It has to be said, 2015 has not been our best year. We spent a second winter on the beautiful island of Sicily. In a small marina on the south coast, with a international group of similar people including Dutch, German, French, Swedish, and British cruisers as well as some other nationalities. This made for a extraordinary community atmosphere and we made great friends of all nationalities. The weather was quite mild allowing plenty of sightseeing trips all over the island. Whilst laid up for the winter we took the opportunity to upgrade the solar panels on Argonauta and now have a total of 450W Solar power which means even in the winter we were almost self sufficient for power, using shore power only for heating hot-water for showers, the Kettle and occasionally on cold nights an electric heater in the main cabin. Based on this we believe in the bright summer days we wont need to run the generator at all. Unfortunately as you will read further on we never got the opportunity to test the theory this summer.

The bad events started on the 6th January Jackie tripped and fell on the pontoon in the marina and broke her wrist. This it turned out was quite a bad break with several bone fragments. We utilised the Italian health service who operated to place wires in her wrist and re set it. Unfortunately she then developed a infection in the wound under the cast and needed further treatment. By March it was obvious that things in her wrist were not going as planned and she returned to the UK for further evaluation and possible treatment by British doctors. We have no real criticism of the Italian health service, they looked after us very well, and with the European health card we had no charges to pay. However there was always the problem of communication and whilst our friend Donnatella helped translating, asking questions and fully understanding the situation was difficult. Hence the return to the UK NHS for follow up treatment. Friends at the marina during this time were fantastic those who had cars offered lifts to the hospital which was in the next town or loaned us the use of their car. Whilst others helped by providing meals and offering to get things from the shops or market.

Whilst back in the UK Jackie had a routine mammogram (this had been due in October 2014 so was already overdue). Here they discovered that she had breast cancer. At first investigation this appeared a small lump and not too aggressive. However after a biopsy it was reported to be more aggressive and larger than had first appeared.
Treatment was going to take quite some time and needed to be started as soon as possible. As such all plans sailing had to be cancelled for the year, whilst Jackie had treatment. Pete sailed the boat 30 miles down the Sicilian coast and Argonauta was hauled out onto the hard at a small boatyard in Porto Palo, on the very south-west tip of the island. We had already started provisioning for the summer sailing season. So before he left, a kind of garage sale was held on the pontoon to get rid of provisions such as long-life milk etc. that could not be kept on board till August/September when we had planed to return. Fortunately the other cruisers bought up our excess stock leaving just the goods that would survive, (mainly Wine, Amaretto & Gin..........) all safely secured in the bilges for the future! Pete returned to London joining Jackie. We are staying with a very good friend in north London. (We had just renewed the annual rental contract on our house two weeks before the discovery of Jackie's cancer)

The time scale for treatment turned out to be much longer than we had originally anticipated. Jackie has now gone through surgery, followed by 22 weeks of chemotherapy with all that entails, including hair loss. In the new year she will have surgery for a double mastectomy followed by breast reconstruction. We anticipate now that treatment will be completed by the end of January 2016. She will then need some time to recover and we have been advised that she cannot fly for 8 weeks after such extensive surgery.

Hopefully we will be back on board Argonauta in March and will start our sailing adventures again. We were due to be in Crete this winter, and had already booked in the marina, once we informed them of the situation they have adjusted things and confirmed a booking for us for winter 2016-2017 instead.

To say things have been tough is a understatement, but I (Pete) have been amazed how well Jackie has copped. In many ways she's dealt with it much better than me. But they say “what doesn't kill you makes you stronger”, here's hoping.....

That said we have a lot to be grateful for. If Jackie had not damaged her wrist she would not have returned to the UK and had the Mammogram. Having felt nothing, we would have continued our cruising this summer and may not have found out about the cancer till it was too late. Iris our friend in North London has been fantastic, putting up with both of us for 9 months so far through thick and thin. Words cannot express our gratitude for what she has done for us. The NHS comes in for a lot of criticism, but the way they have treated us has been brilliant both the NHS & Macmillan have been great. Yes, Chemotherapy was tough, but the assistance we received was fantastic. Support from friends and family has also helped greatly, both those in the UK & cruising friends around the world. You have no Idea how much a quick message on Facebook or e-mail can really boost you up when things are hard.

During the summer we didn't really feel like blogging whist all this was going on. Jackie kept her Facebook contacts updated. But those who are just Pete's friends have not been as well kept up to date. Sorry! We plan on doing regular updates once we start sailing again we are also planning on starting to post video blogs in 2016, to that end we have used the time learning video & sound editing techniques so look out for these next year!

All that remains is to wish all our friends A Very Merry Christmas and the best for 2016.