Eos Log
It had been wonderful to have Eos out of the water on a real slip instead of being squeezed by travellift slings, but even so it took some time for the planks to settle again and so we didn't mind too much spending a week anchored by Culatra waiting for the wind to get a bit less before we set sail again. And for the sun to warm things up a bit; May had arrived but we were sorry that we had stored the chimney in a far away locker.
We used the time waiting at anchor to tidy Eos up to a sail boat and a comfortable home again. Putting things back in place takes much more time than taking them out! Somehow, after having had
the new planks and frames fitted, several lockers, drawers, floor planks, wash basin and bilge pump had to be adjusted to fit again. One thing that was changed we were really pleased about: for
several years our Lavac toilet (the vacuum one where you close the lid before pumping) always had a wet seat and we had got used to wiping it before use, but now, after re-installing it, all of
sudden everything stayed nicely dry all the time! Don't know how but don't complain.
In half a day's time the weather changed from chilly spring to full summer, leaving us no time to adjust, but of course we didn't mind. We sailed back to the Guadiana and spent some time in Vila
Real de Santo António (Portuguese) and Ayamonte (Spanish) to do a lot of shopping and to visit the dentist. I flew to Holland for a quick family visit and then we sailed upriver to near Alcoutim
and Sanlúcar, where it was nice to be among the hills again – still green and with lots of flowers – and to hear the nightingales – or rather dayandnightingales, the way they went on. Also
wonderful to see old friends again and to meet up with new people around the barbecues.
Besides having barbecues we tried to catch up with maintenance jobs that had been left undone while we were on the hard, but somehow our workspeed slowed down as the weather got hotter.
Eos was adopted by a wagtail, but he wasn't The tide is just about to turn
quite house(boat) trained
On one of the many nice walks along the river One of the many flowers
And we spent some time “selling the boat”. We got some enquiries which made us rush to finally get some more pictures of the interior done. When you live aboard permanently there is always a lot of personal clutter lying around, even more so when the boat hasn't been sailing for a few days and there isn't the need to have everything stored away. This meant moving lots of stuff from one part of the boat to the other, cleaning everything till it shone and making a nice “display” before the actual picture taking. Then moving the photographs onto the computer straight away to see if there were any funny objects still in view, yes there were, and so doing another shooting session before putting all the gear back in its former place again. No follow-up on the enquiries though, but now there are some nice pictures on show here.