Meakin on Two Easy - Meakin on Two Easy

Sunday, July 25^th 2010

Boats Babies and Back to Malta

Our remaining few weeks in Greece kept us both busy, one way or another. I did quite a few sewing jobs for our friend Roy from Golden Seal, covers in golden canvas for his wooden dinghy with matching cover for the outboard, a cover for his inflatable and a nice white leather look cover for his keyboard, which was put to good use at Tony’s Easter bash. Around 50 people attended this annual barbeque, mostly people from the marina. Tony roasted two lambs and a pig on spits and everybody brought various rice pasta and salad dishes to make it into a very nice buffet.

Traditionally Tony jumps into his pool after sitting over the spits for most of the day, this year being no exception. There was little or no warning and Linda and I managed to duck behind someone when we saw Tony jump from his balcony. A few drops of water hit us and we thought ‘oh, that wasn’t so bad’ then the big wave that must have been hovering in the air giving us a false sense of security hit us and we were drench, as were most people. Thankfully the sun had a bit of heat. We all looked like cormorants facing the sun with our arms stretched out to dry.

The next days was the ‘Curry Cup’ a boat race from Nidri to Paleros, with a curry at a restaurant and prize-giving. Tony’s partner Liz and I joined ‘the boys’ for breakfast at Nidri then drove round to Paleros with a plan to laze on the beach for a few hours and watch for the sails to appear on the horizon and take Jungle’s lines as they crossed the finishing line. By the time we had driven to Paleros and found our ‘spot’ on the beach the boats were coming in, we felt cheated of our relaxing afternoon. Jungle did well however the racing handicaps were changed mid race and instead of coming second they were dropped to fifth place. I understand all the boats have been weighed and measured and new handicaps set to avoid further riots in Greece.

Then the Icelandic volcano went ‘up’ and we watched the internet constantly wondering whether our flight back home would be cancelled. With a week to go to the flight we had to carry on as normal with our plans, sailing 2EZ to Cleopatra boat yard to leave her high and dry whilst we travelled and be ready for antifouling when we came back. We dug out our bags and still waited, we packed and still waited. Not wanting to be on the maiden voyage through the dust cloud we still waited and 24 hours before flying the airways were reopened.

We arrived back in the UK to nice warm sunshine, which let us down gently to the cold and rain that was to follow. Fortunately the weekend of the Beaulieu Boat Jumble was perfect as we worked for friends Ivor and Maggie setting up the marquee with hundreds of boxes of shoes. A successful show though I’m sure Ivor will only admit to it being ‘average’. We visited our respective ‘expectant’ families and drove to the North East to stay with my mum, waiting for baby news and enjoying trips out and fish and chips at Whitby, with memories of many a happy childhood holiday. Our time in the UK was over, and still no babies until we were back in Greece. Georgina Emily, (Mark and Sam’s little girl) was born whilst we were airborne. Sophie May (Lucy and James’ little girl) followed a few weeks later.

So now I was on a mission, two weeks hard work in the boat yard scrubbing sanding and antifouling whilst Keith repaired a ‘ding’ in the swim platform. Seems when we hit the quay in a big storm during the winter, cracked open the swim platform and we took on water. We also grew a lot of sea grass where a crab lived happily until we moved the boat when it moved house to live up our exhaust pipe. All the work done we relaunched and headed back to Lefkas for a few days to provision the boat and wait for our weather window to sail to Malta.

We fuelled up every container we could find and a few more we found on the town quay as we didn’t want to just ‘wallow’ at 1 knot in no wind. We motor sailed for three days, arriving in Malta through the moles at 6.6 knots. The engines purred away for three days never missing a beat, at last after four years of tussling, our engines are doing what they should do. We had a few stowaways on route as fledgling swifts clung to our guardrails for a rest on their migration. One poor little bird was so exhausted in ‘roosted’ under our spray hood over night, its little head under its wing resting until dawn when it shook out, did a pooh on Keith’s Leatherman case and flew off, firstly going back from where we had come which would be 300 miles to land then turned into the direction we were sailing which was only 50 miles to land. We didn’t see any dolphins this time but I saw my first turtles, the second one being about one metre long!

There was a big storm brewing as we moored in Malta and we were moved 3 times from the buoys by the tour and ferry boat owners as they all battened down for the F7 that came through. Friends Andy and Gail with little Lewkas from Tunisia were a few boats away, and had their fairlead ripped off as their boat rocked from side to side. We also met up with Monica and John also from Tunisia and rafted onto a big steel boat in front of them as we rode out the storm. In fact we’re still holding onto the steel boat.

Once the weather settled we went ashore to check our internet to find a sad email telling us that our lovely friend Eric from Nokomis (Lagos) had just died of a massive heart attack. We had such fun with Eric and wife Wiggie. When we were still in Portugal they would often drop by for coffee or to take us out for the day, and we had lots of laughs with then when we went to the Lisbon Boat Show to help them chose a new boat. They finally got their boat two years later and Eric had only 6 days of sailing it before he died. We’ll miss him a lot.

Now that we were in Malta I could start phase 2 of my mission which was to have a ‘baby fest’ trip, back to the UK to see Georgie and Sophie then to Denmark to personally deliver the smallest pair of deck shoes I’ve ever seen, from the Beaulieu show, to Clara so she will look the part when she goes sailing with her Danish grandfather. Keith stayed in Malta with the boat and it felt strange flying off without him, however I soon ‘got over’ it! First to see Sophie May who is beautiful, then I had a nice 5 days with my mum, driving through to Leeds to spend time with Georgie who is also beautiful. Then a long weekend in Denmark, to have fun with Clara who ran towards me at the airport like I’d only seen her the week before, who slept in my bed at the summer house, waking me up by stroking my face and arms. She was calling me ‘ganma’ and sometimes ‘farmor’ by the end of the trip.

Then back to Malta and work, the winter cover took 5 weeks to make and there are a few more little jobs to do before my order is complete. We had a week off when our dear friend Susan came to visit along with Keith’s granddaughter Emily. They stayed in a hotel as they wanted to have many showers which are rationed on 2EZ when not in a marina. We had nice days out and enjoyed using their hotel shower often. Now we just have a spray hood to make for 2EZ then it will be time to do a little cruising before we hook up to the land again. Firstly a nice cruise to Siracusa Sicily, then a steady sail to Lefkas Greece, to be back in time for Keith’s first sailing regatta. There will be time to do some island cruising before the winter, maybe I’ll get to do some sketching at last.

Posted by pam

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