It was a very busy time in Trinidad getting the sails down and putting bits and pieces away on the outside and Marian busy cleaning up everything inside on Kilkea II. On Wednesday morning we moved over to Peake's marine which is a big full service yard with a very large travel lift and hauled out of the water. By that evening we had the full canvas top put up and the portable air conditioner plugged in and running and went over to friends on Infini for dinner and drinks. It was a fun evening with us Kilkea II , Infini, and Mantra together, all having just completed sailing around the world. It does put you in a different mind set being with people with similar thoughts.
On Thursday we did lots more of putting things away and packing to go home. That evening another BBQ with lots of cruisers and more fun conversations. One of our concerns is that we may find home rather boring as for the last nine years we have had a very social life with countless dinners out and happy hours spend with so many interesting sailors. Always learning about new places to go and things to do whether how one gets on the internet or where the grocery stores are, as well as how to fix things on the boats.
Friday morning we left Kilkea II in the yard and headed to the airport where we flew up to Toronto and spent the night and then to Vancouver in the morning May 02. I was great to be home and see the Vancouver part of our family. It has been nine months since we left for Singapore so we sure notice the growth of the grand kids. Our son has finished building his new house and moved in in April so now we have a house to live in again which is very strange. Marian just spent Saturday night here and then on the third was off to Sydney and another sixteen hour flight to visit her sisters family and say her goodbyes to her sister. It was a tough week for her down there and she was exhausted when she arrived back here on the 12th.
I stayed home here and did a lot of garden clean up, house stuff and even managed to play two games of golf with some old friends. It is rather strange out with them again as it seem the last nine years never happened and that it was all just a dream. I think it will take us some time to get used to living on land again. I also looked for a new car for us as we have just the old 1994 Mazda pick up truck. The used marked seemed expensive versus buying a new car and this being the end of the 2015 season there were some incentives to buy new. This we did yesterday and now have a Acura RDX which is a five passenger SUV. Now we can drive over to Calgary to visit our daughter and grand kids over there. It is about a ten hour drive through the mountains so we look forward to doing that shortly. We have lots of other projects on the house and then we have Kilkea the power boat which I have only been down to once. She is still floating in the boat house and seems to be in good shape so we will start to get it all together so that we can get back on the water which seems to be more comfortable for us at this time. We hope to head up the coast this summer where we will run into lots of our old boating friends in this part of the world and maybe even some our ocean sailor friends so if anyone is going to be around this part of the world let us know.
