Porto di Licata

Having said goodbye to Al and Chris we were back on our travels again. With a few events we needed to head back to the UK for we decided to head back round to the south coast to a marina in Licata since they'd offered us free mooring for September as a bonus for booking in for the winter season.

We retraced our journey back to Marina di Ragusa via Augusta, Syracuse and Portapalo (a little rolly but a significant improvement on our first attempt at anchoring with barely a breath of wind overnight). We were also joined by a small pod of dolphins who came to play in our bow wave and frankly I've never been more excited! It's a miracle I didn't drop Sam's phone in the sea trying to film them!

As we turned the corner from the east to the south coast we were rewarded with near perfect sailing conditions, just the right amount in just the right direction. As a result we had a glorious sail back to Marina di Ragusa, rather proudly winning a race with another boat (who admittedly wasn't informed they were participating in said race), but we were incredibly proud of Odyssee nonetheless, she can be described in many ways but sleek, with racing lines is not one of them!

Of course, when we got Marina di Ragusa we caught up with Bill and Nancy and invited them out for dinner. Sadly it was a very fleeting visit as we had an early start and our longest sail so far, so at 7am we set off, refuelled and hoisted the sails. Again we had another day of glorious wind so after some initial motor-sailing we could switch off the engine and enjoy the peaceful tranquillity of being purely wind-powered.

Having a few weeks without any bilge issues we were well overdue a bilge worry, and that morning we noticed that there was some water and initially assumed we had spilled some when refilling the water bottles. Having mopped this up we were slightly disconcerted to see that it had refilled by the time we arrived at Licata. Knowing that we were leaving the boat unattended for 6 days we set to work trying to work out where this water was coming from. Thankfully with a bit of detective work we finally worked out that it was coming from a tube from the bottom of the fridge. Easily fixed, we defrosted the fridge (a job we'd been meaning to do at the end of the season anyway) and could leave the boat fairly confident she would still be floating when we returned.

As seems to be a recurrent theme for us now, our journey back to the UK wasn't entirely straightforward. After a 5.45 start to catch the coach to the airport we arrived to see that our flight had been delayed by several hours. It later came to light that due to sickness in the air traffic control tower at Gatwick Airport they were now only able to accept 12 flights an hour rather than 40. Luckily our pilot worked out that he could fly us back to Luton (and at least get us back to the UK), but that there we would need a full crew change to continue on to Gatwick as the original crew would be over there allowed hours. The new crew swapped on and were almost immediately crowded by angry and aggressive passengers as the pilot announced we would likely have to sit on the runway in Luton for 2 hours! Thankfully, probably fearing for the safety of the crew, this decision was swiftly overturned and we were on our way. Steve and Helen met us at the airport and handed over my car and Sam and I went in search of a long-craved for roast dinner!

On Saturday we headed to Waldringfield for Sam's cousin Katie's wedding to Ollie. A gorgeous day with a lovely venue and despite a slightly soggy start, the rain then held off for the rest of the day. Heading off that evening and with quite a significant outfit change, I went from a dress and heels to squeezing into my old gym leotard (the only sport-themed fancy dress I could rustle up from mum and dad's house) ready for my friend Pippa's hen do.

Arriving just in time for my second dinner of the day I was very grateful for lycra! This was followed by drinks and lots of Mr and Mrs style games (the key takeaway of which was that my friend has rather questionable taste in food and it's a blessing her future husband sees 'food as fuel'!)

The following day we headed to the local go-karting course and Sam was invited to join as an honorary hen, a decision probably swiftly regretted as he duly won (lapping me 3 times)! Heading back to mum and dad's we cooked up a beef bourguignon (served with some of the mega-veg that had popped up in their veg patch in their absence!) for the returning cyclists after their 2nd and final stage of LE-JOG!Read more