Cannes Boatshow here we come

Sorry that its taken us a while to post. We have been very busy and each time we wrote something, we did not have internet to post ! Finally we have managed to finish off the massive post and find a cafe with internet.

We do need to explain a bit more about our general travel plans. We originally agreed with Oyster to let them show our new Oyster 575-19 at the Cannes Boatshow on the 10-15 September. This meant that we had to get her there at the very latest on the 7^th September so that Oyster could clean her up and do a photo shoot prior to having her ready for general exhibition.

Our plan was to export our boat from the UK through Guernsey thereby saving on the 20% VAT, but paying Australian GST on the value of the boat (less expenses) once we entered Australia, thereby saving a bit of money.

While we were going to be in Guernsey we had hired Mike to provide us with several days of close quarter sailing training on a 40 footer to advance our studies. Unfortunately just before we left Ipswich we had a problem with the watermaker and a faulty Zodiac tender. This delayed our departure for several days, meaning that the course we paid for was not possible to be delivered. John found this quite frustrating, as he had hoped that things would have been thoroughly tested before the handover. His recommendation to any Oyster purchaser is to spend several weeks after handover putting their new Oyster through its paces to get iron things out. We would have done this had we had prior experience in purchasing a new yacht. We had wrongly assumed that, like a car, you simply drive off !

23rd August – Lisbon, Portugal, at the port of Cascais

John, David and Vicki were able to visit Lisbon for the day while Rory and Mike undertook domestic and maintenance duties on the boat.  Vicki wanted everyone to have some time out but the guys “wanted” to work!! Vicki and John wanted to enjoy their first real break and did!

We had a taxi ride to the centre of town and John managed to savour his favourite Portuguese dessert – Portuguese tarts!!  John wanted to know if the ones sold in Australia were just as good as the real thing. Well, he can say that they are just as good.

We jumped into a taxi and asked the driver, who spoke poor English, to take us to the centre of town. Once we arrived, we jumped out to a little park surrounded by small shops – a very quite area.  After wandering around a bit we found a large entrance made of ornate marble and sandstone, and soon after realized it was actually a cemetery.

David joked that we must have asked the taxi driver to go to the “dead center of town” and that is why we were left near the cemetery.   Our original thoughts of Lisbon, thinking that the cemetery area was the center of town were not good.  While David managed to get a haircut at a local barber, we took a look at a hastily purchased map, and finally realized we were in the wrong area. We hastily made a new plan and visited the Castello St Jeorge, had a lunch with the best views in Lisbon and where we met the cook, the events manager – who are hoping that we will bring many people back….John had dreams of a conference….

After lunch we managed to find some delicious port and wandered into the tourist center.  We then found another place that sold even more amazing old port and John could not help himself in buying more bottles.  The taxi driver that took us back to Cascais was a great tour guide and showed us many interesting places to visit, we had a very scenic drive via the coast road, after stopping at his favourite chicken shop so we could taste what Portuguese chicken in Portugal was like…. John liked it, but it does not beat the Portuguese chicken we buy at our favorite place in Sydney.  On our next trip to Cascais we will have to visit those interesting places!!

When we arrived back at the marina in Cascais the wind had picked up, it was a good thing that Rory and Mike were there to reinforce our mooring lines – Vicki took some photos of how Rory did all this so that we will know how to do to this ourselves in the near future!

24th August, leaving Cascais for Cannes via Gibraltar

In the morning we undertook provisioning, a little bit of shopping for clothes, fishing gear (John thinks we never have enough or the right bits), and some more of those delicious Portuguese tarts.  After filling the water tank with water and stowing all gear away we set off to the fuel jetty at 2.20pm to fill up our fuel tank and start the voyage to Mallorca.   Vicki undertook some boat handling training in the strong wind and did well.

It was quite windy when we left and there was yet another missing fisherman, which the Coast guard requested that we kept a look-out for.   It was another poignant reminder as to why we have these great life vests with AIS (Automatic Identification System) SART (Search and Rescue Transponder) capability – so in the unlikely event that we do have a man overboard we can locate them on our Raymarine plotter.  We don’t know if the fisherman was ever found and that was the sad part of our journey as we kept constant lookout.

25^th August, Cascais to Gibraltar

Wind dropped…motoring to make up time, oil leak from engine dipstick – started having engine problems. We don’t know why we are getting this leak, and we need to contact Oyster to help try to figure this one.

Wind picked up again close to midnight – so we were able to sail at 8-9knots!

26^th August, Gibraltar

Passed Gibraltar to Port (left) and Morocco to starboard (right) at 0700.  We didn’t see whales – but we did see dolphins at 6pm!!

I cant believe how close the mainland of Spain and Africa are, and its now quite a hot day. It would not take much to cross over with a dinghy. I think Europe might have a bigger problem with illegal immigrants that we do in Australia.

We had out first BBQ on Josie Maria!!  Rory was the master Chef with David and John doing the cooking – the guys had a beer too!!  The BBQ was to a magnificent backdrop of the setting sun, the sea calm, and very little wind – what a change it makes in the Med.

 27^th August, Heading to Cannes

At 0800 we were visited by a large pod of dolphins – there were dolphins as far as the eye could see. John took a video of a sea of pods of dolphins which we sailed through to our way in the Med. As the sun was rising, it was one of those surreal moments of our voyage.

Today was a punctuated by fishing. John has two deep-sea Tiagra fishing rods  and Tiagra 50W reels set up on the stern (back) of the boat with 150 pound lines and 300 pound leaders.  He has been experimenting with various lures, and has now switched to smaller lures that he purchased in Cascais because apparently his large Atlantic lures are too big for the med.  At 0900 Mike was all excited as the reel on the rod emitted a scream and the rod bent hard.  Mike worked hard to bring in, but was not impressed when he pulled up a plastic bag !

At 1100 the engine coolant alarm went off again and we had to stop the engine to let it cool down and then turned the engine back on. We don’t know why the engine is overheating.  We added more coolant but we don’t think we need it. Let see how this works out.

28^th August, Heading to Cannes ? Maybe

Just before 0100 in the early morning hours the engine alarmed again regarding  the coolant – we think that the expansion tank holding the coolant might  actually be overfull.  We turned engine off to cool down and removed 500mls of coolant from the expansion tank.

We decided to fire up our Volvo Penta 150  around 5am, and a few hours later the coolant alarm went off again. We decided to take a further 400ml of coolant from the reservoir out as we still suspect there is too much coolant still in the the reservoir .  We are getting worried about our engine as another fault has developed ; we are unable to go into neutral and the engine automatically now cuts off.  This is not good as we cannot totally rely on our engine any more. Sailing all the way to Cannes is looking less likely and we are now thinking that we need to stop of at Palma de Mallorca to get these issues looked at by Volvo and Oyster.

We  approached a marine park so we quickly pulled in our fishing lines.  We tacked through the Formentera and Ibiza gap with no engine as we are not game enough to turn it on and have it alarm again.  We are reserving it for later if we need it.  We turned the engine back on mid-day and things appear ok, but after all these engine problems we are getting concerned and are looking forward in reaching Palma de Mallorca.

John put his lines out after we had passed through the marine park. This time he has decided to go all out and use a 300 pound leader with ball bearing swivels and put away his smaller ‘Med’ lures he was advised on using, after the last fish bent the smaller hook clean and got away. He was well rewarded and caught a large green fin tuna with the help of Mike who pulled it in at the end and John gaffed it. After spending 3 hours in the galley filleting the beast, with strong seas around, we had fresh sashimi for afternoon tea. John put in a brave effort cutting it all up and David bagged tuna steaks for our freezer so we can have it later.

We decided to head off to Palma de Mallorca, a Spanish island which also happens to be the major destination for folks wishing to leave their boats in the Med over winter. It has a lot of facilities and Volvo has an office there, as well as Oyster.  It will make it much easier for us to do maintenance work on her.  It’s also Rory’s base of operations and he promises good food and wine.

We arrived and tied along the fuel berth at Puerto de Palma, Mallorca.   Vicki did he first solo mooring at night and it all went well.   She is slowly building up her confidence as Josie Maria is a bit longer than 17.89m once you take into account the Zodiac tender firmly fixed on the davits at the back of the boat.

 28^th August  - 2^nd September , Going to Palma de Mallorca ! 

On the morning of the 28^th August we moved from the fuel berth into Marina (Real Club Nautico) – berth 34. The boys were up early, but we were still sleeping when we hear “Josie Maria… JOSIE MARIA” as the “marinaro” was trying to wake us up so we could move the boat and another boat could come in to fuel up.   Guess we were pretty tired after all.   I think the boys had a bit of a laugh.

We spent the next few days resolving more warranty and maintenance issues.  John likes to joke that we come to nice places so we can fix our boat.  We really do need to do more sightseeing. As we outlined before, we had planned to head off from Ipswich to Gursney so that John and Vicki could do some close quarter boat handling training but that had to be cancelled because the boat had water maker issues before we left as well as a damaged tender which needed a bolt plate refixed.  Later in Cascais we also had watermaker issues which Rory managed to resolve by figuring out why the pressure was so low.  Rory also advised us to put some extra protection on our sails as he thinks they will be shredded by the time we get to the Caribbean, so while in Mallorca we took the mainsail down to have it measured up by a sail maker, and had leather patches placed on areas where the wear is the greatest.

The Volvo guys arrived and we discovered that the reason why the new engine  was cutting out is that the throttle electronics have developed a fault - another throttle part was quickly organized by Oyster to be quickly flow in and at this point we were told the part would be fitted on Monday, with the guys making plans to leave from Palma on Monday afternoon.

The main reason why we are heading eventually to Cannes, France is to be at the boatshow.  We originally agreed with Oyster to show Josie Maria at the boatshow so we are under pressure to arrive there by the 7^th September.  Vicki and I are also under pressure to arrive before then, as we have family arriving in Cannes to celebrate her 50^th birthday.  When we realized that the engine part was critical and Josie Maria was not going to leave Mallorca without it, we made contingency plans to ensure that we did arrive in Cannes to see family as well as Josie Maria undergoing the engine repairs and travel to Cannes.

Whilst on Mallorca we also met Julie, a fellow Aussie, who did the same First Aid course that David, John and I completed in Sydney (what a small world it is) and what a pleasure to see both Julie and her husband!!

Our most memorable day in Mallorca was one where we hired a small car and drove into the hills to a unique restaurant in a remote area, for a lamb lunch.  There were lots of sheep running around while we ate them, and a small black lamb had to picked up and moved from under our car so that we could leave – he wouldn’t move even when the engine went on!!  After this we drove on to Sollier (pronounced So Yeah!!) ,  and had a drink overlooking the small bay and seaside resort.

 3rd September, Boat in Palma but John & Vicki fly to Cannes

Our contingency plan in place is put into motion - John and Vicki fly out to Cannes, via Madrid, because the critical engine part is delayed by a day.  In hindsight this was a good call because it was to take three more days before the engine was working properly.  Josie Maria is left in the capable hands of David and Rory who motor Josie Maria to Cannes from the 5^th to 7^th September – just in time for the Cannes Boat Show (but too late for Vicki’s 50^th) – so we are glad that we made the decision to meet family and celebrate Vicki’s 50^th in Cannes as we had planned!!

3^rd-16^th September, Family time in Cannes, France for Vicki's Birthday

Apart from our obvious enjoyment in seeing family and friends - Highlights were:

• ·      Dinner on “Palme D’Or” a 2 Michelin star restaurant
• ·      Lunch at the Martinez’s seaside restaurant  - in particular their giant burger that all the boys struggled to finish, and dessert that looks like a make-up palette complete with a free lipstick!
• ·      Trip on large motor yacht to St Tropez, lunch at Club 55 and dinner at Michaelangelos in Antibes (for Vicki’s 50^th)
• ·      Winery tour of Font du Broc and Chateau Cote De Provence and delicious truffle lunch at Brunos
• ·      Fragonard tour, lunch at the golden goat (name in French) at Eze and trip to Monaco and the Casino Royale (to celebrate Katy’s Birthday!)
• ·      Trip to Isle de Lerin’s, St Honorat from Cannes by ferry.

17^th -20^th September Cannes, France to Cannigione - Sardenga, Italy 

We are now back on board Josie Maria – we were planning on leaving for Sardenga in the afternoon of the 17^th but were concerned about taking Josie Maria and Taylor and Emily (new crew) into gale force winds and 4 metre seas so decided to stay put in Cannes.  On the 18^th the sea conditions looked much the same so we decided to change our route to Sardenga to be one that was more sheltered on the lee side of Corsica. 

Much of the trip was smooth seas and sunshine - Emily and Taylor saw dolphins!  

We experienced gale force winds at the top of Corsica and then as we left Corsica, just before the Bonifacio Strait.  Unfortunately we also lost one of our sun bathing mattresses overboard as the wind and waves washed copious amounts of water over them.  David and Vicki managed to turn the boat around – it took 6 minutes to furl the mainsail and take in the fishing lines before turning around and retracing the course to attempt to find the missing mattress.  This goes to show how long it would normally take if we had a Man Overboard situation !. Fortunately Emily found it floating in the white caps and we had several attempts at retrieving it with a boat hook.   We had to do this in gale force winds with our harnesses on and clipped on the life lines. We had put tape on our life lines to prevent damage to the teak deck – this proved to stick and make it impossible to move quickly up and down the jackstays (a bit of seatbelt chord that you clip your life line onto to stop going overboard on the foredeck) – these have now been removed.  It was necessary to move very quickly as the mattress proved to be very allusive!!  We actually ran over the mattress  twice and managed to touch it with the boat hook twice – it was apparent that it was far too heavy, full of seawater to lift with the boat hook.  Fortunately John’s got out his fishing gaff hook and was able to spike it, with  John and Vicki managing to lift it back on board (albeit with a hole!!).  A great team effort with David at the helm, Emily at the bow hooked on with her harness in her bikinis as the spotter and Taylor in the cockpit with the binoculars.  It turned out to be a good exercise in retrieving an object in gale force winds….it highlighted to all of us how difficult picking up a man overboard would be, and how difficult it is to see anything in breaking, lumpy seas.  David thought it was quite miraculous that we found it, and were able to pick it up.  The conditions change so fast!! The girls were sunning themselves on the foredeck and had just come down for an early dinner/late lunch when the conditions changed. In future the mattresses will be taken inside when not in use!!

19^th-24^th September, Cannigione, Sardegna, Italy

We had made good time to Cannigione, but the mattress hunting exercise meant that we arrived at night, too late to check-in to the marina.   Franco (John’s Uncle) and Maurizio (John’s Cousin) met us in their dingy and helped us tie up to a mooring for the night.  Zia Lina (John’s Aunt) cooked us a delicious dinner.  Fortunately the anchorage was sheltered from the wind – we were very happy to be on a quiet and safe spot and get over the sea sickeness that was felt by some.

In the morning the sun was up, the sky bright blue and clear, but the wind was still over 30knots in the bay and so we moved into the marina for a cosy berth.  We spent the day relaxing, socializing and eating!!  We decided not to venture out until the wind dropped as the sea was too choppy and we wanted to visit nearby islands with John’s relatives on the boat.

On the 20^th and 21^st September the wind had dropped to under 10 knots so we visited several small bays, in Isola Spargi and Isola Santa Maria. Sardegna has many small islands (isola) scattered around its aquamarine waters. The sea was smooth, idyllic weather, hardly anyone around as its no longer August and the tourists have largely gone back to work. August is the most busy month in Italy.  We managed to get the Seabobs and snorkeling gear out – and had a generally relaxing time. The Seabobs Carago V7 lived upto the videos we saw of them on the net. Very Bond. They are twice as heavy as the new V5, but they go much faster. John really enjoyed their speed and it did not take him long to master the ‘deep dive’ on one of the units. Tonino and John also took Vicki and Cristina on tow and visited a nearby beach on their Seabobs. They got a lot of stares as people marveled at these unique sea toys. It made all the hard work in getting them out of the lazarette worthwhile. However they take many hours to charge which is a bit of a disappointment. They are going to be great to use in our Caribbean adventures.

On the 21^st we  did have a slight problem on our way out of Santa Maria beach, and hit a submerged rock….   No-one was hurt, but our gimmbled stove bounced out of its gimmbles. Talyor, Emily and Vicki fixed this while the guys immediately anchored and dived under the boat to survey the damage.  A video of the damage was taken so that we could seek advice on what to. We had lots of question. Did we need to haul Josie Maria out of the water? Was there other damage?  It was now imperative that we ensure that Josie Maria is structurally sound to continue our voyage.   We also learnt, when in doubt stop the boat, and reconsider and when in dangerous waters reverses back over your known safe course, and those isolated danger marks…give them a very wide berth!!

On the evening of the 21^st we celebrated Franco’s Birthday, but we also manage to do this on the 22^nd – but only after Roma beat Lazio in a soccer game!!. Franco was not planning to celebrate his birthday on the right day as such an important game was on. Rome beat Lazio 2:0

On the 22^nd, the boys went for a swim in the morning and the girls had a domestic day.  It sounds a bit sexist, but the girls were looking forward in getting a bunch of chores done and the boys really wanted to go for a swim. Post the Cannes boat show we smelt a strong sewage odour from the heads (bathroom) of the aft cabin and Vicki needed to find out the cause, as there was no strong odour in the heads prior to leaving Josie Maria at the show.  David helped her and it appears that the holding tank was overfilled during the boatshow, and unfortunately this lead to some spillage. It also explains why Vicki suffered from an infected eye after getting the boat from Cannes, as we now realize that sprayed sewerage got onto stored items and then onto her eye. Antibiotics were used to help her overcome the infection.

The area has now been scrubbed 3 time and sprayed, but some of odor still lingers.

On the 23^rd September we went to some local markets in the morning, had lunch with family and then spent the day sending emails to Oyster regarding Josie Maria’s encounter with our submerged rock, but we had difficulties with the very large video file John send over the internet, so we send to Oyster a much smaller compressed version. They provide us with contacts to have the boat looked at, but by that time we had already gone to Porto Cervo to see if there were Haul Out facilities and what availability they had.

Internet is still quite an issue for us as we have to rely on marina’s with wifi connection or purchasing a 3G card, which we could not find in Cannigione.

While at Porto Cervo we spoke to an engineer who looked at the video of the damage to Josie Maria’s keel and he organized to meet us onboard her at 8am on the following day.  Very nice of him to do so and this will help us decide if we need to haul her out here in Sardegna or if we can make the crossing to Ostia, Rome, our next destination where there may be better facilities and where we can spend a bit more time as we have relatives there to see as well.

24^th  September, leaving Cannigione, Italy for Porto di Roma, Ostia

Our engineer arrived promptly. He was a lovely man who inspected Josie Maria from mast to engine – fortunately he could see no structural damage – he pointed out that there were no visible cracks anywhere and that no keel or engine bolts were loose.  He inspected doors to see if anything was swinging wrongly and if any panels had come loose. After about an hour of pulling all our floorboard out and taking a look a just about everything below, his advice was that she had suffered no damage other that what we could see at the point of impact and that there was no need to haul her out for repairs –unless we wanted to for cosmetic reasons (at the moment we are thinking that we may do this in Palma de Mallorca, as we now have an area with no anti fouling and don’t really want to attract growth).  He commented that the Oyster 575 was a solid and very well built boat.

After getting the all clear,  we have decided to leave late on tonight so that we can arrive at our next port during lunch time as we like getting in while there is light. We are heading off to Ostia, a suburb of Rome. Ostia was the ancient port of Rome, and where more of John’s relatives live. Franco and Lina have also decided to leave Sargedna tomorrow and we will again see them at their home in Ostia. We are also looking forward in catching up with the De Margheriti side of the family, with a possible scuba dive being organised by Adolfo, John’s cousin.

One of the highlights we are also looking forward to is the Toga Party that Vicki is wanting to organize with Stefania. We have invited all of John’s relatives to Vicki’s crazy party and many have never heard of a Toga Party ! Imagine that, Italians not knowing what a Toga Party is about. Some are even asking if you wear clothes underneath your toga. Should make for some interesting photos. We will be in Ostia till the 30^th where will then head off again to Palma de Mallorca to carry out some of the maintenance and repairs we spoke about.

John and Vicki in Lisbon, at its 'true' centre

Take a look at some of these aged ports !

Overlooking Lisbon

Vicki and Mike after leaving Lisbon

John finally fishing, in rough seas

David and Vicki, doing what they love

When we arrived in Palma de Mallorca, we travelled to its mountains to sample bbq sheep.

Vicki, David, Mike our instructor and Rory our Skipper

Mike has a fascination with pebbles. Everywhere he goes he collects one, and marks it. 

We visited Soller, a nice little tourist town in Mallorca

John and Vicki in Soller (pronounced So Yeah)

On their way to Cannes, we had a few hours in Madrid. The Spanish love their hamon (salty ham)

Liz, John, Mattm Vicki and Katy. We are finally in Cannes !

Cannes sunset

Amit, Daniel, Rhiannon, Emily, David, Matthew and Taylor - our guests for Vicki's 50th

Vicki, Katie and Liz 

All girl team. Taylor, Sally-Anne, Karin, Emily (posing), Vicki, Katie (why are you posing ?), Liz, Rhiannon

Love these Cannes sunsets

David and Amit flew in from their travels to make it for Vicki's 50th

Emily and Taylor. Beautiful smiles outshining an orange pink sunset in Cannes

Daniel and Rhiannon

We hired a luxury yacht to take us all to St. Tropez for Vicki's 50th. Its not the large one at the back. The 'smaller' one at the front !

Heading off on the tender to the yacht

Giving of presents. You would think John had just proposed ! 

The yacht had a large saloon area, perfect for gift giving and general catchup

Amit on the yacht

Lunch at Club 55, St. Tropez

Club 55 also had some uninvited guests - European Wasps who love eating mussels

Wasps are a real nuisance. The trick was to leave an offering pile of left overs so they would stop buzzing around

Katie and Vicki, on a tube 

Rhiannon and Karin

Amit and Matt going for it

Emily and Taylor also going for it

David and John. They nearly came off !

Perfect birthday, perfect sunset of St Tropez

Katies Birthday was celebrated at the 'golden goat' at Eze

A very nautical entree at the golden goat

Overlooking Eze

Our Hotel during our stay in Cannes

Portugal here we come

August 18^th

We departed St. Peter Port, Guernsey at 3:25pm, and are heading out to Lisbon, Portugal. We will end up mooring in Cascais, a nice marina near Lisbon. We carried out a deck check to make sure everything is secure as we will eventually cross the Bay of Biscay and don’t want anything to break on the voyage!

This Bay could give us some rough passage making. We got a bit of rain, and mainly motored as initially we had very little wind that was blowing in the opposite direction to the way we needed to go. We started our shifts of 3 hours on, 4.5 hours this time. Oh what joy!

August 19^th

Same day as yesterday except that we are now entering the famed  Bay of Biscay, and sailing over the Abyssal Plain which is over 4,800 feet deep (not that it matters much to us really, as we are not going down for a swim anytime soon).  We witnessed a beautiful sunrise, later followed by numerous pods of dolphins who would spot us and make a bee line to us, leaping in joy with perfect synchronicity. They would come across our bow and then dart quickly underneath Josie Maria, come along our side and take a quick peek or two as they follow along, until another pod would spot us and do the same thing.  It was magical!! This pretty much kept on happening for most of the day. The water was very clear and John took some good photos.

August 20^th

We started the day rather well, with good 20Kts of wind and good beam reach sailing across the Bay of Biscay. Hey, its not as bad as some have made it out to be. But things could always change. We got buzzed by a twin-engine prop plane that flew probably a few hundred metres above us. I guess the pilot wanted to take a look at us. No markings so not military.

We are enjoying the sailing and the winds are starting to pick up so its getting fun.

Famous last words, because by about 8pm it was the start of what proved to be a gale with winds of 38Kts and by 11pm, gusts up to 45knots – this went on for several hours through the night. John’s had to check out from the land of the awake, and lie down on his bed as he was not feeling too well with swells of 2-3 m waves. I guess the Bay is living up to its name after all.

Josie Maria coped really well with the gale.  We had a reefed mainsail and genoa (reef 3), and auto-pilot on – so that we could shelter from the spray coming over the bow.  It was really comforting to know that Josie Maria managed the strong winds so well.  By 3am the winds dropped, the sky was clear all night and the moon nearly full so it was beautiful with the moons reflection on the water – it also meant that during the gale we could see the swell and waves rushing at us!!

August 21^st

As John hit his bed holding onto the contents of his stomach,  Rory had to put in a few more furls on the Genoa, but we are making good time at 8-9 kts.  Vicki who noted that the winds continued to pick up and they hit 45Kts. John tried to sleep, as its one of his most effective ways to stop seasickness.- the basic theory is that dead men cant feel anything.

However he can recall waking up suddenly as he was air-lifted from his bed and slammed with vicious force into the lee cloths on the side of the bed. His theory that fat men can’t fly was put to the test –he was proved wrong again.

Lee cloths are large strong pieces of cloth rigged on the side of your bed to help prevent you from falling out of your bed when the boat keels over during rough seas. What a good invention. They looked rather stupid pathetic anti-cuddle things, but we now can appreciate their practical nautical value. 10 points to the inventor ! 

John also had another moment of clarity, as he finally understood why Vicki purchased so many pillows, having to put several all around him to wedge himself into bed to reduce the force of impact as he was slammed about his side of our double bed. He eventually managed to fall asleep and get over his sea sickness. Resolving that this night is the first of many of such rocking and rolling nights.

In the morning we experienced our first fog – we learnt fog signals and later learnt how to send them automatically through our VHF radio via our intercom system!!

After this the day brought about a much calmer sea as we started to leave the Bay. However we kept on getting a ‘Pan Pan’ with lat/long co-ordinates of a fishing vessel many hundred of nautical miles from us who was reporting a man overboard in Spanish, probably a fishing vessel. We are days away from rendering assistance, and it was frustrating for me knowing that  someone was in that stormy ocean. I truly hoped they were found. It's a reminder that we cannot take any chances. We made sure we were tied to the boat at all times and had out life vests on, as well as not to go to the front and back of the boat where the waves would just roll over.

August 22^nd

A perfect state of bliss. A lovely lazy day, out in the sun, and no strong wind to be found.

John is kind of happy and kind of sad really. His stomach feels normal again so that makes him happy, and the ocean feels like a lake.

….But he is a bit sad because we are not sailing.  We are motoring at 8 Knots with our mainsail up with one reef to give us some stability. Our engine is so quiet you could almost believe we are actually sailing but we better not mention this as we could get strange stares from the rest of the crew. Unfortunately we have 10kts of wind and we need quite a bit more wind to our sails before we can turn off the engines. We need to get to Lisbon and the motor is the only way. One moment we are complaining about too much wind, and the next we are complaining that there is not enough. Someone up “there” needs to get their plan together. Please send us just enough wind to sail.

Everyone is taking advantage of the calm seas and sunny day. After the last 24 hours, it's a relief.  We are all working away – Vicki working on her charts and passage making plans to Cannes, Rory trying to figure out why our showers wont pump out water automatically and Mike is mesmerised by the plotter, checking out nearby container ships on AIS.  David is quietly reading a novel and is rather happy. He has just found out that he is the proud grandfather of Louis David, who was born a few hours ago. I noticed a tear in his eye and a wide brim of a smile. I’m glad we got the VSAT phone working so he could make a call to his son to find out news of the birth.  Congratulations!!

We are making good waves to Lisbon. On John’s menu, so as to ensure that he gains more weight so that he cannot get airborne again (Sue wont be pleased), we aim to eat Portuguese tarts (do they really have these in Portugal ?), Portuguese Chicken and some tasty hamon salted meat (Equivalent to prosciutto, an Italian delicacy) . John is also wondering why he is thinking of food when that was the last thing on his mind the night before ?

We (Vicki and I) worked together to create some piloting plans, which basically means a series of waypoints in Lat/Long on charts before we enter them on the chart plotter and figure out the route we will take to the Strait of Gibraltar and then onto Palma de Mallorca after we leave Lisbon. Mike (our instructor ensuring that we have all bases covered – so we will be save passage makers post Cannes!!). We plan to sort out some maintenance work at Palma and catch some Mediterranean sun. Talking about sun, it's getting rather hot now. We both are starting to like the idea of an endless summer.

We have arrived at Marina Cascais as the sun was setting. This was the first time Vicki had the opportunity to park the boat into a marina under the careful guidance of Rory, our skipper. As we arrived the town was in party mode, with a rock concert occurring near the marina. The whole town was out enjoying things, so we decided to join them. We all found out that beers here are 0.7% alcohol. Enough said. It took us a while to rise the following day.

Time to depart

Lee Cloths on the side of our beds

At the main square in Lisbon

John and David enjoying a coffee and a portuguese tart in Lisbon

The Handover of Josie Maria and departing Old England

The last week after handover was quite busy for us so we were unable to update the blog. Here is a rundown of the events as they happened:

Tuesday 6th August - Wednesday 7th August.

We completed the two day handover of our yacht. This involved the Oyster company taking us through every aspect of our new yacht and all its technical points.  What a huge amount of information to absorb!!  We really needed several more days. How much of this will we retain and how much will we have to figure out ? They gave us 5 very large ring binders full of detailed information to read.... Fortunately I videoed the key points of the handover so hopefully I will be able to go through these videos as a memory jogger. Liz, Katy and Sally-Anne unfortunately had to put up with us ignoring them most of the time as we were transfixed with technical jargon and operating procedures of such a complex yacht.

On the Tuesday we spent time learning all the plumbing on the yacht by lifting every floorboard and inspecting dozens upon dozens of pipes, seacocks, valves and pumps. We need to be able to understand exactly how everything is connected so that we are able to carry out preventative maintenance from the store of spares we are carrying on board, and what spares me may need for Oyster to send over in case they are needed.  The main thing for us is to learn as much as possible so that we can carry out urgent maintenance when we are all alone at sea. I must admit that its a daunting task..  We are starting to realize with sharper clarity that we will be on our own on a vast ocean. Oyster assures us that they are only a phone call or email away, and as much as this is true, we still have to deal with any eventuality.

Wednesday was more about learning other systems such as the watermaker and the various instruments, as well as testing the sails and winches. We used a bow thruster for the very first time and flattened its battery which made coming into the marina very exciting. The Oyster crew were very much in control and brought us in safely. At least I now know that the bow thruster has its own battery and it runs out rather quickly. What can I say…It’s controlled through a joystick and as an avid gamer, I like my joysticks…

Thursday 8^th August

Handover is complete, but will be doing the technology handover on Friday. We officially pick up the boat today and have started moving all our boxes from our storage facility as well as the storage facility at Oyster onto the boat. OMG ! How much stuff did we bring ! Maybe too many toys ?

The general consensus is that there is no way we are going to get everything in on this boat. We will have to select what to keep, what to send back and what to throw out !

We went on our first provisioning trip to Tesco and in memory of my mum Maria, I decided that for dinner tonight I will make my first pasta dish on the boat; “Tagliatelle con involtini”. Yum.

Tomorrow we will be meeting with Gavin Painter our resident IT Guru from IT@Sea, a very helpful chap who will take us through all our systems. The important systems for me are our satellite internet systems ; VSAT and BGAIN, as they are vital to keep in touch with the Academy of Interactive Entertainment staff, friends and family.  I am looking forward on how to   use the sound system so I can start playing some song from my library. Gavin has made a number of very useful recommendations when we were deciding what to install on the yacht. He is the man as far as configuring your Oyster.

Friday 9^th August

Gavin arrived, but we were running late as we were all exhausted. Last night was a rather long night as we worked hard in packing things on the boat.  We decided not to sleep on the boat after the dinner but to go back to the hotel. Trying to cook on the boat for the first time was challenging as we have to learn the systems and deliver a hot meal all at the same time. Regardless of our lack of sleep, it was tremendous fun as we started making Josie Maria our home for the next year or so. Liz, Katy, Sally-Anne, David, Vicki and I drank plenty of wine. I feel like I have achieved little today( I tend to gas bag to just about anyone who walks past admiring our yacht), but the rest of the gang worked very efficiently in sorting things on the boat.

We were expecting our registration papers to arrive today but unfortunately they have not arrived. Without those papers we cannot leave on Monday as planned. This might get interesting.

Saturday 10^th August

David and I started early ; my job was to try to figure out how we could use the Lazarette (large storage area at the back of the boat) and fit in the Seabobs, while David focused on figuring out a better way of storing the spinnaker – in the end we ended up storing it in the lazarette. After the 3-4^th attempt we have managed to store quite a bit in the laz and I think with the clever storing of things by Vicki, Liz and Katy, whom I have been told are Tetris masters,  I think we might just get just about everything on the boat after all. At least its looking hopeful.

Sunday 11^th August

We will be joined by our instructor Mike Dymond,  and Rory Gillard from Vortec Marine. They are very experienced sailors ; Rory has loads of experience on Oysters and will be invaluable in helping Vicki and I understand the beast of a yacht we have purchased, and Mike will help train both Vicki and I, as he is a trainer of trainers.  We feel rather humble to be in his care. At least our friends and family will feel a little bit less concerned knowing that we are undertaking additional training particularly in relation to our new yacht. Mike and Rory will be with us all the way to Cannes, France. Our first port of call will be the Channel Island of Guernsey. When we arrive there,  we are hoping to hire a 40 foot vessel in Guernsey so we can do some close quarter tacking and jibing, man over board etc, so we can brush up on our skills. We have also accepted on board Stephen Lambert of Undercover Boss fame, on board to the Channel Islands as he has purchased an Oyster and wants to get some hands on experience. 

We decided to leave on Tuesday after learning that the registration papers for the boat will arrive sometime on Monday.

Monday 12^th August

We managed today to fit just about everything on the boat. Woot. Vicki, Katy and Liz are true Tetris masters of packing. I did have to handle a number of heckling remarks on the number of toys I’m bringing on this trip, but I’m not concerned. I will enjoy my toys, especially the quadcopter from which I hope to grab some rather nice aerial shots. I hope that the Seabobs will get a good use as they are so heavy and take so much space in the Laz. I have high hopes that family and friends will have fun and make the whole storing and sailing with loads of toys worthwhile. 

Tuesday 13^th August

Alas, most good plans never survive first contact. We had a number of niggling issues with the new yacht, which we expected as this kind of thing happens, and are glad we found the more complex ones before we left. The Oyster team are amazing. They jumped on the issues straight away and our project manager, Stephen Parkinson was on top of getting things sorted out with the their commissioning team managed by Adrian. Vicki and I  were duly impressed, and very grateful. I was also very grateful to the Oyster employee who took the time to recharge the Seabobs as the batteries needed to be kept recharged for them to not to develop problems. Its nice when someone goes out of their way to look after a client.

Unfortunately this has meant that we have had to postpone our departure till tomorrow. We decide that we would have our farewell dinner tonight and it was really nice to have Katy and Liz here in Ipswich to see us off in the morning.

Wednesday 14^th August

Again we experienced further delays. We had to wait until the tender was returned from getting an overnight repair, so we have moved our departure till this afternoon. Its really not an issue, but we are getting itchy feet as we want to set sail ! As long as we are leaving knowing that all the key equipment is working, who really cares, right ?

I would advise any new Oyster owner to allow at least a week to work through the usual niggles. We did not allow enough time. Oyster are great and will pull all stops, but if you have more time, it's a lot less stressful for everyone, including the poor suffering Oyster team keen to see us off on our adventure of a lifetime.

We finally left Ipswich. UK at 5:15pm. It was quite uneventful in the end. We jumped on and sailed off…waving goodbye to Old England.

We are finally off to realise Vicki's life long dream.

Thursday 15^th August

The first reality of our cruising lifestyle hit home last night. Passage making is all about shift work ! I new this before we left, but it really hit home. We ran a roster across three teams of two people : 3 hours on watch, and 6 hours off to sleep, except its hard to grab sleep when your yacht is sailing along and all the action is happening upstairs in the cockpit.  I felt like a zombie this morning. Will need to snatch some more sleep.

This is our first night out at sea, crossing the English Channel. We were worried that there would be a lot of other large container ships, but the Channel is well organised. There are ‘lanes’ where container boats  and other large vessels go up one side and others large ships go the other side.  There is a special lane for little yachts like ours, away from those monsters of the seas. David, Mike and Rory made it look so easy.

Friday 16^th August

We arrived in Guernsey early this morning. I don't know the exact time as I went to bed after finishing my 1am shift, but David and Vicki stayed up and lowered the anchor with Rory. I recovered a little from my zombie state, rising up and taking a look at a spectacular sight. I must admit that I have felt not a twinge of sea-sickness during the last two days. The ocean was very calm. We said good-bye to Stephen, and decided that now was a good time to grab a quick bite to eat. Seafood sounds like a good idea. We had some rather nice seafood especially the local crab, which Vicki is allergic to.   Tomorrow we will do some sailing of a rental and get our rusty skills back in shape. Its now time to fire up the internet, scan for a free marine wifi hotspot and post on Josie Maria’s blog.

Now this is a tidy cabin..

David Cutcliffe

Vicki at the helm on handover day

Katy at the helm on handover day

David giving Vicki some pointers

Katy and Sally-Anne

Stephen, Mike and Rory

We are finally underway,

We have finally arrived in Ipswich for the handover of our yacht. Its a fantastic yacht, full of very nice features. We threw a party to celebrate and invited folks from Oyster and their contractors to come along as well as some of our family from Australia and the UK.

On our voyage we will be joined by David Cutcliffe, an experienced yachtsman who is also doing the sailing adventure of a lifetime with us. Here is David helping out trying to find tools from all the spare parts currently stored at Oyster that we will be bringing onto Josie Maria in a few days ! We certainly have a lot of stuff, more on this in later posts - it should be quite funny...

David Cutcliffe

John, Vicki and sister Katy

and big sister, Liz

 Matt, Liz, Vicki and Katy

Some of the wonderful folks at Oyster who gave us a great inauguration/naming party

 Sally-Anne, Liz, John, Vicki and Katy

Now our plans are to complete our two day handover where we get to learn all about how everything works, and go for a sail.

We are also receiving a few requests from family and friends to join us. I can say that November 2013 right through the end of January 2014, when we are in the Caribbean, we are totally full ! We have some friends who will be coming over in all of February2014, and March 2014 looks like its fairly open. The Galapagos leg, probably mid April 2014 is also fast filling up. There are some great times to be had.

More photos of the build

Here are some more photos. They are a few weeks old. Next week we will see Josie Maria on the water as we have arrived in London. We are in London with Matthew, Emily and Rhiannon and plan to go to Ipswich on the 24th July to start the process of getting to know Josie Maria and provisioning her for our trip.