30 Years Old

Almost a month has passed since I last added to my blog, but it has been a good one. The obvious highlight was my 30th Birthday. For those who don't know, this momentous day was a week and a half ago, on June 30th.

As had been planned for some time, Fi, Mum and Dad, Jay and Marie and myself spent a week and a half at Jim and Patsy's home in Spain to celebrate. Jess and Marla, Rach and Paul and Griff joined us a couple of days after we had arrived to complete the grandeur of the occasion.

Much time was spent lounging by the pool, lounging in the pool and lounging on the pool, courtesy of a few 4 Euro inflatable things. This was mostly accompanied by a drink of some description. Typically San Miguel, but we all discovered the amazing Ron Tobacco, the cheapest rum in all the land! Apparently 'Ron' means 'Rum' in Spanish. I like to think of him as just plain Ron and his honest 'Tobacco' Rum.

Other than lounging, we spent a bit of time doing the tourist thing in the Costa Brava, driving around, lying on the beach and, as you'll see from the following link, taking lots of photos. We also got an opportunity to go sailing for a day. Jim's friend Mike invited us all out on his boat. Mum and Patsy declined with boats not a particular love of theirs, but the rest of us snapped up the offer. I was of course particularly keen to follow on from my recent success in the Orange Regatta :o) Needless to say it was an absolute blast.

Follow this link to see my photos

As a final word for the time being, I was entirely overwhelmed by the cards and gifts I received for my Birthday and I'll use this as another opportunity to thank everyone for all their generosity. You know who you all are.

Regatta Victory

The Orange Regatta was simply amazing. Our crew of seven Gybed, Tacked and Ran Sunsail 53 to resounding victory. I spent much of the time at the helm, as the picture shows but sailing is a true test of teamwork and most of the credit goes to the skipper and assistant. The picture also shows Capt. Mike on the left and foredeck man Mark on the right. We were victorious in four out of five races and were second in the fifth. Dropping our worst result gave us a perfect grand score of 3.0.  

On Monday, the wind was a little light making the races very technical, but by Tuesday afternoon the wind was 4-5 and it all got quite dramatic (a bit too dramatic sometimes)!

You can see all the photo's I took in my online album. All you need to do is follow this link

Orange Regatta Photographs

A sailing we go

Ahoy,

I'm off sailing this afternoon. Monday and Tuesday will see me, and about 60 others from Orange, racing between Portsmouth and Cowes. Sounds like fun doesn't it? I'll post all the pictures when I return.

Shiver me timbers.

This just a test of some new functionality. Hope it works because it will allow me to post images straight into the Blog. Incidentally, this picture was taken in Prato Nevoso in January this year. 

The Emperor's New Clothes

After much delay, here is the new look to my blog. I'll not pretend that it is anything to do with me though. Thankfully, a whole bunch of new templates are available on Blogger. This one is my favourite.

The 'external links' bit has disappeared, but I'll use my considerable expertise in CSS(!) to rectify that in time.