The 2022 season is upon us and we are currently aboard Two Hoots anchored just outside Gaios on Paxos. We have been here for 10 days just getting back into the swing of onboard living.

We actually left the UK a month ago and drove to Preveza with stops in Colmar and Rimini before boarding the ferry in Ancona to Igoumenitsa. It's then a short 90 minute drive to Cleopatra Marina where Two Hoots had been stored on the hard for the winter.

We rented a nice apartment in Preveza so we did not have to live on the boat whilst out of the water. We were also able to deal with the biggest priority, namely Benjis hygienist and vaccination appointment at our vet in Preveza. It was done under general so he was a bit dopey for a while. Dopey but with shiny clean teeth!!

Although we had concerns about the state of our new (9 month old) batteries (Cleopatra had done a test on them and told me they were bad and needed replacing), it turned out that they were absolutely fine and did not need replacing. That was £3.5k less to spend.

So the task of getting Two Hoots ready for sea began.

1: Remove and fold the winter cover. Its massive and took two of us 2 hours to do that.

2: Grease seacocks.

3: Update / reboot / restore systems.

4: Get plumbing commissioned. (Flushing water tanks, sorting out loos etc)

5: Paint the RIB with UV protection paint. More to follow on that in another blog!!

6: Launch (Monday 11th April)

Once launched we moved to the anchorage to the north of Preveza town to continue with our preparations. But first issue identified was a leak in the toilet in our heads. Fortunately we have had this issue before so we had the necessary service kits on board and were able to sort that out quite quickly.

Next issue, the outboard would not start despite usually being very reliable and having just been given a good service.

So back to Cleopatra we went as no motor means no going ashore. Benji put his paw down and insisted!!

The next morning, the engineer who serviced it identified oil in the carb and on the plugs which probably happened when the boat went to a workshop to have a puncture repaired.

An hour later we were back in business and back out to Preveza.

Then there was a day of getting the boat rigged. The mainsail on it is bulletproof so needs serious tools to bolt it onto the mast sliders and set the battens.

We also recommissioned the watermaker which requires purging the pickling chemicals out of the system before it can make drinking water from sea water. Its really cool!

Eventually we were ready and just in time for Emma's arrival as she was going to spend Easter with us. Alas, Jack had to cancel as he was still testing +ve for the dreaded VID.

So 9 days after arriving, we were ready to depart with a plan to head town through the Lefkas canal towards Nydri and Meganisi.

In the next blog, we will tell the story of the case of the exploding dinghy!!