Well life is back to normal now: The crew left early yesterday morning and we've been cleaning/provisioning/maintaining Jay Jay ever since .... and there people think it's a glamorous life! All joking apart it's fantastic to be back on board with Paul.
It was an amazing feeling watching Jay Jay approach the customs dock on Thursday morning ... all four on board had beaming smiles and were so obviously delighted to be here having completed what is probably one of the toughest adventures of their lives. Paul was on the helm and brought Jay Jay smoothly alongside before leaping off to give me a big hug ... so good to see him again. After clearing in with C&I, we moved Jay Jay into the marina proper and then all went ashore for a celebratory beer in Peter's Sport Cafe, quite the place for newly arriving sailors to drink to their success and toast one another. I, of course, was just a free-loader!
I fully expected to find a boat picked clean of anything edible given the extended passage but there's actually quite a lot of tinned stuff and dried goods on board! Paul did all the cooking on the crossing and is justifiably proud that he didn't serve up the same meal twice. Quite the creative chef!
Our new crew member (Georgina) arrives on Monday so we had planned to explore Faial Saturday / Sunday but both of us feel weary - Paul because of what he has just completed and me because I've caught a cold! Damn!! Hopefully we'll both feel a bit brighter tomorrow.
Looking at the weather forecast, you guessed it, the winds are from the wrong direction for the forseeable future. So I think we'll visit a couple of the other Azorean islands this coming week and keep our fingers crossed the winds swing to the north (or even better, the south or west) very soon.