having been so implacably opposed to the whole thing right from the winning bid to the opening ceremony.

Perhaps we really should plan to sail down to Rio for 2016!