We just returned from a three-week visit to our families who all live within the USA. We visited all four children all of our brothers and sisters, met for the first time Nathan, my daughter Jill's love and even celebrated with a "thanksgiving" meal for the one we missed months ago. It was a very good respite for both Nancy and me. We spent some time together visiting my expecting younger daughter Wendy and Byron. We went to Colorado to keep our insurance policy viable and then split up to cover the several family members on the east coast and in the Midwest.

Although we didn't miss any airplane connections we were greeted with the Polar Vortex and staying warm was a full-time endeavor for me. I sure don't miss the cold.

It was great to catch up with my former partners and long-time friends and hear how their lives and their families have grown and changed. It has been about 7 years since I last visited Cary Orthopaedics and now I find they have 125 employees! YIKES!

I think both Nancy and I questioned our sanity the day we returned to the boat. At home we were wined and dined and were spoiled with comforts in all of the homes we stayed in.

The trip back was VERY long and made worse with misplaced baggage at the end. However, the worst part was returning to the boat in gale conditions! It was impractical to find a hotel so we chose to suck it up and move aboard anyway. A dear friend answered our radio call and came out into the maelstrom getting soaked in the process to transport me back to Always Saturday so that i could launch our dinghy and go back for the bags. The rain was cold, horizontal and we had to transport ourselves and our 8 bags in the dinghy across the harbor in maybe 3 foot waves. Salt water was coming aboard and if it weren't so miserable it would have been fun. It was certainly exciting! By the time we transferred our belongings were soaked, and we were questioning ourselves why we chose this lifestyle. We had some heated discussions!

The third day the weather broke, the sun came out....we were back in summer again the bad memories passed and now we are excited and looking forward to our extended camping trip down to the South Island starting in a few days time.

This next year we hope will be much easier, less stressed and much more fun. We are no longer new¬-bees to this lifestyle! We aren't going to plan very long passages and we expect to coastal cruise Fiji, Tonga and Vanuatu most of the season. We plan to come back to New Zealand at the end of the season where we can continue to travel maybe to Australia (by plane) and prepare to sell Always Saturday so that we can be free to come home and live a more mature and subdued lifestyle.

I know that we haven't been writing much lately but once we start living new experiences we do hope to do a better job with our blogging.

From the Crew of Always Saturday