Time for some champagne sailing. Breeze 20 knots from the rear port quarter, no seas to speak of as we were in the lee of the island. Only a little over 8 nautical miles to Marigot Harbour, passed Queen Mary 2 anchored outside of Castries (the capital).
Spent only one night at anchor in the lovely harbour, opposite the Capella resort.

Left Le Marin at 10:00am on 23rd December and set a bearing for the entry to Rodney Bay in St Lucia, only 24 nautical miles away.
The journey only took us 3 hours, the seas were a little lumpy with a three metre swell and 1 to 2 metre chop all from the rear port quarter. Winds ranging from 20 to 30 knot true from a similar direction to the seas. Two reefs and half the head sail, we had some very interesting times speeds around 9 to 10 knots at times, just a little too fast for the conditions.
Spent 5 days at Rodney Bay marina, got some washing done and a few jobs on the boat.
Christmas eve dinner at an awesome tapas bar in Rodney Bay town as nothing much open in Christmas day,a little expensive but it is a special occasion.
We thought the Euro prices in Martinique were expensive, the St Lucia East Caribbean Dollar prices are a killer.

Arrived LeMarin Martinique 23rd November
Moved GAVID onto the LeMarin marina 24th November, providing better access for ‘the trades’ as well as taking away my concern for the state of the anchor chain.
So much clearing out and repair to be done.
Both engines received a complete going over. Rebuilt salt and fresh water pump systems, rebuilt heat exchanger on starboard as well as replace the alternator and replaced the exchanger on the port engine. So basically both engines have had all peripherals repaired, serviced or replaced.
Kiera and Stewart were scheduled to join the boat on 29th November, but were bumped off the Miami to Martinique flight. American Airlines sent them to St Lucia instead, with the suggestion that St Lucia was close to Martinique and AA would be able to sort out a transfer. Needless to say, nothing of the sort. They finally arrived on 2nd December after spending unwanted nights in St Lucia and organising a local ‘puddle jumper’ flight to Martinique. It is expected that further legal discussion with AA will follow.
We spent two days at the riggers wharf where the rig was completely rebuilt over two days, a number of problems with the headsail furler were also identified and fixed (just don’t think about the costs) . A new anchor chain was also fitted, so no more worries in that area.
Removed about half a ton of old gear and rubbish off the boat starting to look tidier.

17th December – left the marina and motor sailed the few mile to St Anne, where we spent two days learning about the boat at anchor. The township of St Anne is small and aimed at the French tourist.
19th December – sailed across the bottom of Martinique and around to the lower west coast to Grand Anse. Our first real sail, two reefs in the main and about 60% of the headsail. Seas were quite lumpy around 3 metres from our port rear quarter, so manageable. Winds ranged from 25 to 30 knots true and we saw over 9 knots at times. The village of Grand Anse was again a typical French tourist location, with rustic bars on the beach and basic restaurants everywhere. The return trip was not so nice, we motored against 3 metre waves.

Spent quite a few hours aboard the boat over the past few days, just working through what needs doing.
The manufacturer Fountaine Pajot, will be working on warranty repairs to the hulls until mid June. So it looks like I'm going to miss out on leaving the Caribbean before the hurricane season starts. At this stage the boat will stay 'on the hard' in Martinique until October, when I'll return and go through recommissioning ready for the sailing season to start.
The boat is to be given a new name 'Gavid', thanks to my son Aaron.

Now we go through the whole change of ownership thing.
First, a paper export from France to Australia, then send the export document to France for deregister. Then the fun begins with the Australian registration process. All of this is going to take around four weeks, so even if the warranty work was finished Gavid could not leave Martinique until this stuff is completed.

Well, back in Martinique for a few days.
Checked out the boat and signed all the appropriate docs.
I enjoyed a delightful 'French' lunch with the yacht broker for my birthday, Jacqui is not around so into the 'good stuff'.
Jacqui and Lynne are visiting (shopping) Portland Oregon while I'm in Martinique.

Jacqui is closeted in a Homeopathic convention, so I headed off Downtown to source something unhealthy for morning tea. At the last minute decided to go to Pure Bread for their fantastic range of cakes. Unbelievably directly across the road from the cafe was a gathering of Australian and New Zealand military, I had inadvertently stumbled onto the Vancouver ANZAC day ceremony.
Quit a moving experience so far from home.
Closed of the journey with bread and butter pudding with a good cup of coffee.

Took a stroll to Downtown and was surprised to see large crowds everywhere. It turns out the annual rally for the legalisation of 'green' was underway. The air was full of the pungent aroma.
It's interesting that the stuff is not legal, as there are something like 200 shops in Vancouver selling for so called medical purposes.
The demonstrators in the main area were very vocal, but the large police presence appeared to be indifferent to noise.

I have given-up the chase for a bargain big boat and have settled for a little 2005 40' Lavezzi.
We looked her over while we were in Martinique last November and kept her as a fall-back as she required osmosis treatment. Fountaine Pajot have instigated the treatment and the present owner is covering the lift and storage, while the work is completed. Expect to have the boat (Kim) back in the water in June.
Our offer has been accepted and the deposit paid.
The survey has not picked up anything that we didn't see during the November visit.
As expected we'll need to re-rig as the stays etc are the originals, but not too expensive in the Caribbean.
We'll take the opportunity to do a little tidy-up while she is 'on the hard'.
If things progress as planned, I'll visit Martinique in late April to finalize the sale, as well as sort out the additional work.

While we were away, I received the survey for the Bahia. Way too much work required. Rebuild engines, new sails, damaged starboard hull and the list goes on.
Pulled the plug on the purchase

Onto the road by 10:00 this morning. A very warm day, perfect for the drive to Denver's outlet malls. Apparently we need to buy something!
The snow cover falls away dramatically as we leave the valley.

Again we hit the slopes early as we expected the snow to deteriorate with the warmer weather. The early morning runs were very icy and fast. Legs are much improved and we're really getting into the flow. Unfortunately the snow turned to slush by early afternoon. We stayed out as long as we could but a couple of falls convinced us that it was time to call it quits. So by 15:00 we had handed in our gear and taking time over a couple of very strong Margaretta. We are very fortunate that we had the best of the spring skiing.

We spent the bulk of the day working our way across the mountain to Peak 6 while the snow is still in good shape. Peak 6 is the highest that can be reached by chair. Quite windy up there and I find the first part of the return trail a little intimidating.

We are both a little tired and sore after yesterday, Jacqui in particular, as she went off and attacked the Black runs yesterday afternoon.
The snow is holding-up reasonably well in the morning, Although a warm day is forecast so we can expect 'porridge' by this afternoon.

Our stamina is improving and the journey top to bottom is requiring less recovery stops, particularly Jacqui, who is flying.
Had a late lunch and we are both shattered. I think I'll need to take it easy for the remained of the day.

A little cool this morning, still at -12C. We had 23cm of snow overnight, which has turned the whole area around. Clear blue skies and soft landing for this average skier.

The clouds started to come in around 15:00, with light snow flurries reducing visibility to 10 or 20 meters. Getting cold on the chair's now and we need the extra layers we brought with us. Called it a day around 16:00, with the snow starting to get serious and the temperature continuing to fall (dropped to -12C overnight).

An early start had us on the snow before the crowds arrived. A few more people about today and the snow is still just OK in the morning. A little hard and icy for this average skier, particularly on the more heavily groomed sections.
Found the most expensive coffee on the slopes, US$23 for two coffees and a couple of 'cookies'.

Surprisingly there were few people on the slopes and the weather stayed cool enough to maintain good quality snow.

There are a range of lift systems providing access to Peaks 6 through to 10. The Peak 9 runs proved to be to our liking, not only because of the direct connection to the Beaver Run Chair, but a good mix of Blue and Black runs. The Blue's for me and the Black's for Jacqui when she needed a little more of a challenge.

I'm not too sure that the human body is designed for this activity, particularly over a certain age. We were on the snow by 08:30 and well and truly ready for a coffee by 11:00.
With legs "a quivering" we headed to Ten Mile for our break.