UK Arrival

We were totally spoiled on our flight to the UK, including being given a Bon Voyage card made a signed by all the crew and plenty of champagne - Airline Crew all certainly love travel so when they learned our plans we couldn't stop them quizzing us for all the details.

We now have 10 days until we start the handover and will be spending a few days with family around the country collecting the belongings we have stored for Askari - first stop with Jon and Nat's in Cambridge and the sun was out for a beer by the river.

Card from Etihad Crew

Champagne at 40,000 ft

Beer by the River in Cambridge

Test sail

Sneak peak from on board the test sail on the River Orwell - thanks to Nick for sharing.

AIS live on Marine Traffic

It's quite exciting tonight as Askari is out for a test sail so we are tracking her on Marine Traffic - doing 7.1 knots out into the North Sea!

A good send off

We had a wonderful send off at Fremantle Sailing Club, this included a presentation of a FSC flag for Askari from the Commodore. We have made some amazing friends in the 8 years we have lived in Fremantle  and it was fantastic to celebrate our next adventure with them.

Andrew, Carolyn & Commodore Baker

  Thanks to Alain from CG for the picture.

Of no fixed abode!

It's official we are of 'no fixed abode', today we moved our treasures into a storage unit 3m x 1.5m and are staying at a friends place until we fly to the UK. We noted that it is actually due to be 17 degrees and sunny (yes sunny) in Ipswich today, where as we are starting to get autumnal weather here so definitely time to go!

The list is also down to the last few items, none of which are really a big deal like scanning my favourite recipes and updating all Andrew's frequent flyer accounts. But one that has been nagging us for a while is 'learn French'.... hmmm not sure we are going to get that done before we go but we made a start last night at Fremantle Sailing Club.

Meanwhile in Ipswich Askari is about to go on her test sail and we have approved the position of the boom vinyl showing her name - yes we are into the small stuff now.

19 days to go!

Not much furniture left.....

A week until we move out of our rental house and it's fair to say we haven't got much furniture left - nearly everything has been sold or given away! Andrew doesn't care - he's got a camp chair, a beer and a sailing mag....

She has sails

We just woke up to see these pictures shared on Facebook Dolphin Sails - click the link for the full suite but here are a few highlights.

We went for Graphite Weathermax 80 fabric and the Sails are Grey Taffeta DYS Laminate - we are pretty excited...... 31 days to go!