Back to the future

I'm sorry to have taken so long to update the blog, but as I said in the last posting, it is quite disheartening doing so, and I have also been somewhat preoccupied over the past two months.

The Admiral is recovering well, but slowly. She had 4 trips to the hospital in the end - the first for 5 days, then straight back in for another 2 days, 2 weeks at home and back in for another 2 days, another 2 weeks at home then back in for 13 days. I think that adds up to 4 admissions and 22 days "inside". 2 trips in ambulances, Xrays, MRI's and two trips to theatre for angiograms and a stent, plus the pharmacy full of drugs that she is presently on (and they keep changing) - I shudder to think what all this would have cost us in the USA, considering her heart condition was not covered by our travel insurance while we were doing Stage 1 of the Loop!

Last month we had our "kids" over (including Shawn, who lives in Australia) plus my sister who looked after Woody, and a few friends for Christmas a dinner on the 25th  (a couple of months late). We had turkey and ham and mashed potatoes and gravy, roasted veges and cranberry sauce - all very reminiscent of our Thanksgiving day feast at Panama City. Finished it off with steamed fruit pudding with custard and cream and ice cream. Plenty of bubbles and sangria. Carolyn is going to stay with our son Adam, who lives on Great Barrier Island in the Hauraki Gulf (nowhere near the Gt Barrier Reef), while we are away shifting the boat.

We took Shawn out for a weekend in Kindred Spirit (yes - we still have her..... and she still goes) and we fished and he dived and we finished up with several meals of fish and shellfish - snapper, REAL mussels and a few scallops.

Charlie, Pauline and I leave tomorrow night for our return to the USA and delivery voyage of Loopy Kiwi to Savannah to rendezvous with the cargo ship that is bringing her home. About 2 weeks ago we got an email from the shipping Company informing us that, due to lack of cargo, the ship was going to bypass Savannah , and the next sailing was 3 weeks later! As we had already bought and paid for the airfares to and from NZ to Savannah, plus all the other travel arrangements, this threw us into a bit of a tizz - but fortunately, after several days of negotiation the freight company managed to talk the shipping company into calling at Savannah, so the schedule was reinstated (although the sailing is now 5 days later). So here's the final leg of her Great Loop voyage (in red, of course):

 

While I was updating the map of our Loop trip so far, I noticed that the map itself finishes just north of Savannah. Maybe it was trying to tell me something.....spooky eh?

 

Thanks again to our well-wishers. I hope we can catch up with some of you during the last part of our US journey, and you know you will always be welcome to visit us in New Zealand