We celebrated our first Christmas at home in three years which has been wonderful. We are lucky that Chris' parents live only about twenty minutes away from mine, so we were able to spend a lot of time with both, including our little nephews and nieces. We have been eating non-stop, catching up on all of the good things we've missed while at sea, probably the best of which was lamb for Christmas dinner followed by persimmon pudding.

Being at home is also somewhat of a harsh reality, as we've started seriously contemplating exactly what we will do when we get home. I've been dusting off my resume and talking with old work contacts and we even spent an afternoon driving around looking at homes. We're comforted by the fact that we are not officially home yet, but we will be before we know it.

We are planning to fly back to Cabo next Friday to make the final run up the coast. We've bought some more layers, as this will certainly be the coldest sailing we've done to date. We have reserved a mooring in Newport Beach and cannot wait to sail in and be greeted once again by our families and friends. We will celebrate with a magnum of our favorite South African champagne that we've been saving for this occasion!