Tuesday 20th October 2009

It's now exactly a fortnight since Impossible Dream slipped her lines on the Beaulieu River to begin her delivery trip down to Lanzarote.  Those of you tracking her progress will know that, as of this morning, she is currently in Cascais, Portugal. Click on the link on the top-left of this page to see where she is now.  They are about another 700 miles from Lanzarote and they aim to be there by this weekend.

Susana & Geoffey Find the Hidden Cakes

Skipper Julian and his delivery crew have had an eventful journey so far, motoring into strong headwinds along the south coast of England, a fuel-supply proplem with one of the engines (quickly fixed in Weymouth), fishing nets around the propeller in northern France, lobster pot lines around the rudder in Spain, both requiring the services of a diver, but thankfully no difficulties for the past 7 days and the farther south they go, the warmer the weather and the better their progress.

Nick saves the day by untangling the lobster pot

My crew member Susana did the first part of the voyage from the UK, flying home from Bilbao only a few days ago.  Although not making the journey to learn to sail, it was essential that she got some quality sea-time on the boat and, in addition to the 650 sea miles she logged, she started to learn where everything is stowed on the boat - apparently there's a lot of hiding places on board.

Dolphins in the Bay of Biscay

Back home, we are now only 5 weeks away from flying down to Lanzarote to get ID ready for the departure on December 10th.  Those 5 weeks will fly by.  We still have a few jobs to do back at home, not least resolve the Comms issue so, by the time we leave, we'll be in a position to fire back film footage which you will be able to see on TV, and for us to have good quality, and stable, internet access - how can I survive 3 weeks at sea without access to my emails? Anyhow, we are progressing the Comms well and we have a fairy-godfather who looks like he will be coming up trumps in the next week or so which will be a tremendous relief.  I also need to find a spare day to do my Christmas shopping - I will be at sea for Christmas but I think it will be a bit too mean to make master T wait until I get back from the Caribbean for his prezzies.  Besides which, I might need to buy myself a surprise Xmas gift - I don't know if Father Christmas will have Santa Nav or not and may not be able to find us...!!

I've been as busy as ever on the speaking circuit this past week, burning the candle at both ends, as I continue to promote the project and disabled sailing.  Last week I spoke to Whitely Rotary group and the Trident Forum, a collection of south coast professional services firms, at the Royal Marines Museum in Eastney, Portsmouth.  On Friday I gave a talk to another business group, this time at Chewton Glen, the world's 2nd best hotel (as voted for by Conde Naste magazine 2008) - it was actually every bit as good as I hoped, and then on Friday, I was guest speaker for the Royal Engineers Yacht Club on board HMS Victory - what a special honour that was.  OK, not the most wheelchair accessible boat I've been on, but with the help of the Navy boys and the Royal Engineers, they ensured I was carried to all the appropriate places, the Mess bar for drinks, the lower gun deck for dinner and the spot where Nelson, our most famous disabled sailor, was killed - a memorable night indeed. If you have never been to see HMS Victory, then you really must put it on your "top 10 things to do" list.

More talks this week, more meetings and hopefully a few more jobs ticked off the "to do" list.