First few days on boat

17/May/07
So here we are finally on board Wind Belle our new home for the next 2 yrs.You will no doubt get used to my awful spelling and terrible grammer. This is the reason I am not allowed to home school the girls in English. I also type rather slowly so although the length of my prose may look quit short you can re assured that it has taken a long time.
Getting here seemed like a never ending list of jobs to do. Taking the kids out of school, renting the house, packing all of our Cobham stuff into Tides reach Attic. All the time we avoided really saying good bye as we know we will see our good friends soon enough.
We have even started home schooling which is a real experience, in both the positive sense and the less positive. First of all I have to read the days lessons to make sure I vaguely know what i am supposed to do. Then it is time to be Mr Dad, but what i have found great is understanding how much the girls already know and watching them trying to learn new stuff. Makes a father feel proud and frustrated at the same time.
Sophie and I drove down to France with one car load, including putting the optimist dinghy on the roof as a roof box.Only problem was that we used one of those cheap blue tarpaulins which broke up after about 100 miles, leaving all our stuff exposed to the elements.See photo.
I finally left the De Beers group and had a great send off from one and all. (Thanks Grace) Actually i was a little embarrassed by how nice everybody was. "My office Girls" gave me a great clock and barometer which is proudly on Wind Belles wall and the office gave me a great pair of binoculars.
Just before we left we had Tallulahs 5th birthday party, some 26 kids and a big group of parents.A great way to see people before going.
Now we are in Port Camarge, on the mighty Wind Belle, it would amuse Tim Peters to hear that it is blowing 35 knots, but we feel quite snug, in the marina.
So far the girls seem to be adapting well, despite the 35 knots and blowing sand. They really enjoy going on the trampoline and skipping.
Sophie bought down their 3 hobby horses much to my protestation, but the girls have used them a lot, so you can just picture it, three blond girls doing international velvet along the dock, amongst all the yachties.
Jonathon
18th May
Johnie's spelling really is bad! Not sure mine is much better but I think my typing is. Well, day two and things are getting better by the day, today clear blue skies and sunshine, the wind even died off this evening although it was jolly hot, but seems to be nice and cool tonight. We did home schooling this morning, about time too, I think the girls have missed about a week over the pack up and move, not sure we are going to be able to give them a half term next week, I think we are on week 4 and we should be on week 5 or 6, our summer holiday is getting shorter and shorter! But still the girls worked hard this morning and although Imy needed rather a lot of persuasion she did write a lovely story about baby owls. This afternoon the girls and I spent our first afternoon on the beach which was fab and made us think for the first time we were going to enjoy this life! We even swam, all of us, which considering the water temperature was colder than our pool back home it was quite impressive! The air temperature makes it all possible which was about 28 degrees. Plenty hot enough to dry two loads of washing in only a few hours thats all I know!! Its great, I do love my washing machine.
Sophie
19th May
First trip in the boat with the girls. Started both engines, tested them in forward gear, cast off the mooring lines, then found out that the throttle on the port engine was not working. Not too much of a drama except that were in the the middle of the Marina main channel with little steerage and losts of stress and lots of traffic. My french which is nonexistent but was made up for with my gesticulations, Very French!.
Anyway we did a couple of circles out to sea, and anyone who knows me and my mechanical skills will realise that i quickly came to the conclusion that it was broken.
Back to our berth before the sea breeze kicked in. only problem is that is requires a reverse a lot with only 2 foot on each side of some decidedly aggressive looking posts. Anyway after much twittering from me and an very subdued Sophie we put the kids in the cabin locked the door, and put the boat into reverse, only for Sienna to start crying and the kids to help her escape from the cabin by giving her a leg up out of the window. Despite the distraction we made it into the birth without a scrape,or a scratch.
So that's the first day sailing, without putting a sail up.
Jonnie
20th May
Totally land locked today. But Jim and Graine have joined us. Great to have Jim aboard as he gives me an excuse for a glass of Rose'. We have been swimming in the sea every day which would amaze Katie boat. The water is the same temp as in Chi Harbour in the middle of Summer, gets rather cold around the midriff.
Also thanks to Katie boat we have mug beans growing, not quite sure what to do with them but they are shooting. So Katie if you are reading this please let us know what t do.
Jonnie
Now 25th May.
I know this gets very dull for most people. Last few days have been great. Fabulous weather, and we have been on a miny voyage. We did our first trip which was 25 miles, out to a place called Sete. At Sete we had to wait for the Bridges to be lifted, there are 5 in all and you must be ready to go through at 715 as the bridges carry all the traffic and the trains into set. We went through the bridges, some which lift and some which swing. Its very hard to believe that the whole of Sete must stop moving for a few sailing boats. Then we progressed onto Meze, which is where there are a lot of Oyster beds and a small fishing port. We were too big to get into port so had to anchor outside right by the beach in 3 meters which was about 200 meters from the beach. In the morning the girls all swam to the beach and I sailed in the opi. It was a great feeling to wake up at our first anchorage with the sea all around and gorgeous sun shine. This is what it is all about. It was so fun we decided to stay for another night. Next day back through the five bridges t 10 am. You can tell when a bridge is about to lift because the people walking across it start to run.
Then for a sail back to Port Camargue. Its then that Jim lets me know that he carries the curse of up wind sailing. He always seems to have a wind that is a beat when he is cruising true to form we end up beating the cat, we do aboout 45 degrees to the wind and were averaging 5-7 knots in 12-15 knots of breeze.
We better find some trade winds for most of our sailing.
Finally the first competition amongst the Belles has been decided. Tallulah was the first to fall into the water from the dock. luckily she had her life jacket on and the fish she was reaching for with her net got away. However she is turning out to be quite the fishing chick, and runs up and down the dock with a net getting little whitebait size fish, not that we are going to eat them knowing what we have pumped out into the harbour. Stop press all the girls have now caught a fish, Ok so they are only 2 inches long but they are the first fish of our journey.
Jonnie.
My turn now. Mum and Dad have just left after what we thought was a fabulous week, I think they had a fun time too. They both seemed very relaxed, judging by how much wine was consumed and how much sleep was had! We have been incredibly lucky with the weather while they have been here I don't think they saw a cloudy day. We ate outside every meal and it certainly didn't rain. However since they have left the weather has taken a turn for the worse and we had our supper inside tonight and I have just had to bring the towels in as it has started to rain, come back mum and dad! Tomorrow is Sunday and the forecast for the next few days isn't great but our plan for tomorrow is to go to a bull fight (a friendly one Johnie assures me) apparently they take ribbons of the bulls horns should be entertaining anyway. Everyone very tired tonight, too late to bed last night for the girls resulted in a lot of tears this evening. When wanting to leave the beach at 5 o clock the girls did say they wanted to go home but when asked if they meant really home they said "no, back to Wind Belle" which was a relief !
Soph X
28th May
Yesterday we went to a bull show. At the show a big bull was put in the middle of the circle it had ribbons on his
Jonnie head.
There were nine people in with the bull,when the bull ran to the men they jumped over the wall. Sometimes they grabbed a ribbon from the bull's horns.
Imoge
Tallulah has also been the second person to fall in the water, reaching for a crab, Having already got the gold medal for falling in and now the silver i full expect her to get the bronze as well.