Shipboard fantasy for today: ("yachtboard" or "boatboard" do not work.)

The sun is out, it's not quite 10 o'clock, the rainshower has passed, the boat gently rocks, listing, as we make our 5 knots west-nor'west, destination Vava'u in the kingdom of Tonga. Since 7 this morning Adrienne has typed an email to daughter Dawn, we have listened to the weather and checked in to the net and had a nice long radio conversation with Gerry, on Destarte, anchored Opunohu Bay in the fabled French Polynesian island of Moorea.

We have also raised the double-reefed* mains'l, to add an extra knot of speed in this light 12 knot breeze from the east-sou'-east. Adrienne has been cooking breakfast; potato omelet, and I hear it is just now ready. Excuse me ...

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Wow! That was delicious. But left me still hungry! So we had bananas, canned peaches and cream, and plunger-pot coffee, also with cream! Yesterday, I boiled some potatoes in their jackets, mashed one spud each down with new Zealand butter and topped that with reheated chicken Paella, and a bit of fresh ground pepper. Second helpings, of course. Cruisers (when they're not talking about what's wrong on their boats) talk about food - the meal they are eating at the moment, or in the past or in the future, good restaurants in Z-town or Fiji, pot-lucks, recipes ...

Another shower, with a squall - driving rain - wind at 25 - reef the genoa - adjust the course - Adrienne, naked, shiny with rain, cranking the winch handle, me, no underwear but clad in the foul weather jacket, at the wheel, wrestling (well, not wrestling folks! - steering!) with the wheel, as she tries to round up into the wind ... and now . the wind has dropped, less than before, and I hear the sheet block banging away out there. At least I'm warm, dry, and clothed, and sitting at the nav station typing this on a little computer velcro'd to the chart table .

... ... ... Wind shifts, sail changes, emails, radio skeds, meals, naps - nights, days. And reading, just about any trashy old novel we have on board. We laugh a lot, and get on amazingly well, I think, for two people in a small boat together, for two years ...

12 noon. Well, that's it for now. As they used to say in the GOON Show "It's all in the mind, folks!"

BUT WAIT!! There's MORE!!

It's now 12:52 pm and we have just raised the mizzen sail - but just as it reached the top!!! it came sliding back down ... the shackle pin in the halyard clip has fallen out! Things like this happen all the time, it's like a cross-the-Sahara-desert cross-continent car rally - things breaking or wearing out or falling off - it's what you get. How to get up there and retrieve the halyard?? - We normally use the halyard to pull me up to the top of the mast. Tune in again next time for the exciting conclusion! ...

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* Double-reefed so as not to rob the headsail of wind.

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