Dr Seuss once said…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

…”Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened!”

It’s been a loooong time since I’ve posted anything on the blog but I thought I should give an update of where we’re at with everything.

We’ve been back in Australia for two months now and we have all slotted straight back into the lives we left behind this time last year. Kir and Xav have gone back to school, Mum’s working on starting her Yoga business back up and I’m back at university. we’re back living in Helensburgh which has made the process of rebuilding our “normal” lives a breeze thanks to the amazing friends we have here.

It’s incredible to think that a few months ago, we were living on a yacht in the Caribbean, living a life so different to the one we’re living now. And honestly, if it weren’t for the photos and people constantly asking how our “holiday” was, we could almost forget that we’ve even been away! That’s not to say we didn’t have an amazing time. What we did was an adventure of a lifetime and we most certainly do not regret doing it. I think, if anything, it shows how supportive all of our friends are and that fortunately, we are a pretty adaptable bunch of people. It also helps that we are living in an absolutely gorgeous part of Australia.

So yeah, we’re renting a little house (big compared to Planet Ocean!) in Helensburgh and it’s pretty close to everything which is nice. Dad is still on Planet Ocean and he is just in the process of setting off to Panama to finally fulfil his life long dream of crossing the Pacific. He has got crew and it should take him about 6 or 7 months, depending on the winds and how much he wants to see. That’s the plan at the moment but as you know, in the cruising world, no plan is a good plan!

Anyway, here’s some photos to show what I’ve been up to since we’ve been back and to show all of you non-Australian folk what you’re missing.

Did I sat that we live on a beautiful part of the coast?

This is about 15 minutes from home

Australia definitely has lovely beaches

Just because we’re back doesn’t mean there’s no boats involved!

Kayaking 30 minutes from home

I’ve been spending lots of time with friends to make up for the lack of in the Caribbean!

In the next few days, I’m going to post lots of photos to show off our time on the boat which will not only refresh your minds, but ours as well!

Also, I made a video for my friends to show what my life has been like over the last year and a half but I thought I’d share it here. There is a bit of french at the very end of the video, so you might want to watch it without young children the first time round!

Australia Bound

So it’s only a few days away and we will be back in Australia. Wow what a year. I thought I’d write a few words to try to express how we feel returning but it’s not easy, here goes anyway.

Yesterday Kirana was asking me, what do you say when someone asks, so how was your trip. I suppose we all feel like it hasn’t been a trip like a holiday is. It’s been an experience, yes many say of a lifetime and I would say that, but it’s certainly been an experience filled with lots of fun and lots of challenges.
It’s a tricky one to explain as living on a boat is not normal and to try to explain family life on a boat is hard. I would say it’s the extremes. It’s amazingly fantastic and then can be incredibly hard. Your living in a confined space and moving around a lot so nothing seems to be consistent. It is fantastic having your home with you all the time and our boat was a great set up for the 5 of us where we could all escape when we needed to and believe me those times were often.
I loved The amazingly beautiful remote places you can go to and only people who own boats can get to. Being able to just jump into the water when your hot. Sailing along and feeling invigorated thst your just using the wind to move to your next destination. Feeling self sufficient.
Sailing is a challenge in it’s self. For me it certainly has been. I grew up on the Yorkshire moors for gods sake, until I moved to Bali water wasn’t my thing. I’m also a worry wart, a little more than I realized so it certainly has challenged a lot of more fears.
When we left at the beginning of last year after selling our house and everything we owned , I remember thinking to myself why am I doing this. The answer was because I want to spend the time with my family. But not just with them, fully submerged in each other’s lives. Yep a boat will do that. But for me it has been incredible and a great success. I have watched each of them grow a lot. It’s not been easy for them at all. School has been very hard and we all totally under estimated how hard that would be. But out of it they have had to teach them selves how to learn independently. Kirana would say she now understands how important education is and that you get out of it what you put into it. It’s also hard with no internet. Just to go and find internet it’s in the dingy drive to the dock walk to a cafe only often to find the internet was too slow to download the information she needed, so it was all a constant challenge. Having said that Kiranas end results were very good. Xavier’s schooling was easier as it was all on usbs infact a fantastic set up he’s also do ne very well. Xavier keeps saying he can’t wait to go to school and study with other kids. They’ve also had to cope with very little friends. Xavier was lucky he met quite of few of his age but there are no I mean no 16 and 19 year olds cruising. Well not that we met anyway.
So the boat and Markus are currently in Dominica and slowly making there way towards the north of the Caribbean and possibly to America and when he’s ready we will see Planet Ocean.
We have met some amazing people whilst being in the Caribbean. The sailing community Is amazingly friendly and fun. We miss them all and wish them all a great journey.
It has truly been an amazing journey for all of us.
So what are we all looking forward to coming back to. FRIENDS. All of us have missed friends so much. I’m looking forward to teaching yoga again and just coming back to lovely Australia.
See you soon.

Here’s some pictures of Bali for you all!

Hotel in Benoa

Cousin Kara telling Kirana a story.

This is the usual method of travel.

Family gathering

We were brought breakfast every morning at the Villa we were staying in.

Amed

Sunrise at Amed

Dolphins

Ubud

Ubud

No trip to Bali is complete without the food!

Watching movies with cousins.

Another Christmas Gone By

Merry Christmas to you all!

So, another Christmas has gone by and what a Christmas it was for us! For the first time ever, we had Christmas with the family and it was great.

So, the night of Christmas Eve, we had our own dinner with a roast turkey, vegetables, leeks in white sauce, bred sauce and all sorts of traditional English things. We stuffed ourselves until bursting and then had to cram in some Christmas pudding for good measure. We then had an early night so Santa would come quicker which is not easy when everyone’s buzzing from the excitement of Christmas the next day!

Our pre-christmas Christmas dinner

Xav woke up at sunrise (about 7:30am here!) and did the rounds, waking us all up and dragging us down to the tree. Eventually, we all got down stairs and the present unwrapping began. Thankfully, we are in England temporarily so we couldn’t get anything too big and expensive because we don’t have much room in our suitcases. No room actually!

We then went for a walk to the seafront because they do a swim around Brighton Pier every year on Christmas day so we thought that would be fun to watch. Sure enough, we get there and are greeted by barriers blocking the beach with signs telling us the beach was closed because it was too rough. Just our luck. We then went for a walk through Brighton which was really nice. Because it was Christmas morning, there was absolutely no one around!

Our walk along the seafront

Empty Brighton streets

After our stroll through town, we went home to play with our presents and just relax for a while and for good reason. That evening we were set to go to my aunty’s house and there’d be 18 of us!

At about 3:00 we went around to her house and we had a great time. We all brought some food and we had everything you could imagine from roast chicken and turkey to smoked salmon and ham. We then opened the presents we’d gotten each other then played some games. Playing games with 18 people is about as good as it gets and we had such a ball!

Nothing beats a homemade trifle

We are so so so happy that we got to spend Christmas with family. It will most probably be the last time that we’ll all be here in England together so it is definitely something that we’ll remember for quite some time!

And People Think We Failed..?

Whenever we tell people about our incredible trip, people are amazed at how we pulled it off. That is, until we tell them that we got off. That’s normally when they’re look of sympathy kicks in and they say how sorry they are. Basically, they think we failed… Again! I completely understand that way of thinking and I too was disappointed at how embarrassing it is that we didn’t pull it off quite as we intended. It is, of course, human nature to want more.

However, being in England has given us time to think about it all and I decided to go back through the photos of our year. What I realised is that it is SO far from a failure it isn’t funny! The things we have seen and done are experienced by so few, it makes me feel selfish to be upset about it at all. I mean, in the last year, speaking just for myself, I have been to 13 different countries spread over 4 continents, swum with sharks and dolphins, stood next to Richard Branson’s yacht, freedived to 55ft/16m, learned to hold my breathe for 3 minutes, met great people that I never thought I would meet in a million years, seen some insane wealth and some obscene poverty, caught fish that people pay to fly all over the world to catch, learned to sail, the list goes on and on! Sure, you could be negative and say we missed out on lots of things but you could also think positively and say that we have had an incredible time and have taken away memories that will last a lifetime.

It’s annoying to think that it took so long to realise all of this and to appreciate what we’ve done!

Thankfully, we took thousands of photos (literally, I have 3000 odd photos on my computer!) so we will never ever forget such an awesome experience! I decided to make a slideshow to show how much fun we’ve had and I thought I would have about 50 photos that would really show what it was like but there was no chance. I ended up with about 200 photos after an hour of separating the good from the bad so it’s quite a long slideshow but if you can sit through all of it, you will understand what I mean when I say it was an incredible experience.

A Sandwich in Greenwich

Greenwich. The place that started navigation as we know it today. That’s a pretty big claim but it’s true!

So, a few days ago we visited Greenwich – yes, as in Greenwich Mean Time – and we had a great time. We set off in our little hire car armed with food, iPods and some directions thought up by google maps, determined to not get lost like out past few outings. It all went pretty smoothly until we got close to Greenwich. For those of you that don’t know, Greenwich is in London so it is BUSY! Add to that the fact that the road signs here are just weird, it gets pretty stressful. One thing that us Australian’s should be so thankful for is our road signs. In Australia it’s all pretty self explanatory, a big sign with 110 on it means you go 110km/h. Easy. On English motorways, numbers are too boring. Instead, they have a white circle with a black diagonal line across it which means a certain speed on a motorway and something else on a smaller road. There’s also a blue sign with a red circle and a cross but I still have no idea what it means. Pretty self explanatory to anyone who isn’t English… Not!

Anyway, enough about road signs. We eventually found our way to the Greenwich Observatory and got a free (yes, free!) parking spot which was good. We wandered around the museum/gallery for a few hours, checking out all of the different exhibitions they had on and we all really learned a lot from that. They had lots of interactive stuff that Xav loved which is always a bonus.

Yep, that’s a telescope…

We then decided we wanted to go to the observatory to learn all about longitude and see the Prime Meridian line. Turns out you have to pay £7 each just to go in so we decided against that.

The Royal Observatory of Greenwich

Thankfully, as we were leaving we spotted a gate to the side of the building which had the Prime Meridian line on the other side so we went in and took some photos of that. I don’t know what I was expecting but I was disappointed to find just a metal line on the ground. No red glow from the Earth’s core, no vortex sucking you in and as far as I know, I haven’t got any super powers from it, so, it was a bit of an anti climax but still cool to say we’ve been there. The importance of the line isn’t how it looks but in fact, what it does.

Not exactly spectacular is it?

That boring metal line on the grown is accepted as 0˚ longitude which is important because the Earth is a sphere, so we have to have a starting point to measure things from. That all important starting point has been given to this line at Greenwich Observatory and because of this Prime Meridian line, it has allowed accurate navigation for the past hundred years by working out how far away from the line you are. This same principle is still used today on boats, in planes and even the navman in your car. So, it was cool to see where it all started and what it’s all about, even if it is a boring metal line on the ground.

We then wandered around Greenwich a bit but it was SO cold so we decided to head back to the warmth of our car and enjoy some sandwiches before our, hopefully “lost-free” drive back.

Now, without a doubt we are a strange bunch of people. We have used google maps to find our way around every time we go somewhere and without fail, we get lost (lost meaning; we have no idea what the instructions are saying but we’re going to guess anyway) every time yet we still insist that, “we don’t need a road map” and that “google maps is fine, we get there in the end.”

Anyway, that’s all for this post because I’m sure I’ve bored you all with my lecture on what makes your navman send you up one way streets and around in circles. We’re all getting excited for a big family Christmas now so, fingers crossed it’s as good as we’re hoping, some even talk about their plans for when it snows in hushed voices but we won’t get too excited about that for now.

2 Months

So it’s been just over 2 months and our lives have changed massively! We have gone from living on a boat with the floor space of your average double garage to living between 2 ‘normal’ houses – I’m not going to lie, one of them isn’t much bigger than a double garage (sorry Nanet but it’s true!)

Another thing that is a massive change is the weather. Without a doubt, one thing that the Caribbean is known for is it’s warm and sunny tropical climate. Also highly documented and completely opposite is England’s weather – a mass of rain and clouds with a tad of sun once every few years. Ok not quite that bad but you know what I mean. It’s definitely safe to say that going from the Caribbean to England was quite a shock to the system, not just weather wise, but also in terms of day to day life.

For example, one thing that we can’t get our heads around is how different the people are! (yes we get it, it’s a different country, lifestyle and all that but this is like night and day.) If you walk along a street in the Caribbean, you’re expected to say hi and those who don’t are considered to be rude (seriously, we had a man come out of his bar and tell us to say hi back to him when we were soaking in the sights, oblivious to the friendly greeting being yelled our way.) Walk along a street in England and you’re expected to bury your head in your iPhone or use all your will power to stare directly in front of you and avoid eye contact at all costs, those that do say hi and give eye contact are considered weirdos. Of course, coming from the Caribbean, we’ve been saying hi to everyone we walk past and it’s incredible how startled some people are as they snap out of their zombie-like state. Some try and pull themselves together and squeeze out a “hi!” but end up with a sort of “hurrr……” while others just pretend us ‘weirdos’ don’t exist.

Having said all that, it really isn’t all that bad! I mean we have had one person say hi… No, I’m joking. Quite a few people say hi but not anywhere near as many as in the Caribbean and thankfully, the weather gods have been very good to us which has been great. Still, we can’t help but feel like we’ve stepped onto another planet entirely, one where people are more focused on having the latest iPhone allowing you to load Angry Birds half a second faster and can read your thumb instead of having to type out that monstrous four number password, when in reality, they should put that money into having fun and spending time with their families. Maybe it’s because we’re more suited to life on a boat in the Caribbean or maybe the ‘western world’ has gone a bit too far? Who knows.

Don’t get me wrong, we all have an iPod or iPhone each and we use it everyday. I mean, Mum even takes Xav’s iPod away as a punishment. We also love England and we have had an amazing time and seen some incredible sights but it is definitely missing that sense of warmth (both from the people and the weather) which was everywhere in the Caribbean. Thankfully, we have amazing friends and family here who are so supportive it’s ridiculous and we’re very thankful for that!

Finally gotten that rant off my chest! Here’s some of the highlights of England so far:

This guy was drawing country’s flags in chalk

Hundreds of beach huts in a row

Mmmm cake!

Malham Cove. The view from the top. Some of you may recognise this place from a Harry Potter film.

Bolton Abbey

After the caves we drove 5 minutes down the road to this Aqueduct.

Nice contrast between the old and the new.

In other news, it’s now December so the Christmas count down has begun! Here’s what we got in our first pocket of our homemade advent calendar:

Spot anything strange?

Musical Houses

Musical houses is a perfect way to describe our life here in England over the last two months. We have been moving to a different house every 10 days or so and although it can get stressful, it has generally been great thanks to the fact that we get to see so much. We visited the amazing countryside of Yorkshire, the lovely town of Leigh-on-sea which sits on the edge of the Thames and we’ve seen the hustle and bustle of the city of Brighton.

At the moment we’re in Leigh-on-sea until tomorrow then we’ll be back in Brighton in time for Xav’s football practice he does on Saturdays. We have a hire car which has been perfect because it allows us to get out into the more remote areas and the other day we did just that.

We visited the small town of Maldon which is on the banks of the Thames.

We visited the Chapel of St. Peters-on-the-wall which is a tiny chapel in the middle of nowhere. It was built on the walls of an old Roman fort in 645AD so it’s amazing how well it’s held up over time.

It really was in the middle of nowhere.

Tiny little building.

The view from the church.

Nice contrast between the old and the new.

We then went for a walk around Leigh-on-sea which ended up being a really long walk much to the disappointment of Xav and Kir. We went into Prittlewell Priory which was founded in the 12th century by monks.

The start of our long walk.

The Priory gardens

We had a puppet show put on by Xav

Monk Xavier comes to greet us.

To the delight of most of us, we got the bus back!

Tomorrow we’re heading back to Brighton where we’ll stay for a while until the music starts again and we pack our bags and move to the next house.

Photo Epic

So I have been suuuuper lazy lately and have not been motivated to write a new post. I’d like to say that I don’t have the time but, let’s be honest, I don’t have a job or uni work to do so I think it’s fair to say that I have too much time on my hands.

It’s not like we’ve been having a boring time either. We have been for walks along the sea front, watched fireworks for bonfire night, celebrated Xav’s 11th birthday, visited Leeds Castle and to top it off, we’ve just been up to Ilkley in Yorkshire for 10 days to see where Mum grew up and to visit some of her school friends. Now, obviously that’s a lot of stuff to write about. Too much I’d say… Instead, I’ll put lots of pictures up and by the time you’ve looked through them all, you would’ve seen tens of thousands worth of words given that “a picture tells a thousand words.”

We started in Leigh-on-Sea at Kakek’s house where we luckily didn’t get affected by those wild 90mph winds I mentioned in the last post. The reason we were there was because Mum flew to Miami to go to a yoga conference for a few days – it’s a hard life, trust me. We all got into the swing of things pretty quickly and Xav and I helped out with some gardening. Kir and Xav got really stuck into school which was much needed. It’s amazing how well they do school under the watchful eye of anyone but Mum…

Having fun with some sparklers.

Mum then arrived back in England the day after Xav’s birthday so we had a little family get together and had some cake. That night also happened to be bonfire night so we had fireworks going off all over Brighton and we had a great view from one of the bedroom windows upstairs.

Mmmm cake!

The sight out of the bedroom window.

11! Note the candle as an extra finger.

We stayed in Brighton for a while and went for walks along the seafront which was nice. We managed to witness the aftermath of a little crash which livened the day up a little.

Luckily no one was hurt.

Then we headed to Ilkley in Yorkshire for a tour of where Mum grew up. It was a massive 6 hour drive and we were so thankful when we pulled into Philippa’s (Mum’s friend) house and were greeted with hugs and spaghetti bolognese. This is where we’d be calling home for the next 7 days (we loved it so much that we stayed an extra 3!) We went into tourist mode and visited all sorts of sightseeing spots.

On our way to Malham Cove.

Malham cove. This photo doesn’t do this place justice.

Malham Cove. The view from the top. Some of you may recognise this place from one of the Harry Potter films.

Malham Cove. There were literally hundreds of coins stuck into this log.

Bolton Abbey.

Bolton Abbey.

The Strid.

The Strid.

We had an amazing walk to the Strid thanks to the beautiful Autumn leaves.

We decided to go for a drive to Haworth and our GPS took us everywhere but Howarth.

We never got to Howarth so we stopped at a tiny town called Heptonstall which was lovely.

White Scar Caves. The boys leading the way.

We came out into this massive cavern at the end.

White Scar Caves.

After the caves we drove 5 minutes down the road to this Aqueduct.

One of the days we went for a walk around a reservoir. One of Mum’s good school friends joined us which was nice.

The Reservoir.

Being in the North of England, it gets a lot colder than Brighton.

One of the many places we visited.

The countryside is magnificent!

As you know, nothing ever goes that smoothly for us so keeping with tradition, we were in Ilkley and everyone was hoping for snow and when we saw the frost, our hopes were high. Sure enough, we came to the end of our time in Ilkley and hadn’t seen snow. We headed back to Brighton on our 6 hour drive and sure enough, as we walk in the door we get a call from Philippa telling us it’s just snowed! 

I’ll try and write more frequently now I promise!

One Month Already!

“Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone”

So, we have been in England for a whole month already and I think it’s safe to say that the above lyrics sum it up.

“Ahhh, this temperature is perfect!” I said as we walked out of the airport on a crisp, 24 degree English morning. We hopped into our small hire car, making sure to fill every nook and cranny with luggage, and set off for Brighton where we would be staying with my Grandma, Nanet (Indonesian for Grandma). We were warmly welcomed into her house and we instantly began retelling our past 7 months of adventure. My Aunties (Mum’s sisters) popped round to say hi and by the end of the day, it’s safe to say that our narrating skills were on par with those of David Attenborough.

Anyway, we stayed for about 10 days in Brighton where went for walks along the seafront, played soccer in the park and went sightseeing in the countryside. Obviously, we have done a lot over the span of a month so I’m going to use photos to try and show it all. As they say, a picture tells a thousand words.

Evening walk on the seafront

The countryside

Pottery at Nanet’s

Walking in the countryside

We then headed off to Leigh-on-Sea which is where Mum’s Dad, Kakek (Indonesian for Grandpa), lives. The house is much bigger so it’s a lot less crowded and we can all have our own space – in Brighton I have to sleep on an inflatable bed that goes down by the morning, so, a normal bed is a welcome sight! We played mini golf, went to the driving range and played all sorts of games which was good fun.

Games!

Driving range

Yep, that’s right, 2 golf balls balancing on one another…

Mini golf

During our stay there, we also went for a trip up to London for a day which was really nice. It’s such an amazing city with such history and grand buildings whilst also having amazing modern buildings which are home to hundreds of offices. We went into the National Art Gallery, visited Trafalgar Square, walked by Big Ben and crossed the Millennium Bridge, all while getting free bus rides which are included with the train tickets. Public transport in London is really quite amazing. Once again, I’ll let the photos do the talking.

St. Paul’s Cathedral

Millennium Bridge with St. Paul’s Cathedral in the background

Street performers are everywhere in London

London Bridge and The Shard. Both old and new architecture in the same city.

This guy was drawing country’s flags in chalk

Big Ben

That iconic red bus

Trafalgar Square

Street performers in Trafalgar Square

Trafalgar Square

National Art Gallery

We then headed back to Brighton for a few nights then set off to Mudeford to stay in Nanet’s beach hut. Everyone we told about our plans thought we were mental and that we’d freeze to death! Despite the doubters, we stuck with it. It ended up being really lovely and because it was so cold, there was absolutely no one there. One day, we went to visit stonehenge as it is only an hour or so drive from the beach hut and when we arrived there, we were shocked at what it had turned into. There were fences everywhere and it was a full blown construction site. To top it all off, it cost £8 each! We ummed and ahhed for a while before deciding that it wasn’t worth it and that you can see it perfectly well from the road.

Hundreds of beach huts in a row

Family portrait

Stonehenge from the road. I underestimated how enormous the stones are. They are massive!

Xav went swimming!

A storm decided to roll over one night

Evening walks on the beach

We then came back to Brighton which is where we are now and as I’m sitting here, there’s a monstrous storm brewing which will send 90mph winds our way in the next few days…or so they say. Our experiences with weather information on the boat has lead us to take all weather predictions with a pinch of salt. What we can guarantee is that it’s only getting colder from here, so that perfect 24 degrees has turned into a nippy 15 degrees and no doubt that it will continue to plummet for as long as we’re here. That crazy heat isn’t looking so bad anymore!

Overall, we have been having a great time and I’m sure we will continue to have a great time. There’s so much to do in England that I’m sure we’ll have plenty to do for now.

Also, now that I have so much time on my hands, I can make videos. I’ve decided to make a sort-of ‘series’ about our trip. So, here’s the first episode:

The Planet Ocean Implosion

“Sometimes good things fall apart so better things can fall together.” – Marilyn Monroe

So, we have some pretty important news that we’ve been delaying for longer and longer and finally we’re writing a post for you all. As you can tell by the quote above, something’s gone amiss aboard Planet Ocean, something is falling apart. Unfortunately, that something is our whole trip.

What?! You guys were having such a great time!

Ain’t that the truth! But understandably, living on a boat with a floor area the size of most of your garages is clearly going to be a challenge. Take away the abundance of friends that “normal” people have in their day to day life and it’s getting very tough. Throw in some schoolwork and you have the perfect recipe for an imminent implosion.

Hell yeah we have had these implosions on land, but everything on a boat is amplified ten-fold thanks to the fact that there’s no escape. So, coming onto the boat, we knew it was going to be tricky but, we’re a good family and we can usually sort it out, and sort it out we did, for a while. What we under-estimated, is the schoolwork. Being on a boat with one living area that is often host to schoolwork, cooking and lounging around, all at once, is extremely difficult. Then, there’s the added distractions that you don’t get when you’re staring at a whiteboard in your quite classroom. Things like; the beautiful surrounds, the constant lapping of water against the hulls, the sound of a dinghy motoring past every few minutes, the insane heat and humidity, the constant coming and goings of friends and family, the chatting of everyone on the boat, the movement of the whole boat and of course, the biggest factor, the presence of family members (even sitting and reading in the same room seems to diminish any chance of productive schoolwork).

This lack of productivity/motivation was becoming a serious problem for Kir and Xav. So much so for Kir that she was (and still is to an extent) on the brink of failing year 10 meaning she’d have to repeat it. Definitely not good news.

Also, the fact that we live on a boat, with limited internet and a very slow postal service, meant that Kir and Xav weren’t receiving work until it was too late. As in, they were just starting when they should’ve been halfway through it.

So, what’s happened?!!

Well, we’ve gotten off for a bit of a break from the monotony and insane heat of Grenada. We’ve flown to England to stay with relatives which should give us that much needed breath of fresh air. It will help Kir and Xav catch up with their schoolwork and it’ll allow all of us to get our heads on straight and work out the kinks that are all too common in a cruising lifestyle. Dad has stayed on the boat to look after it and have a break from all of us as well.

How long until the better things fall together and you get back on?

Well, at this stage, we have no idea. Probably a few months so we can escape hurricane season but nothing’s definite yet. We have great friends and family here in England so we’re taking it one step at a time for now.

A goodbye games night was in order

Airport

The kids of Moana Roa and Planet Ocean

So there you have it! I’m sure some were wondering why there were no posts, well now you know. Hopefully we’ll have everything sorted soon enough and we can get back into the swing of things again.

Big shout out to everyone that’s helped us so far, it’s been great having the support and we can’t thank you enough!

Here’s a video I’ve put together quickly to show what Grenada (and a few other places) were like.