So Doug left Vancouver and is now on the boat and I’m spending my days waiting for the familiar ping of a WhatsApp message arriving and being pleased that the time difference is a respectable 21 hours. It was a crazy last few days: whizzing back from Texas, getting everything organized, and then him rushing off again. And now the house is all quiet and everything feels like it’s on hold, waiting for news from Illusion. (So far it’s mainly been about mold, gulls and, er, more mold. Oh, and how there’s no electricity. And that the batteries don’t work. And did I mention the bird poo? And the mold?!) Knowing that it’ll likely be a few days before he has enough internet access to write a full update on here, I get to do a little catch-up post about our recent USA trip. Continue reading “¡Su casa es mi casa!”
Tag: personal
Background checks in San Francisco
Just had the best couple of days in and around San Francisco on our trip to the States to see Doug’s family and friends before he heads off to New Zealand. He thought it was just a chance to show me where he used to live, not realizing my ulterior motive for the visit – checking a) whether he really does have a sailboat, b) whether he knows how to sail it and c) what he’s like as a captain. And the results of my research? Affirmative for the first two questions, mixed responses to the third….
“Fancy a sail?”: a bit of background
Reading Doug’s post about cruising safety reminded me of our endless Skype conversations when we first got together. Telling me about some of the people he’d met sailing, on more than one occasion the seemingly happy little anecdote ended with ‘and the boat sunk’, or ‘and he died’. An explanation would follow of how, with a little more care, the disaster could have been avoided. I think this was meant to help me feel better about the idea of going on his boat sometime, but it got to the point where I made him tell me the ending first, so I could be prepared. Most stories, though, are better told from the beginning. For example, how does an English girl based in Spain end up in Canada, about to wave her American husband off on a six month (or maybe seven, every time I ask it gets a little longer) sailing trip? And aren’t you worried about being apart that long? Well, it happened pretty much like this… Continue reading ““Fancy a sail?”: a bit of background”