Travelled to to Aus twice. First my mother celebrated her 90th. We drove Darwin to Perth, picked up our children and flew to Tassie. Passed thru Melbourne and saw Jennifer's mother. Sadly for the last time.....we returned a few months later for her funeral. She enjoyed a good life and reached the age of 95.
August saw us go to Europe, good friends were getting married in France , and said want to come to a wedding?? Well you ask an Aussie that and of course they say “you bet ya”. Having made good friends with the Norwegians and Swedish yachties, they said if you come that far you must come to us. So what could we do but go. Europe was wonderful. (Thanks to Di & Murray for the intro!)
Flew to France hired a Renault Twingo (small little beaut car), drove straight out of Charles De Gaul Airport on the wrong side of the road!! Well it’s there right side, Michael did a champion job of driving the whole way!! The wedding was in Cognac fantastic fun, one of the best weddings we have ever been to. (Thanks Lil & Barry SY Targora).
From France we drove thru Belgium , Netherlands , Germany , Denmark , and Sweden and on to Norway . We were able to catch up with friends in Germany , the past owners of Mahili, Hans & Renate. Sweden saw us see Boris and Liz Beth SY Li, and Norway we saw and stayed with good friends SY Cintra, Knut & Liv in Oslo, SY Fruen fra Havet, Eric & Berit in Grimstad (Near there) and SY Checkmate, Nils & Morit near Lillehammer SY Stormsvalen Tom & Anna also gave us a great night These Continental folk sure know how to turn on the hospitality, Fantastic. We loved our stay in Europe and got really enthusiastic about buying a canal boat, shame about the economy took a dive thru out the world!! Any way we have not said no just not yet. We think when we are done with Asia then we will we look at a canal/barge type boat to do the inland water ways of Europe
So back to Mahili we came but only for a few weeks when we up and flew to Nepal for a month with Miss Vicki (SY Sarenity,) we came to a different land and loved it, so totally opposite to Europe . We treked a little and I rode a horse a little and we loved Pokhara and the experience. We would only pass thru Kathmandu not liking it much, if we went again. The power outages 4 -6 hrs per day are hard to live with, especially when you know the Nepal government sells their electricity to India !!
Well by now we really had withdrawals from sailing and Mahili. So back we came to Rebak, ready to sail. A few hiccups with work in progress on the boat, but Michael sacked the Malay workers and finished as best we could. We have decided No More Boat Work for at least a few years!! Sailing Asia has been good and we will probably stay in this area for a few more years. Other Darwinites Ollie & Claude SY L’attitude caught up with us in Langkawi. Thus another long Darwin lunch was experience again Hic!
Christmas 2008 saw us back in Phuket and Thailand