October 2017 – Cartagena.

A year to the actual day since we descended on this lovely city and here we are again. One of our favourite places especially for its people, culture and amenities. It feels just like we have come home, a bit like putting on a pair of your favourite shoes. It’s comforting and reassuring, fits snuggly in the right places and gives you support when you need it. We wonder how many faces we will see that we recognise.

First things first, we need to get the girls settled back into a routine whilst we are here. We go back to the school to collect the necessary paperwork which will enable them to attend whilst we are here. We shall be returning back to the UK soon though so don’t need them to start straight away, not much point putting them to disrupt them and the class when we take them out again.  The girls and I amble up to the school taking in the familiar surroundings and searching the spots where familiar old faces might be – Jose the lottery ticket seller was not in his spot. We find he is now working further along the street from the chap who has now taken his spot. Such a shame as we see not one familiar face until we get to Colegio Patronato Sagrado Corazon de Jesus – the girls school. Such a warm and vibrant welcome from the administrator in the office, followed by huge hugs and kisses from the teachers in the school. Whoops of “Olivia” and “Jessica” ring out through the hallways as old classmates see them there. The headmistress was consulted and we were instructed to bring the girls the very next day. I tried to explain in my broken Spanish about our journey back to the UK and that it would be best to wait until we had returned, all I wanted was the forms. No forms needed – start tomorrow….Something was lost in the translation – but I did manage to get a pass until after the weekend which gave us a bit of grace to get school clothes sorted for them both again. Routine then takes over – school starts at 09:00 so we are up and sorted ready to leave the boat by 08:30 and collect them at school close 14:00. They do not have a lunch break as such just eat it during play at 11:30. This gives Howard and I a few hours to get the boat tasks done without interfering with time to be with the girls. So free time is taken up once again with us getting intimately acquainted with all the nooks and crannies Arctic Fern has to offer and there are lots of them!. It’s amazing how those 4 hours disappeared everyday all too quickly. Some days one of us would be left behind to finish up whatever it was we were working on to collect the girls and do the bakery run. Davos’ is the best bakery we have found on our journey thus far. It’s a family run bakery located right near to the school. A fabulous place that makes you feel part of the community, learning your name and even your daily order. We used to arrive and it would be in a bag ready for us to collect, always with extra that we had not ordered; Fabulous service and great tasting bread and cakes.

No sooner had we settled into a routine and it was disrupted with a trip back to the UK to spend some time with family. We knew it would be cold but hadn’t appreciated how we had become accustomed to the warmer climate. As we stepped off the plane it was freezing, although it was 23:30 at night. It was like being in a freezer. I was lucky as I had the coats, Howard and the girls however had nothing but short sleeved tops on. Ryanair in their infinite wisdom only allow families to sit together if you pay for the privilege, I was sat at the front of the plane so exited through the front steps, Howard and the girls were sat near the rear and so exited at the rear steps. I quickly saw them on the steps and had coats and jumpers ready for them when they reached me. The bus was packed to the point of us not fitting in; someone had to urge the rest of the bus to bunch up so we could actually get in. Welcome back!

Luggage was not an issue as we had packed light and we were soon one of a few thousand people waiting in the queues to be seen through passport control. Grandad was called and told we were through and were making our way outside.  The girls were eager to get their first glimpse of Grandad in over a year, they didn’t have to wait long. We eventually got back to the house passed 01:00 which meant it was 02:00 for us being an hour ahead. The girls must be totally bushed, I know I am and looking at H he is too. We flop into bed eventually and fall sound asleep.

17 days seems like you will have time to do a thousand and one things and see everyone that you want to. I can tell you the reality is you are not able to fit everyone and everything in. In fact it was an impossible task. We were staying miles from our old home so any journey already had an extra hour before you could see anyone. Not only this, but we had a different kind of constraint that we put on ourselves. Grandad was due for surgery in the second week we were back and we wanted to be close so that we could be on hand to help with keeping the house chores up to date so Grandma could concentrate on being by his side as much as possible. I have to say that this upset some very close friends who really wanted to see us, and us them, but it was just impossible to do it all in the time we had available. I am really sorry about the upset that this caused but it was unavoidable.

The girls did manage to briefly see old class mates when they went to the school and spoke to their old classes. It was lovely to see how much the children had changed and matured – some even asked who Jessica actually was, whilst others from older classes whispered that it was the girls who had gone off to sail around the world. It was brought home to me even more as we were walking to the school at home time; these people’s lives had not really changed much on the face of it, the same faces were still walking the same path to collect their children from the same school, yet here we were on this path for the first time in 16 months and having been through 4 different countries and countless individual new places within those countries. Hopefully we are doing the right thing, people forever tell me we are but I often wonder what their lives would be if we had stayed as these people had. Anyway, we were waylaid by people wanting to ask how we were and what we had been doing, to the point I did not even get to collect the person we went to collect. I was the one who ended up being collected and taken to the school to talk to the teachers. One child from Olivia’s old class had even said to her mum “why can’t I have an exciting life like Olivia”. The problem is that that your constant moving and seeing new places becomes the norm for you so the excitement can drop off if you let it.

We did have a couple of important presentations to attend whilst we were here making our schedule even tighter. Our club that we belonged to and helped us get into sailing the East Coast of the UK had awarded Jessica and Olivia their Endeavour Trophy at the annual awards ceremony. The commodore Keith and his lovely wife Gilly invited us for lunch and presented the award to the 2 girls. They were extremely chuffed although a bit worried about how we were going to get the trophy back to Spain and then back to the UK for the next person to have it. Luckily Grandma and Grandad N have kept it in pride of place in one of their bookcases in the UK so it can be collected ready for the next year’s recipients.

We had a few days with family, catching up with nephews and nieces, brothers and sister in laws and then it was time to leave. It was extremely sad to say goodbye to close family but harder for the girls to say goodbye to grandparents.  I believe that Grandparents play an integral part in a child’s life. The relationship with them is very different to that of a parent. They can be told things and asked things that are important to them without the fear of repercussions. I loved the time with my dad’s parents as I grew up ( my mums parents emigrated in 1977 to the USA and only returned when I was 15). I continued to see them on a regular basis as an adult, they were an important part of my life so I knew how the girls were feeling. They too have great closeness with all 4 of their grandparents and it’s really hard to have to see them say goodbye and the heartache that it causes them. They don’t know when they are physically going to see them again but thank goodness for today’s technology that face to face conversations can be done using skype and FaceTime etc.

Back in the warmth and time to get ready for Christmas and the festivities. Christmas day saw having dinner with 51 people at the side of the marina. The girls had made the table decorations, we had been in charge of cooking 51 baked potatoes in our on board oven ( not a mean feat when the oven only has one shelf in it), others had taken charge of cooking the suckling pig and turkey crowns. Everyone bought either a main side or a dessert. The cruising community had rallied and made a real effort. It was tiring but fun. The girls had great fun playing the games Lorraine had planned as well as talking, dancing and playing with new made friends or anyone who was prepared to play with them.