Here I am again!!

Well it is the last day of 2007, a year that has seen a lot of comings and goings- not all in the direction I expected! When we flew back to England in July we really didn't know what to expect. We were on a bit of a rollercoaster emotionally. But we soon settle down into life in Dartmouth. Julia went to Brownie camp and then moved up to Guides. Lydia found a new singing teacher and had a term of lessons ,she also joined the Saturday morning orchestra and will continue with that in the new year.
But the biggest turn around was our decision to keep Pumpkin and bring her back to England- as quickly as possible!! To that end Phil and Daniel are flying out to Cebu on 2nd Jan to sail the first leg to Klang in Malaysia where it is planned that Daniel will fly back to England and Phil will take on new crew in the form of Chris and Katie Devenish.
This of course means that the girls and I are going to be on our own for quite some time,which is not great, but this trip for Phil will be a great experience. Since leaving the RM band he has benn a bit in limbo, too much DIY at home and at Church and not enough music ( which, lets face it is what he does best!) so this for him, especially the chance to spend time with Dan will be great.
I am going to try and write more frequently this year and keep a record of Pumpkin's doings!!

Well here we are back in Tagbilaran again!
Since my last post a lot has happened. We, rather foolishly( as we now know) left for Palau. We cleared Customs and Immigration and we were on our way! Before we had left Philippine territorial waters we hit some bad weather. The boat withstood the conditions with no problem, but not all the crew! Julia was sea sick, but not too badly. I, on the other hand, proceeded to pass out after every spell of vomiting! This was enough to convince Phil to turn around and head back to calmer waters. Maybe I am not fit for Ocean sailing after all.
After much prayerful consideration we have decided to return to the UK for the time being. We are leaving Pumpkin at Tagbilaran in the care of a local boatman. We will put her up for sail, but if there is no interest Phil may return to Pumpkin with a view to sailing her down to Australia with an able bodied crew.

Goodbye Hannah and Dan!!

Hannah and Dan flew back to England yesterday, so we are back to just the four of us. Although the Yacht club is convenient we won't be sorry to sail away from here, it is hot, noisy and very insecty!! We all get bitten at night despite wearing lots of insect repellant and keeping covered up!
Phil is keepimg a close eye on the weather forecast ( he gets daily updates on his mobile phone), if the weather is okay, God willing, we will leave the Philippines tomorrow to sail to Palau.
This is the scary bit!! This will probably be my last post until we get there. Don't know how easy it will be to use the net when we get there.

Still in Tagbilaran!!

Yes, I know I said we would be leaving today, but Phil and I went shopping for ice this morning and took advantage of a couple of hours on our own away from the boat and the girls(and boy).
Any way there wasn't much wind so we took a walk into Tag.We found the local museum, which was very interesting and we are having tea at the mall, which will give me a cooking free evening. I bought fabric this morning so I nrrd to get my sewing machine out and make storage bags for our clothes.
Hopefully tomorrow we will mae it to Cabilao.

Tagbilaran again!

It is Monday and we are back in Tagbilaran. I did a mountain of washing and left it hanging up to dry on the boat while we came to the mall. We watched a film and caught up on emails, and now we need to start stocking up ready for our trip to Palau. We had a lovely few days at Alona, big news- Hannah and Dan are now engaged! We definitely need to be back in the UK for their wedding!
Tomorrow we will leave for Cabilao and more swimming and fish watching. Dan and Hannah fly back yo England next week, so we will be back in Cebu to see them off.

Back to Alona!

It is now Thursday and we are back at Alona beach, but this time with Pumpkin!
We left Cebu Yacht Club on Saturday and sailed for the Camotes Islands where we anchored off Santiago and had a lovely day swimmimg on Sunday after family worship.Monday saw us on the move again to Bonoon, than on to Ubay which is a bit off the beaten track so we were a source of great interest to everyone. Dan celebrated his birthday with a visit ashore in the evening for a drink and a song or two on the karaoke machine! Last night was an overnight sail all the way to Alona beach so we are all a bit sleep starved. We plan to say here for a couple of nights to enjoy the beach and the swimming.

Going sailing!

Hannah and Dan Durdin have now spent their first night on board with us. It was very hot and very noisy as the restaurant next door to the Yacht club has live music every evening including karaoke! I think tonight we might just sit in the bar with a cold drink rather than try and sleep in the heat listening people murdering various songs!
Dan has bought a guitar and Lydia has her clarinet, Phil has his piano accordion, so we could probably make quite a bit of noise ourselves!
Tomorrow we leave the yacht club to do some island hopping, cool breezes, sea to swim in and sandy beaches! Lovely!

We are back in Cebu today, Wednesday 13th June, moored in the yacht club ready to pick up Hannah and Dan Durdin from the airport for a 3 week stay on Pumpkin.
We arrived this morning after an overnight sail from Cabilao where we had picked up a buoy near the reef. We saw dolphins and flying fish, and Phil and the girls snorkeled. It remains very hot but once we get out sailing again it will be more bearable.The chance to come to an internet cafe is very welcome!

I have just realised that these posts are UK time! It is actually 5.55pm here in Tagbilaran!

Today we left Mond See Land resort (after having our last swim in the pool), and moved on board Pumpkin! We all swam in the sea and Phil climbed the mast.
Tonight we sleep afloat for the first time! We all got lots of sun today,probably too much, so we have invested in more sunblock.
There is still more to do on the boat but hopefully we will have a sail soon.

Well here we are on Wednesday 5th June and we are here in the Philippines at Alona beach.
As you would expect it is VERY HOT and we are very grateul for the air-con and the swimming pool outside our chalet.
Pumpkin is looking good but there is a lot of sorting and tidying to do, so the first few days when we move on board won't be very relaxing, but once we get sailing it will be great (I hope!)
The shops,cinema and internet cafe are a haven of coolth, we even saw 'Shrek the Third'!

Well we are finaly packed, just about! Still too much stuff but Hannah can bring some for us in a couple of weeks. We now need to buy a clarinet as well as a guitar when we arrive.
Everyone is a little tense at times, but as Phil says this time next week it will all be over and we will be there on Pumpkin!
Said goodbye to the Ryders yesterday and to the Hackers today, and Hannah comes to the airport on Sunday to wave us off and take the car back to Portsmouth. Departure time approaches! Wah!!!!

Not quite there yet!

This time next week we should all be in the air, on our way to Pumpkin! It is amazing to think that we are this close to leaving.
We are still in the middle of packing and struggling to keep within our weight limit! But we'll get there in the end.