Arrived in Athens and got onto the yacht at about 10 pm.

Another pleasant journey courtesy of One Railway (or wahtever it is they call themselves these days) and EasyJet .

Spent the first couple of days going over and sorting out the boat ready to deliver it the 3,000 nm to Kiel and realising, in the process, what joys a 21-year old boat bring.

Apart from the general weariness of the boat there are the blocked sink outlets, blocked shower drains, substandard cooker, no manuals for anything, no boat diagrams, in fact, very little; guess I've just been spolit in the past.

Also, at Marina Delta in Athens, there is NOTHING here, nothing!

It was built for the Olympic games and, in subsequent years, nothing else has been added: no shops, bars, restaurants, chandlers, fuel pontoon, nowt!!

As a result, we moved the boat 2 nm this morning to Marina Alimos to finish provisioning, to refuel, take on water and then to depart...oh no!

On our huge trip down here (an hour), the engine bay was starting ti fill up with water.

This was flooding out of the impeller housing and, seeing as the impeller is okay, seems that the seals within the housing itself are washed...

Now to see tomorrow if we can get replacements...ho hum!!

Fly out of Gatwick on Friday afternoon to join the yacht for delivery to Kiel, Germany.

This one will be a fairly long trip taking around about a month.

Weather's grim at the moment but I hope it'll improve in the Eastern Med by the end of the weekend.

I have two experienced crew with me on this one, Dave and Claire so should be a good one

Went down Looney's pub to watch the championship decider between Wales and Ireland.

Ireland were chasing their first Grand Slam victory for 61 years and Wales were playing for the Triple Crown and the Championship title.

Beating Ireland would give them the Triple Crown, beating them by 13 clear points would also give them the championship.

Unfortunately, and this is one of the beauties of rugby, the English victory over Scotland, the French hammering of the Italians and the last minute drop-goal by Ireland (giving them a 15 - 17 victory) meant Wales came fourth in this years Six Nations.

It was a very exciting game, edge-of-seat stuff in the second half and full credit to the irsih for their victory.

Now to look forward to the British Lions in May...

Still waiting to hear about a possible transat from La Rochelle to Fort Lauderdale I receive an email about a possibility of another delivery from Athens to Kiel, Germany

About 6 weeks ago I tried to upgrade the firmware on my iPhone.

I've used QuickPwn in the past and it has worked flawlessly. Unfortunately, this time the software wouldn't recognise my phone: it works to synchronise with iTunes but QuickPwn just doesn't see it.

I tried again today with a new download and install of the necessary files but again, QuickPwn doesn't see the phone...bugger!

Googled for assistance but no luck I'm afraid.

Will try again when the next upgrade is available I guess.

I was looking forward to watching the Six Nations rugby this afternoon: the Italy v Wales game being the first one I have seen this season.

Unfortunately the game (from a Welsh point of view) was very poor and I have to admit I was very pleased to hear the final whistle and see Wales win 20 - 15.

I sincerely hope they do far better against Ireland next weekend in Cardiff.

Well the flight from Cancun to New York is 2/3rds empty so is a pleasant 4-5 hours (if you know what I mean).

The four hours at JFK go fairly quickly and the good news is I get an SMS message from Gibbo saying he'd drive down to Heathrow and give me a lift back up to GY - nice one mate!

Unfortunately the NY to LHR flight is pretty full (well it is in cattle-class)
and I have a crap seat with some 'peon' behind me who keeps 'hitting' my seat and prevents me getting any decent kip.

The in-flight entertainment has some programmes I want to see so I watch the film Slumdog Millionaire (I read the book last year) and finally manage to get to see the US version of The Office.

I think the UK version of Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant's series is hilarious but after watching three and a half episodes of the US version with not one single chuckle I admitted defeat and switched to the film (which was okay - normal score though, the book was better).

We arrive in Heathrow a little earlier than planned and after a short wait in the freezing cold, Gibbo arrives and drives me back to my mothers' house in GY.

Good to be back eh?

Board the bus for the 4.5 hour ride to San Jose and then have a day in San Jose before getting a 5 am taxi to the airport.

Back up to Mexico City, across to Cancun and then down to Puerto Aventuras to see Adam, Emily and family again.

It's good to see them all again and, after a day sorting stuff out, Adam gives me a lift to Cancun for my flight to New York and then back to London Heathrow.

My mother had a fall a while ago and my brother 'recommended' that I return to the UK to 'assist'.

I have the possibility of another delivery from Europe in about a month so decide that I need to go back to the UK to sort things out.

I like Puerto Viejo. It's a great place, some really good people and maybe somewhere that I could happily stay for a while.

I book my flight back for next week but have to return to Puerto Aventuras, Mexico first as I may need my sailing gear that Adam has kindly looked after for me.

Speaking to some people who have been here a while (20+ years), they say that they have neer seen rain like it...

It's going on far too long into the 'season' and will affect everyone here, especially the diving

Ah well, life goes on...