How time flies – here are three long overdue updates.

I’ve had a good week visiting my dad in the hospital where he is astounding everyone with his determination and his progress. He is almost 88 and two weeks after breaking his pelvis and being unable to move, he came home this morning! It is the first day of spring, and after a couple of weeks of above 0 Celsius weather, we had 15 cm of snow this morning, wouldn’t you know? No worries though – a little shoveling and the path was clear. He can walk up and down the hall with his walker, do all his own washing up and personal care, and now he will be able to sit in his chair in his own kitchen, eat some good meals, read his mail and the papers in comfort, and tell me what to do! I sure hope I can manage to be as fit and able when I am his age.

In the meantime, Jim is combining the end of season boat chores with visiting friends in the Rio Dulce. He’s been cleaning lockers, checking on another problem with the holding tank (a bucket that you simply empty overboard is looking good right now!) and delivering bags of left over items from the larder to friends and neighbours. He emailed last night from the dinghy out in El Gofete because the connection ashore was impossible. Today he is running down to Livingston in a lancha to deliver paperwork to Raul for a boat that Casey is taking to Cancun, and then he can watch as a 7 ft draft boat goes over the bar. I love that image – a guy in a dinghy in the middle of the water, smoky mountains all around him, dug out canoes and men with fishing nets passing by, emailing me – thousands of miles away – on his Blackberry. Thank goodness for technology!

And thank goodness for good health. And for friends and family. And for (ahem) Canadian medical care. And for co-captains who say, “Go, I will take care of things here.” And for beauty and dophins. And for love and kindness. And for the sailing life with all its vagaries and joys. It has been another good season.