Hi All I have been back two weeks now and working towards getting mrs Opela back in order again because when I got back the fact that i had left her alone for such a long time made her decide to take revenge Bev on Dandelion had been looking after her for me by airing her out once a week and checking the bilges as well and running the engine once or twice for me and for that I am truly thankful but my lady is a very jealous lady and she wasnt happy to be left standing so when I got on board I was expecting to find mould and black algae and a host of other things lurking in corners not often looked at. My first big one was that the new stay wires i had had installed in Le Marin in Martinique a year and a half ago were worn such that one fell on the deck because the hook swaged to the end simply snapped and on further inspection i found the others were all cracked as well which means I cannot sail her. I phoned the suppliers and they were struggling to remember my boat but soon r...

John and I are home on our boats now After reading the air ticket saga you will know We were given tickets and $500 to get to LAX to connect to our next part of the Journey home Max and Rachael (owners) came and met us and went over the boat as they were preparing to go on holiday on the boat a week after we left Sitting talking to them was really interesting as Max is designing a smaller space rocket which will take small satellites up to space and what makes it even more of a challenge is their team is using 3D printers to achieve results and seem to be winning Rachael works for the government helping bring innovative improvements into public transport systems and was really interesting to talk to as well Rachael and Max helped us arranging for the USA customs and immigrations officials to come to us and stamp us into the country and they were really accommodating and when John was presented with a USD 500 fine for entering on an ESTA entry permit instead of a B1/B2 visa Max...