Bullfights

Saturday 16 April

We have spent the last few days working inside the boat – yesterday Mike spent all day fully servicing the electric bilge pump and filters and cleaning the bilge.  We discovered a pipe in the engine that needs welding and the welder can only come next week!  I had been a little annoyed with Mike for wanting to come down here so early as I felt that four weeks would have been more than enough time to do all the work needed to make Forever ready for the canal trip. And I do detest living ‘on the hard’.  However, he was right and we are going to need the full two months.  As it is Spring there are lots of people about working on their boats and all the service companies are very busy.  We’ve taken advice from ‘our man in the marina’ about what work to do on the hull to paint and polish.  Also very busy, he makes no attempt to secure the work for himself and is very kindly going to lend us all the necessary scaffolding and electric sanding and polishing machines – good man.

Despite the inconvenience, I have settled well into life on board again.  That horrid Mistral has come to an end and though cool again the days are sunny and bright. The sky continues to give me endless delight.  We are obviously near a military airbase as we see and hear a lot of aircraft, in particular helicopters and very noisy Mirages in groups of four. 

And Mike?  Well I haven’t seen him this happy in a long time.  We listen to French radio and I try to follow all the chatter, but it’s not always easy.  We’ve lost touch with what’s happening in the rest of the world again.

Monday 18 April

This weekend we took it easy and had a break from work.  Yesterday, Sunday, we went to a local bullfight. It was the first of the season, so not very well attended, in spite of the lovely sunny day.  I loathe the very concept of bullfights, but was assured by numerous people that bullfights here are quite different from the Spanish variety.  The bull is not killed, or injured, and in many instances he ‘wins’ the battle.  Rows of soft thread (cotton or wool) are wound round the base of each horn with a single thread passing between them which holds a rose in the centre of the bull’s forehead.  The toreadors, who hold a sharp sort of comb in their right hand, must remove the rose and all threads within a set time period.  If they don’t succeed, the bull wins.  Obviously, they have to get up close and personal with the bull and the potential for serious injury is very real.  There are six young toreadors (all men) with a further four older, perhaps retired toreadors, who act as distracters and set the bull up for a side streak by one of the youngsters.

It was very entertaining and happily no one was hurt badly.  Some of the young men hurt themselves jumping over the rails and on a couple of occasions the bull managed to get a snappy bite of a flying foot, always well protected by a shoe. 

But perhaps there’s something wrong with me – I just couldn’t really enjoy it.  There is no doubt in my mind that the bulls hate the whole thing. He comes out initially looking so beautiful, big and black and proud, very feisty and aggressive; he charges around for a bit, lowers his horns and does that pawing the ground thing so typical of bulls.  Then the toreadors enter the ring and start taunting him and to begin with he joins in the spirit of the thing and charges them.  But as time goes by he gets tired, more and more bewildered and then enraged.  The bulls do get hurt; the combs the toreadors hold are sharp metal and do sometimes scratch the bull’s face – one bull’s eye was badly scratched and bled horribly. But it is largely self-inflicted.  The angrier they get the more they fling themselves at the rails trying to nail a toreador.  One flung himself so hard he broke his nose and tongue and bled profusely from his mouth for the rest of the session.  The rails are low enough for the men to leap over, but the bull’s leap after the man often causes him to land on the rail and he tumbles painfully over into the outer ring (which causes a mad scramble of bodies).  They get so mad they attack the boards in the rail, lifting them with their horns and scattering them all over.  One poor chap, brighter than the rest, knew exactly where the exit door was and, ignoring all the toreadors, either just stood and stared at it or kept charging that portion of the rail.  He just wanted out and we felt for him.

It was interesting to note that the bull does not charge the men who just stand, waving their arms and shouting at him.  He will take stock and stare but he doesn’t charge.  Then a youngster comes out from the side and streaks in front and past the bull who turns away from the stationery figure and chases the runner.

Mike and I were walking in a field in Wales a couple of years ago when a young bull walked slowly up towards us, then put his head down and started a charge.  There wasn’t a tree to be seen for miles.  Mike told me to keep walking and he stopped and faced the bull off.  To my surprise (and enormous relief) the bull stopped his charge and stared back at Mike.  Eventually, Mike turned away and slowly followed me.  The bull just watched.

They were selling mementoes outside and I bought a silver bull’s head key ring for Mike’s birthday – he’s a Taurean. 

Today Mike’s working on the engine whilst I do laundry and the blog.

Moules Frites

Saturday 9 April

There is second, smaller market in Port Saint Louis on Saturdays – fresh fish and some vegetables and fruit  – so we took the long hot walk in.  With too much left-over food on board and no refrigerator, we had to forego the fresh fish but we’ll make sure we have an empty meat larder next week.  There’s a second hand chandlery in the port and we found a decent old bike – one of those nifty little folding jobs.  It has one flattish tyre so we’ll return on Monday with our pump and bring it home.  We stopped and had a beer with Lennart and Ulla, who have now moved to Port Saint Louis and are parked a hundred yards from the supermarket – lucky toads.  We made a plan to meet for dinner on Monday.

After the tiring walk back and a lovely lunch of fresh salad with tomatoes, avocado and olives, Brie and baguette, I was too tired to attempt laundry, even though it was a sunny, windless day.  So I just sat and read my book, or tried to.  Mike bustled about and needled me – he hates to see me sitting on my butt doing nothing.

Sunday 10 April

The predicted Mistral has arrived, and I’m sorry I didn’t do my laundry yesterday.  I managed half of it which now flaps furiously in the rigging and then spent an hour in the restaurant posting the blog, checking emails and having a long Skype chat with my mate, Caroline.

My attempts to sneak back into my book were thwarted by Mike, who wanted to start work on the engine and he can’t manage that without his reliable ‘spanner boy’.  We re-familiarised ourselves, reading the manual, and discussed what needs doing, but stuff needs to be bought and it will have to wait for a working day.  Frustrated, he went off to assist a neighbouring sailor with his hydraulics (I assume he was the spanner boy in this instance) and returned to say we were invited to dinner.  And I’d just prepared a delicious stew from a fat slice of beef with an enormous marrow bone in it.  Ah well, we’ll have to have it tomorrow, and perhaps there’s enough to invite these folk back.

Monday 11 April

Dinner last night was great.  Our hosts were three Swiss Italian gentlemen, very charming.  One of them produced an excellent Spaghetti Bolognese (quite different from how I make it, but better of course) and we drank all manner of aperitifs, wines and liqueurs.  Communication was in a combination of English and French.  Our main host and the boat owner, Renato, lent us a book on the French Canals, a trip he says he has always wanted to do but never managed.  The book is rather old but still valid and we are enjoying it.  The three of them (their wives don’t like sailing) have gone off today for 3 to 4 weeks in the Med and we’ll see them when they return.

At about 4pm, with hair tucked into caps and heads down, we struggled against the full force of the Mistral into Port Saint Louis, pushing our one bike in the hopes that we could both cycle back.  Having arranged with the lady in the second hand shop to return today for our bike, she wasn’t there!  Monday, we were informed by her mother who runs the neighbouring marine upholstery shop, is her day off, like most shops in France, actually.  We tried the banks also, to inquire about opening a French bank account, but they were also closed.  We did find a bakery open and bought an enormous and totally delicious loaf of bread – pain levain – which is heavier, tastier and less crusty than the baguette.  It will last us some days (unless I get too greedy).  We then did a bit of shopping at the supermarket and arrived early at Pinta lugging beers for pre-dinner drinks.

Another Swedish couple joined us (Swedes all speak such good English) and the six of us trooped into the Port Restaurant for the moules/frites. Apart from an infestation of hungry mosquitoes who took a particular fancy to my ankles, it was a very nice evening and the meal was excellent.   After dinner I whizzed home on the bike whilst my brave captain walked, weighed down with ten litres of wine (two five litre boxes) in his rucksack.  Good man.

On my return, I find that somebody has added the word 'WOMEN' in large black letters plus the scientific female sign onto the door to the 'FEMMES', but it makes no difference.  The Frenchmen continue to prefer our showers.  Amusant, hein? 

Good and Bad news

Monday 4 April

We were rudely awoken at 3.45 last night by a bang on the deck.  Mike leapt out of bed and investigated but could see nothing.  We are placed right under a bright spot light and in full view of the security cameras, so his naked body will present an interesting sight to anyone viewing the cctv tapes.  I’d seen a large ginger cat in the rubbish dump earlier in the day, and we finally decided it may have been him, but how he got on the boat I’ll never know.  Can cats climb ladders?  Then again at 8.10am my phone rang and I leapt out of bed, to a wrong number.

The good weather has deserted us today and the Mistral blows coldly from the north.  Mike has gone off on the bike to buy boatie things, including some shopping in town – I need a baguette urgently.  He’s going to try and find cutlery at the one other supermarket in town.  I am supposed to be washing and sanding the cockpit which is in a very poor state, but I don’t feel like it in this wind, so I’m working on the blog instead.  We have invited Ulla and Lennart for supper tonight.  Taking a coffee in the restaurant, checking emails, there’s one from our prospective buyer who had threatened originally to visit on 15 April.  He had to change his plans and now wants to come this weekend!  Yikes.  We are not nearly ready, but never mind.  My day of rest now cancelled, I had to go back to work.  The sun has returned, but the Mistral still howls. 

Mike went off on his bike at 4pm to buy fresh mussels from the mussel farm nearby for dinner tonight, only to find them closed.  That’s France for you.  We wandered over to Ulla and Lennart to renege on our dinner invitation on account of no mussels, and stayed for a couple of glasses of wine.  We have agreed to try again tomorrow, and if the mussel farm is still closed we will get something else.  Mike and I ate various interesting scraps for dinner.

Tuesday 5 April

The dinky little lady from the boulangerie comes by the marina at 9.15ish every morning (except Monday) selling bread, so today I bought a baguette and arranged for her to hoot at my boat every morning.

The wind has eased considerably and it is remarkably warm – hot even.  We slogged all day on the boat and at 4pm, Mike went off again and came back triumphantly with 4kg of the biggest, juiciest mussels we ever saw.  I did roasted vegetables to go with – it was a very good dinner and Ulla and Lennart were good company.  We used the mussel shells as pincers to eat with.

Wednesday 6 April

Pinta went into the water early this morning, too early for us to come and watch.  They are parked on the wall outside the marina for the moment.  Today is market day, so we all walked in and spent a couple of hours walking around.  I love all markets, and French markets are usually good.  Not only was there a wondrous selection of fresh fruit and vegetables, but all manner of kitchen utensils (we finally got cutlery and various other useful things), clothing, shoes, watches and jewellery, fabrics and furnishings, delicious ready cooked food and the general rubbish you always find at markets.  It was good fun to browse.  Walking back we stopped to watch a lone German boat enter the lock into the Rhone River.  It is very early in the season and the current against will be strong, but he assured us that with a 120hp engine he would be fine.  I enjoyed the walk in and back again, but forgot to put barrier cream on and have burned my upper arms and neck – ouch.

After lunch I checked my emails again and discovered that our prospective buyer, Rudy, is arriving tomorrow afternoon!  I arranged for Helmut to collect him.

Back to the boat and hard at work.  The wind has died off completely and it is very warm – extraordinarily so for the time of year, but we believe it is like this all over.

Mike is totally enamoured with my computer.  In the evenings after dinner whilst I read a book he either plays chess against a machine that doesn’t argue with him or take hours to make a move (and by hitting control/alt he can undo a move he regrets), or watches dvds with headphones on.  We have to buy a set of speakers so we can both watch together.

Thursday 7 April

We have scrubbed and washed and sanded and oiled everything that needs it.  By 3pm, we’d finished doing all that could be done in the time and just sat limply in the cockpit and waited.  At 5.45pm Helmut drove up with Rudy, both speaking German and very matey.  There is absolutely nothing in this marina apart from the restaurant and it is a good mile from town, so Helmut agreed to come back later and drive Rudy into a hotel.  Rudy spent about an hour and a half looking at Forever and chatting with us over coffee and biscuits.  He had fallen in love (his words) with Forever because of three things – she is a Hallberg Rassy, she has an in-mast roller furling main, and she has electric winches.  His wife suffers badly from seasickness so he wants a boat he can comfortably sail single handed.  He seemed very taken with our boat, and a little after seven he phoned Helmut and left, agreeing to return the next day.  He said he was flying back to Austria on Saturday.

Friday 8 April

Lennart wandered by this morning and stopped for coffee.  Their boat, Pinta, is still on the wall outside the marina.  The wind has blown up again today.  According to Lennart it will ease tomorrow and then the Mistral will return with a vengeance Sunday through Tuesday.

We went to buy a few things at the chandlery here (I always go along to translate for Mike) and the young woman in there asked me if I was French!  Ha ha, I said, not at all, I am English.  She then said my French was impeccable and that I didn’t even have an English accent.  Very flattering, I’m sure, but not true.  Over the last few months, I have watched a lot of French films and did a course on the internet, so I do feel more confident speaking French than before, but not that much.

We are going about our business as normal, but there is no sign of Rudy.  Disappointing.  He had seemed so keen and so impressed by the boat.  I just saw Helmut driving around the marina – he tells me he took Rudy to the airport this morning!  Amazingly rude – not even a phone call. 

Ah well.  We are not so very disappointed as this means we will now be doing the canal journey as planned.  And we are so glad we have done all that work.  Forever is lovely and clean and shiny, and now I can relax a bit.

Carnivals, bikes and computer games

Sunday 3 April

In the south of France, west of Marseille, is the large Golf de Fos.  This whole flat, marshy area is called the Camargue, famous for gypsies, wild horses, bullfights and flamingos. On the west of Fos Bay there is a canal leading north/westwards, about half way along is our Navy Service Marina, and at the end is the town basin of Port Saint Louis du Rhone.  There is a large marina there and it is the spot where boats wait to pass into the first of the locks into the Rhone River.

Ulla told us there was a carnival in the town this afternoon, so we finished our work and walked in at 2.30.  I wore my new sandals which rubbed a bit.  We found the carnival behind the Port Saint Louis marina.  It was sweet, very small, there were a few fun floats and some good music, gypsies and clowns on stilts and lots of people in fancy dress. Stupidly, I forgot to take my camera.  Later, we tried to get our ‘moules frites’ (mussels and chips) but, being Sunday they were just closing for the day.  We walked home again and I made a Spanish omelette for dinner which we ate with Parma ham.

We need to find a second bike.  With only one, we have to walk everywhere which is silly. For reasons best known to himself, Mike decided we should only bring the one bike at a cost of £18.50 on Easyjet.  Helmut wants to sell his nice aluminium bike for €130, and that’s too rich for us.  I suspect any second hand bike is going to be more than the £18.50 we saved by not bringing our own, but I’d better shut up about that.

I found a few good books in the marina office, but Mike had neglected to do so and was bored tonight.  He wanted me to play chess, but I was more interested in my book, so I introduced him to the addictive pleasure of computer games.  I set up the chess game - he lost the first to the computer but was excessively pleased with himself when he won the second game.

Life on the hard in the yard

Saturday 2 April

Forever is situated in a corner of the t-junction created by the main tarmac road that runs the length of the marina and the short untarred arm that runs to the canal and lift out area.  The lift out crane is usually left parked opposite our boat at night. It is a noisy, busy spot and we see most people come by. 

Views from Forever

Running along the main road is a long building, height of about 3 stories.  There’s a basement which is a car park, and there are a few marine businesses in the building, but it appears mostly empty.  Right at the t-bar is the rubbish dump.  There are numerous recycling skips for used oil, batteries, and paint and oil containers as well as a very large skip for general waste.  From our vantage point we have a bird’s eye view of this area.  Yachties are notorious scavengers.  Every day, dozens come by and unashamedly climb into the skip and hunt around.  They leave wielding unlikely treasures like pieces of timber, large bits of foam rubber, old scraps of carpet or broken equipment.  Some people (though not all) leave their better quality rubbish, like unwanted or broken equipment, at the side of the skip for easy access.  These items usually go on their first day.  When we left three years ago we put loads of stuff in big boxes at the side of the skip and watched with amusement as it all disappeared within a couple of days.

Today I rediscovered the joys of hand washing.  My excellent rubber buckets have disappeared (I think we may have given them to someone three years ago) but there is a washing up area in the ablutions block which I can use.  I am trying to do it often to keep the amount manageable. Our Swedish friend Ulla (that’s how it’s spelt) came by and said she had been to Port Napoleon to do hers as they have machines there - €6 to wash and €4 to dry!  I will continue to do mine by hand. 

Ulla and Lennart invited us to tea at 2pm.  Odd time, but off we went bearing a packet of chocolate biscuits. They built their boat, Pinta, themselves, it is much larger than Forever though the saloon is less spacious.  It has that wonderful ‘unfinished’ and well lived in look, with homely touches like a small herb garden.  It is made of steel, which is why it didn’t mind so much being dropped the other day.  Forever would not have fared so well.  Ulla and Lennart are very nice. They like to do everything themselves (or should I say Lennart likes them to) and Ulla made all their sails, clever lady.  I can’t imagine that.  We had tea, coffee, doughnuts and biscuits and chatted, particularly about the canal trip which they did last year, coming down from Holland.  They confirmed it was fabulous and had lots of useful information for us plus some charts that we are thinking of buying. The subject of Helmut came up again and Ulla said that he’d told her he had lost his driving licence some months ago for going through a red light!  Of course, this could be another of his jokes.  One never knows. 

After tea we had a couple of glasses of wine and left them at 6pm, intending to talk into town to the Restaurant du Port who do a plate of fresh mussels with chips and a beer or glass of wine for €10 – the same price as three years ago.  However, we lost impetus and stayed home.  I opened a tin of mussels, tossed them in garlic butter and roasted some potatoes and sweet peppers in the oven.

The first day aboard

Thursday 31^st March

Our first morning on board, we rose fairly late and had a breakfast of muesli bars.  Mike checked the main gas bottle which, amazingly, still contained gas, so he re-connected it and we could make tea and coffee.  I took all the upholstery outside and beat them with a carpet beater and gave the interior another clean.  The weather is lovely and what, I believe, what most people would consider utterly perfect – bright and clear with some warm sunshine.  The young and hardy are sporting shorts and t-shirts but the rest of us need a light jacket or cardigan.

At 1.15 we walked to town, stopped at a cafe for a drink and divine ham and cheese baguette sandwiches, bought a new rope (our mainsail outhaul line has been badly frayed), a French sim card for the mobile phone (investigated mobile broadband but pay as you go is too expensive), exchanged our spare gas cylinder for a full one, and finally went shopping at the supermarket for basic stuff like rice, spaghetti, flour, salt and spices.  We managed to find clothes hangers, one pot (the only one they had with a lid) and one frying pan, and the last two pillows.   Fearing our cases would be too heavy, one of the things we had removed at the last minute was a set of cutlery thinking they would be easy to replace - but no such luck.  On board we found one knife, one fork and a couple of spoons.  That will have to do for the moment.  The good news is that whisky and wine are cheap, the bad news, everything else is expensive.  (I foolishly paid the enormous bill by debit card, forgetting that we had cleared our account drawing euros.  I tried to get them to credit it and let me pay cash but she said it was too late.  Yikes! Now my dear sister Lucy is helping me out with the bank in UK.)

When we’d nearly finished, we telephoned our friend Helmut and asked him (his wife actually as he couldn’t hear me on the phone) if he could collect us.  Yes, that was fine, and he did come but half an hour later than agreed.  When we’d unloaded and we asked his charge, he growled, deadpan, “€500” and this time we laughed uproariously.  Mike got his wallet out, but Helmut now waved him away, saying ‘demain’ – tomorrow – got in his car and drove off.  Our Helmut obviously takes a bit of getting to know, but it seems his heart is good - thoroughly weird.  It was 6.30 by the time we got home and were both exhausted.

Mike had oiled the frozen padlock the previous day and today he could open the cockpit locker and retrieve our hosepipe.  He now washed the deck and cockpit again, and dropped the foresail.  I fiddled down below and put everything away.

Too tired to cook a proper meal, we ate bread, cheese, olives and an artichoke for dinner.  I drank my whisky and Mike had wine.  It was a beautiful warm evening.   And the sky - clear, deep blue, spotted with early stars.  How I have missed the sky!  Now I know why I love being on the boat so much.  The sky is just there, all the time.  You don’t have to go looking for it.  You can’t miss it.   Forever is cleaner and getting more comfortable, and I am adjusting, getting happier by the day.  There are a few mosquitoes about, but not biting.

A half hour after eating, Mike lay his head down beside me and fell asleep.  I went to the ablution block alone, which I don’t care to do late at night, skipping quickly through the dark shadows cast by hundreds of boats.  Not afraid, I was nonetheless glad to get back to Forever.  For middle of the night excursions, we have a bucket, which Mike empties and washes in the morning.

Friday 1 April

Good news!  I found the shoes.  Hooray, they are both so nice – a pair of slops (ideal for around the yard and in the shower) and a pair of sandals. They were in an unsecured pocket in another suitcase, so I have still to figure out what was in the other pocket which was unzipped and flapping open when it came off the conveyor belt.

Taking a shower this morning, there was a masculine cough from the booth next to mine.  I really don’t mind the blokes using our showers (it is one way of meeting all your neighbours), but it means you have to dress inside the booth, with a very wet floor.  Tricky business putting wet feet through knickers and trousers without getting them sopping, and making sure you don’t drop clean clothes all over the floor.  I have checked the shower situation with Mike, who uses the men’s.  He assures me they are perfectly alright.  I had a look myself.  In fact they are newer and nicer than ours and both toilets even have proper plastic seats on them.

There’s lots of work to do and we are marching through it.  Mike works hard all day which is a nuisance as he constantly wants me to assist in everything, but it makes a nice change from watching tv all day, usually from behind closed eyelids.

I am using the wifi connection at our new restaurant.  We are told it is free, but of course it isn’t completely.  You have to have a drink, so an icy cold diet coke goes down very well.

Back to Forever

31 March 2011

So, we have arrived back on Forever without particular mishap, apart from Mike losing a pair of pliers, confiscated out of his hand luggage and me losing two pairs of new shoes, stolen from an unsecured pocket on my hold luggage.  Annoying but not catastrophic. 

We arrived, to a nice sunny day, with two large bags, two smaller, bulging, rucksacks and a bike and were met at Marseille airport by Helmut.  Helmut warrants a special mention.

In February I had emailed the marina to advise that we would be coming to stay on the boat, and asked if they could arrange transport from the airport.  They emailed back that I should contact Helmut direct and gave me his details.  I wrote to Helmut in English explaining that we were two people arriving at Marseille airport at 14.20 on 30 March, could he collect us and take us to the marina and how much would it cost.  He emailed back: “Numero de vol. Terminus. Helmut.”  I emailed back in my best French the flight number and Terminal MS2, and again asked how much the transport would be.  He emailed back: “OK”.  A week later I wrote again, asking him to please advise the price of the transport to which I received no reply.  I then telephoned him. He spoke no English, my French is not fluent and his is extraordinary.  I really struggled to understand (I thought he was German but he insisted later that he is French, though of German origin) and he frequently didn’t understand me.  He finally grasped who I was and the question, and after much difficulty I understood the price was €60.  I balked slightly, “€60?” and he insisted that that was good value as a taxi would be €130.  I said ok, €60 was agreed.  A week before leaving I wrote to him again, confirming our arrival and warning him that we would be two people with two large suitcases and a bicycle (velo).  He emailed back: “Numero de vol. Terminus.” Ha.  I wrote back, reminding him that we knew each other, had emailed before and spoken on the phone, I repeated the flight and terminal anyway, and went on to explain that I was simply confirming our arrival and warning him of the amount of luggage.  No reply.

So, we were pleased to see him actually at the airport;  short and plump, white haired, red cheeked and bespectacled, he could have been a beardless, unsmiling Santa. He looked at the bike (which was packed in a very large box) and immediately said that it was too big and wouldn’t fit in the car.  A small altercation ensued with me insisting that I’d written and advised him of the bike and him saying yes a bike, but that box is huge.  He then said he’d go and get the car, we should wait outside.  His car was more than big enough and everything was loaded easily – nothing further was said about the bike and we assumed it had been some sort of ‘joke’ on his part.  A couple of miles along the road, he suddenly announces that though he had said €60, that was per person, so €120 and then for the large ‘baggages’ and ‘velo’ there would be extra, bringing the total to €250.  I said you must be joking Monsieur, you said €60, and €60 it is.  No, no he argued, it is €250 and if you don’t like it I can stop the car and you can get out.  Mike, not understanding a word, was laughing jovially at the man until I translated the gist of the conversation.  Now miles from the airport, I had no intention of getting out as our chances of a taxi with all that luggage would have been slight so I said no more. It did rather spoil the trip.  Helmut made a few attempts at friendly conversation which we ignored.  Eventually, Mike (in front with Helmut) looked back at me and I said quietly that perhaps it was another of his ‘jokes’.  Mike agreed and little by little we spoke a bit more to him.  He frequently just didn’t respond to comments and most of the time we didn’t understand him, but we remembered him from when we were here before – he is the marina caretaker and lives with his wife in a small cottage within the marina complex.  He used to run a small, uninviting snack shop situated very near our boat, which we rarely frequented.  He was known then as a difficult, unfriendly chap.  His wife did a laundry service which I tried once.  He told us that the snack shop had closed (he is 80 now and too old to work) and there is now a large new restaurant, good but expensive.

We had originally intended to ask Helmut to stop briefly at the supermarket at Port Saint Louis, which is, very conveniently, on the way, but were now too nervous.  If there was going to be a row, we didn’t want to be beholden to him for a small favour.  So, we sailed past the supermarket and went straight to the marina, unloaded, and Mike asked the price.  Once again, he started about the €250 and I kept calm and said firmly, “No, Mike give him €60” which Mike did and he was perfectly happy.  Bizarrely, it was another of his jokes, and he was so pleased with himself he now gave me a small packet of M&Ms, though at no time did he ever smile.  Though I could happily have strangled him, we then got stuck in a long conversation with him about a bike he had bought and wanted to sell and finally took Mike off to look at whilst I was left, like a lemon, standing guard to all the luggage by the boat.

Luckily for me a very nice Swedish woman, name pronounced Urla but probably spelt quite differently, came by and we stood together and chatted.  I related the story of Helmut and she laughed, said yes, he was renowned for his odd ‘jokes’ and she explained that he is very deaf, which is presumably why he often  didn’t respond when spoken to.  This charming woman told me that she and her husband had been scheduled to go back into the water the previous day (the Navy Service marina where we are is only hard standing – going back into the water means leaving and going sailing, or as in our case, up the Rhone River) but the yard had dropped their boat!  The sling hadn’t been properly secured and their boat fell, causing some small amount of damage (mostly paintwork) to the bottom.  They were very laid back about it.  I was rather pleased to hear about this because it means the yard personnel will be on extra alert for some time to come about not repeating that little mishap.

Mike returned, we put up a ladder and set about boarding Forever.  Poor old dear, she looked awful.  It is amazing how quickly neglect lays its sad, ugly face over things.  However, the man who had agreed to occasionally clean the boat and maintain the batteries had done some work and the batteries are ok (not great) and taking a charge.  The interior of the boat was better than I’d hoped, but still a layer of fine dust everywhere.  Whilst Mike re-assembled the bike and rode back into the town of Port Saint Louis (about 1 mile) to get some groceries, I wiped down the inside and put things away as best I could, then borrowed a hosepipe from a kindly Danish neighbour (ours was in a locker on which the padlock had frozen) and washed the decks and cockpit, which were filthy. Dying of thirst, I tried the tap at the kitchen sink and out poured what looked like clean water.  I drank. It tasted fine.  Who knows how long that water has been there, we’ve been away for three years.  Now that I had the hosepipe, I filled the tank, topping up on the old water already there.

Mike came back with essentials like tea, coffee, milk and sugar as well as a baguette (bliss), some blue cheese, a tin of mussels, a carafe of wine, some vegetables and fruit.  He’d also bought a gas refill for our mini camping stove, but it didn’t fit, so we had no cooking facilities which bothered neither of us.  I fell in a heap at that point, tucked into the bread, cheese and wine and finished an earlier started Sudoku with my feet up on the still dusty salon berths.  Mike continued to bang about on deck, as men do. 

We’d brought a duvet and some bed linen with us, but there were no cushions on the boat at all and we had no pillows.  I went for a cursory wash in the ablution block.  Three years on, the men still prefer to use the ‘femmes’ showers and loos and I met two blokes.  The ‘hommes’ section was empty! One of them made friendly mention of the mosquitoes, notorious in this area, and though I heard a whine later that night, they haven’t bothered us yet.  I made the bed up and retired, Mike soon following.  We slept well, despite uncomfortable improvised pillows.  Sheer fatigue.

And how do I feel being back on the boat?  Not good, I have to say.  They say never go back and that’s how it feels to me, like we’ve gone back.  I’m not pleased to be here.  I want my comfortable, clean home that I don’t have to climb a ladder to reach or walk 200 yards to get to the loo.  There is a lot to do to make it a comfortable home again and everything is so much more difficult on a boat (especially on the hard).  I don’t know if I’m up to it.