Packing

Last weekend was spent almost entirely spending lots of money on internet shopping! Therefore most of this week was spent receiving parcels in the post! I don’t care what anyone says, no one can convince me that isn’t much better than the horrors of shopping at weekends, not that the sort of thing we were buying can be bought on your average high street.
We are now the proud owners of water filters, autopilots (automated steering device), bolt cutters, water purification tablets, additional fire extinguishers, grab bag supplies (in case of going to Liferaft), EPIRB (Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon), 12V hand vacuum cleaner, satellite phone, generator, bosun’s chair (harness to go up the mast) etc etc, etc. After weeks and weeks of research it was simply a matter of placing the orders, we had deliberately left this until relatively late because we didn’t want warranties expiring sitting in the garage.
There have been lots of decisions to be made in the last few weeks, we have had to confirm the optional extras for the boat – as it is now in production!! It’s seven weeks today until we arrive in La Rochelle and our boat is delivered on a very impressive tilting HGV trailer from the factory some miles in land to the beautiful La Rochelle old town and the commissioning quay. We passed a Mahe heading to the water on our trip to the factory, at 5 meters wide it takes some impressive driving to negotiate the parked cars, roundabouts etc on the journey. That is part of the process I will be very happy not to witness!! We had planned to visit the factory again 6/7th March before they fit the “lid” (the mould of the boat is in two parts, the join being just below deck level. The production process means building everything inside the boat before fitting the lid, Kevin was therefore keen to go over to take photos of where pipes, cables etc are run before this stage of production passes. However the build is now running a week early (how often do you hear that?!) and we will now need to be there on 28th Feb to see the boat before this is complete. Unfortunately, I can’t travel on 27th Feb due to work commitments, so unless I can find a suitable flight Kevin may need to make this trip on his own. As I have every weekend in April in La Rochelle when the boat is on the water, I am happy to forgo this one trip.
We have also now received the bill for the boat, which I guess makes things pretty real! So we are now anxiously watching the £/Euro exchange rate hoping for a rallying in the next couple of weeks, as payment is apparently now due 1 month before handover not 1 week as previously agreed. The other thing which gives reality to our plans is that we have started packing! Last weekend was also used for some more eBaying (now superfluous tender & outboard, etc) which has cleared a little more space in the garage and allowed us to start gathering all the items which we will fit initially on the boat.
The other fairly big change of plan is that we have now calculated that we won’t be able to bring the boat back to the UK as we hoped to ease the fitting out procedure and aid wedding preparations as we wish to export the boat from the EU and the time allowed for delivery was not as long as we first thought. Therefore, we are now back to plan A (which always seems to be the way with us!), delivery of the boat from La Rochelle to Canary Islands approximately 20th April (leaving a few weeks for new boat de-snagging and kitting out). Kevin will then stay with the boat through the summer, with myself and Alex flying out when possible, until August when Kevin returns for our wedding and we then both fly back and set sail for a tour of the Canaries together until November when we will set off for our Atlantic crossing.