21 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
Glenys did school work, while I spent the morning doing admin – working out our finances and writing a few letters. Brett was desperate to go and play badminton again, so we went to Tijax after lunch. We must have been mad to play it at two o’clock in the blazing sun! We then motored back to Mario’s anchorage and went to taco night (again!). The trouble with going to regular events like this is that it shows the passage of time – and it’s quick! Jack from “Southern Cross” loves playing with the boys, but he tends to get them very excited and they run out of control - it took us ages to get them settled in bed!
22 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
School work in the morning. After lunch, Glenys went out to see Suzanne from “Boston Scrod” mostly to get away from us. I messed about recording myself playing tunes on the clarinet. Bloody awful! I thought I was starting to sound OK, so it’s brought me back down to earth – I must record myself every time I start to get cocky.
Taran Tara! I had an evening without drinking any alcohol, it’s a miracle. I sat up until eleven o’clock, working on plans for our grand return to the UK. I’m trying to make sure that we do as much as possible in the States to ease ourselves into the UK. I’m also trying to think of ways to earn money back in the UK. So far, I’ve got a four pronged attack – permanent job (groan), working investor with up to £50K to spend, do contract work, set up a business (but what product?). It’s very much an iterative process, but very difficult because we don’t know what is going on in the UK, both economically and technically. I’m now starting to look forward to getting back, so that I can get stuck in!
23 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
Still waiting for word from the Trust, I feel like we’re trapped here on the Rio Dulce! I picked up a fax from Ceris which is just chat. I then went to pick up some water in jerry cans from Mario’s, but they ran out of water! Nothing’s going right today!
We motored down to the fuel dock and filled up with diesel. We then anchored by “Gooseberry”. I was in a grumpy mood - I’ve been feeling guilty about not doing any jobs on the boat. We’ve got a slight water leak in the pressurised water system that makes the water pump turn on and off randomly, which is very irritating.
After lunch, I decided “sod it”, and sat down with a good novel. Glenys went out and did a bit of shopping. “Gooseberry” came over for a beer. They met “Wise Cat” last year in the intra coastal waterway. Apparently, Robin and the boys had flown home and Phil was sailing the boat back to Australia by himself - 15 years to sail from Australia to Florida and 6 months back!
24 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
We dropped the boys off at “Boston Scrod” so that Suzanne could babysit while Glenys, Graham and I went horse riding. We picked up the horses at the stables at Tijax at about quarter past nine. Glenys had a feisty little horse, I had a nice responsive stallion and Graham had an awkward, old mare. We were let loose to roam around the 300 acre Finca (Farm). The horses were good and we had some good canters as well as pleasant walks along paths through teak plantations. Graham’s horse took a different path to us at one point and he had to get off and lead it back! I swapped with him halfway through and agreed that it was bloody minded. Glenys looked relaxed on her horse and I was quite pleased with my efforts although it was awkward with short stirrups, which couldn’t easily be adjusted.
After picking up the boys up from “Boston Scrod”, we went to Mario’s Marina for a late lunch and then had a relaxing afternoon, watching TV and chatting. “Filia” turned up and it was nice to see Ollie and Margaret. The last time we saw them was in Grenada, August 1994. They spent 5 months here last year and then went down to the San Blas Islands and Panama. They were hit by lighting in Panama and had £25,000 worth of electrical and electronic equipment damage. I finally received a fax from Paul Preston acknowledging my fax of the 19th.
25 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
Craig got up four times last night because of nightmares; he slept all night with his light on. We watched a film called “Starman” last night. It seemed pretty inoffensive to me, but something bothered him and it’s hard to get him to talk about it. He’s going through an age of vivid imagination – Brett went through the same thing. Craig has even had nightmares about an old James Bond film “You Only Live Twice”. He didn’t like the bit where a Ninja crept into the ceiling over James Bond’s bed and then dribbled some poison down a thread. Craig is now worried about someone creeping about on the deck and opening his hatch - the strangest things bother children!
Glenys did school work in the morning while I did some jobs. The pressurised water leak eludes me. The stern gland has been leaking badly again and because we have been slack running the bilge pump, the engine bilge sump has flooded, so I cleaned that out. I also tightened the stern gland by ½ turn – I wonder if everyone else has to adjust their stern gland as much as me?
After lunch, we went over to Rositas hoping to play soft ball. For some reason the game wasn’t on and we had to go back to Glencora. “Boston Scrod” dropped by for a beer and we then went to “Pot Luck” at the Marina. At ten pm, we all settled down and watched “Time Cop” and didn’t get to bed until after midnight.
26 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
We couldn’t raise ourselves until nine o’clock! School work in the morning. No fax from the Trust, so we just have to wait. I may send them a fax tomorrow, asking them to acknowledge my fax of the 19th. Brett and Craig have invited themselves to stay the night on “Southern Cross”.
After lunch we all did our own thing, but as five o’clock approached, the boys got more and more excited. I dropped them off and Jack took them to the swimming pool. Lynn says that Jack is as excited as the boys! I made a lasagne for dinner and we had a very quiet evening drinking wine, listening to music and ...
27 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
I picked the boys up from “Southern Cross” and it sounds like everyone had a good time. We did school work in the morning and then motored down to Fronteras, so that Glenys could do some shopping. Still no fax from John Barrett, I’m going to send him a fax tomorrow – I can’t stand the suspense!
I spent the afternoon playing the clarinet and doing some music theory. I’m trying to suss out how to ad-lib and I’m starting to learn the chords so that I can play in the background to accompany people (I think!). We had a quiet night.
28 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
Glenys did school work in the morning and I went into Morales. I sent three faxes, one to John Barrett asking him to tell me what’s going on, one to Ceris to get her to bring some things out to us and another to Carol in reply to her fax.
In the afternoon, Glenys went out to do some more shopping and I played clarinet. I recorded some songs again – one of my biggest problems is that I don’t finish notes off positively but they kind of slide away, going flatter as they go!
We went to Tijax in the evening for a beer. John, who runs the bar, has managed to acquire a subcutaneous worm which is moving about 1 inch per day under the skin of his foot. It’s leaving a thin red wavy line on his skin as it tunnels its way along – yuk! We all stood in a bucket of Savlon and had a shower when we got back to Glencora!
29 February 1996 Mario’s Marina, Rio Dulce, Guatemala
It’s a leap year. We did Test 60 today which has been a minor accomplishment this month – thank goodness for the extra day! I received a garbled message that a fax has arrived from John Barrett. It apparently says they are trying to get hold of Paul Preston. This waiting is very frustrating!
In the afternoon, I finished off our small model of Glencora so we went to the marina to put it up and have a swim in the pool. In the evening Jack and Lynn from “Southern Cross” came for dinner. “Boston Scrod” popped by and had a quick drink with us. We had a pleasant evening and drank lots of wine.
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