Week 12

Ok Folks.

Just a brief blog post before we depart tomorrow.

All’s going well here and we have most of the stuff on the boat under control. We still have the heating system arriving today which will have to be fitted and I’m busy fitting bilge pumps to the sponsons (outriggers) as one took on a bit of water on the way over, but other than that it’s refuelling and getting on all the provisions. The visit by the Dalai Lama is still on the cards but we’ve not had an official response from his people. They say they may be able to get him to pop past and bid us farewell from the shore or something. We’ll see how that turns out.

Otherwise Hobart has been a blast. Everyone on the crew has enjoyed it and the people have been fantastic. There is a very wide section of the population here that’s not into the consumerism and materialism that we all seem to have embraced with such relish, the same that will probably be recognised by future generations as our civilisations’ downfall. That’s if there’s a hospitable planet left to support anyone of course.

I’m losing weight with being more physical and on the Vegan diet when on the boat. I’ve lost 11 kilos already and am all the better for it. I was getting a little portly it may be said. I’m feeling a whole lot more physical and am generally pretty happy with things. The Vegan diet isn’t so bad, I kind of thought of it as a compromised hunger strike before but it’s not as bad as I thought.

We went for a dive yesterday to test out all the kit and to do a training exercise with all the new crew members. The only crew member not here is Jeff. He’s stepping on board as the ship pulls off the pier it would seem. I hope he remembers everything he needs as there’s no turning back. The dive was good, lots of soft corals I haven’t seen before and the toys worked with a couple of exceptions. There’ll be another testing session tonight.

We had an open day planned for Saturday but the Port authority, in their great wisdom, closed us down because it was deemed that Health & Safety was more important than people’s curiosity and education. But despite them we had a good day for fund raising and there was an excellent turnout, with people turning up in a constant stream to look and buy T shirts and stuff. There was even a local folk band that came down and played us a couple of their tunes.

Tasports are the only people here who haven’t been totally supportive & friendly. Their security guard caught me standing with the marina gate open the other evening and bawled out that I “ Shut it! Now! I don’t have time to &^%$ around”. Obviously a very busy security guard & quite reminiscent of the Gestapo in some ways. It’s amazing what you can achieve with a little decency, but she obviously didn’t know that.

Anyway, I’ll try and get the blog up to date as often as I can once we’re at sea, the satellite comms system is quite expensive to run so it’ll be once a week if that’s possible.

I hope you all have a Merry Christmas and an excellent New Year in case I don’t manage to catch up before then. We’re prepared and chomping at the bit to get down there and kick Japanese ass so don’t be overly concerned about us, we’re having fun.

Catch up soon.

L