May 8th, 9th 1982

In the morning I set to work clearing the spare toilet + bikes off the boat, + then washing down + oiling the latter.  Val got the job of seeing to the laundry – one of the better jobs around, in my view, since you can sneak off to the laundry room with a book, get away from Dave, + yet he can’t accuse you of not working.  At lunchtime, Ed had a hot dog party to celebrate the finishing of the painting of his bloat, + naturally one had to wash down the hot dogs with a beer or 4.  Afterwards, Ed (+ his semi-partner Fred) took the boat out for a run around the bay.  We understood there was a general invitation to come along, so we climbed aboard, + then discovered we were the only guests.  A pleasant little run, tho’ I do think motor-boats are rather tedious, compared with sail.  I don’t think our captain was overpleased with our going AWOL, but we did a few more little jobs when we got back, then beer, steak, + a good old Billy Wilder movie on TV – Love in the afternoon.  After which we escaped.

Sunday began with brunch out at the Officer’s Club.  The food + drink were excellent, so it’s difficult not to appear ungrateful – after all, we didn’t pay anything for it – but the company was excruciatingly boring.  There were some halfway interesting people there, but we managed to get stuck at the wrong end of the table, next to Monika.  Anyway, we returned at about 1, + Dave immediately set us all to work.  I was up the mast yet again – tho’ not very far up – cleaning up a sail track –  + we had some refurling of the sails to do.  And Val was busy with her sail needle once again.  The same old jobs.  Still.  A good meat, veg + gravy meal in the evening, after which we pushed off.  Ran into Fred + Debbie, a youngish couple who own a boat there, + they invited us aboard for a drink.  It turned out Fred was pretty drunk, but they were good company anyway.  We drank a few drinks, chatted, + played a game called Rummy-O.  Fred asked many times if we said “Me mum” in England.

It seems we have had to abandon our search for the time being; we are still attached to, and involved with, both Crusader and the yacht club, and are hardly in a position simply to walk away.