NOVEMBER , 2008
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NOVEMBER , 2008 |
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| WEDDING BELLS |
October 1 – November 19, 2008 We flew out of the Brisbane airport on October 1 at 1105h and, after a total of 22 hours in the air, landed at JFK International Airport in New York at 1920h on October 1. We spent three days in NYC with our daughter Jenn and future son-in-law Jass as they finalized the preparations for their wedding. We were able to be present for Jenn’s fitting for her gown, which was a special moment. We also shopped for a dress for Mary and arranged for rental of a tuxedo for Paul. October 6, 2008 Early Monday morning, we left New York and flew to our hometown of Windsor, Ontario, for a three-week visit with family and friends. Usually we go to Canada in January and February, the winter months, but this time it was autumn and we were looking forward to seeing the colour changes in the leaves. As well, Canadian Thanksgiving is the second Monday in October and it is Mary’s favourite family holiday. We had a splendid turkey dinner with Mary’s family at her sister’s house in London, Ontario, and started the weekend off with a visit to the London home of our friends Yvette and Chris Fliesser. On Monday, Thanksgiving Day, we spent the day at Point Pelee with our friends Ray and Ann Robinet (with whom we stay when we are in Windsor). Mary packed a picnic lunch, which we enjoyed at the East Beach, and then we walked three of the trails, including the marsh boardwalk.
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When asked where we live in Canada, we tell our Australian friends that we come from the southern-most tip of mainland Canada. We were happy to spend the day at Point Pelee and it was a bonus to be able to take this picture to show our friends.
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Here we are with Ann and Ray, standing at the most southern tip of mainland Canada at Point Pelee. The water that you see is Lake Erie, one of the Great Lakes. |
Thank you to our family and friends who made our visit home such a special time. It was a pleasure spending time with all of you. October 29 – November 5, 2008 Early on October 29, we flew back to New York City. We had breakfast at the airport while we waited for two hours for the arrival from Vancouver of our son Jeremy and his partner Jenn. The four of us had rented an apartment for our stay in NYC for the wedding. Thus began five hectic days of sightseeing, meeting Jass’ family from Utah, final preparations for and celebration of the wedding, and the watching of the famous Manhattan Halloween Parade. |
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Here is Paul (centre) dressed for the Manhattan Halloween Parade, with our niece Sandi (right) and her friend Ken. The costumes in the parade were amazing and it seemed that the entire city was taking part in the festivities. |
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Before the ceremony, pictures were taken on the roof of their apartment in Brooklyn, New York. There were three different venues for the day (a theatre in Manhattan for the ceremony, a restaurant in Manhattan for the dinner, and a club in Brooklyn for the after dance party) and Jenn and Jass moved the 70 guests around via a hired bus. Jass put together a mix of music for the bus that the guests very much enjoyed.
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Here we are with our two children, Jeremy and Jennifer. |
Mary and Paul with Jenn and Jass.
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Here is our son Jeremy with his partner Jenn Sabean. |
It has long been Paul’s dream to sing “Sunrise, Sunset” at Jennifer’s wedding. We were thrilled to have this dream come true. Here we are as we prepare to sing, accompanied on the guitar by our good friend Yvette Laforet Fliesser, Jenn’s “Aunt” Yvette. |
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Tribute from Gabe, the Webmaster Cheers Jass & Jenn! |
We flew out of New York at 1900h on Wednesday and landed (after 22 hours in the air) in Brisbane at 0745h on Friday, November 7. Peter, our friend from the boat Cleopatra, picked us up at the airport and brought us back to Bella Via. The boat had been well looked after by Peter and Ann and also Lynda and Brett, from whom we rented the private pontoon. In February when we returned to the boat, which had been left in long-term storage at a marina in an industrial area, we were dismayed by how dusty and dirty the boat was. Not this time. Bella Via looked clean and smelled clean. All we had to do was unpack and get over our jetlag. Paul had the additional task of re-installing our ICOM 802 HF radio, which had been sent to Melbourne for warranty repair while we were away in North America. |
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One of the downfalls of leaving a boat in one place for an extended time – we came back and found that a bird had built a nest in our bridle. Paul very carefully transferred the nest to a safe place on the dock the morning that we had to leave. |
We stayed awake all day so that we could go to sleep at our normal time that evening. As we hadn’t yet spent any time with Lynda and Brett (the owners of the pontoon) who had been away when we arrived at Aquatic Paradise, Ann and Peter arranged a dinner party that evening. We had a very enjoyable evening and by 2100h we couldn’t keep our eyes open. We had a good sleep and spent the next day provisioning the boat and getting it ready to go back out for coastal cruising down to Tasmania. On Sunday, November 9, we met up with friends Peter and Donna from Two Up, who were staying at Rivergate Marina in the Brisbane River. Peter and Donna drove over and picked us up. We had a cool and windy picnic lunch at Wellington Point on Moreton Bay and then warmed up at a local coffee shop. November 11 - 17, 2008 After an evening spent at a Thai restaurant where we treated Peter and Ann and Lynda and Brett as a thank you for their hospitality, we left Aquatic Paradise on Tuesday morning and headed out into Moreton Bay. Thus began a period of lots of travel. We want to be in Hobart, Tasmania, for Christmas and that is a lot of miles to cover in a 6-week period. We spent two nights at Lazaret Gutter on Peel Island while we awaited northerly winds and then headed down through the protected waters of the Broadwater to the Gold Coast Seaway. We left the Seaway entrance at 0500h on Friday, November 14, and had an amazing spinnaker sail to Iluka/Yamba on the Clarence River. The distance was 90 miles and we managed it in 13 hours, with a speed of 9-11 knots for most of the afternoon. The swell was less than 1 metre, which made it a very comfortable ride at that speed. We arrived just at sunset with poor visibility due to heavy cloud cover and misty rain. We headed for the spot near the entrance where we had last anchored in February and quickly ran out of water and stopped dead in the sand. Just before we ran aground, we had been discussing a green buoy that was new since February but didn’t react quickly enough. We had a good laugh about the fact that we had just traveled 90 miles only to be stuck in the sand at the end of the day. We dropped the anchor and prepared dinner. By the time that dinner was ready, we were floating, as the tide was rising. After we ate, we hauled up the anchor and motored closer to shore where we found deeper water and re-anchored for a comfortable night’s sleep. In the morning we motored the 9 miles up the Clarence River to the Harwood Bridge for our scheduled bridge opening of 1100h. We then continued on up to Maclean where we spent the evening with our friends, the Macaulays. They very graciously offered us their private dock for the night. |
The walk up to the Macaulay home from the dock is long and steep and the youngest son, Rhys, is unable to make the walk due to rheumatoid arthritis. Here is Paul greeting the family after Sue drove Rhys down in the tractor. |
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We had a wonderful visit with Gary and Sue and their sons, Tyler and Rhys. We had a tour of their new boat that Gary is building. The family intends to cruise to Alaska starting sometime in late 2009 or early 2010. Monday, November 17, 2008 We left the Macaulay’s dock at 0830h and motored for 10 minutes to the town of Maclean, where we anchored in front of the public jetty so that we could go into town and get some groceries. We had booked a bridge opening for 1300h and had lots of time and we decided at 1100h that we would go to the bridge early and drop anchor and have our lunch. It was a good thing that we decided to haul up the anchor early because, to our dismay, we found that we had hooked the anchor on something solid and it wasn’t coming up. It took about 30 minutes of manoeuvering to finally bring it up and we were quite disappointed to see that the anchor shank was bent for the second time in six months! We made our way to the bridge, had our lunch, and then Paul disconnected the primary anchor and readied the fortress, our secondary anchor, for use in Iluka harbour. Once we reached Iluka boat harbour, Paul found a place in Yamba (across the Clarence River) where the anchor could be straightened. Before he tried that solution, our friend Allen from Svanika went with Paul to the fishermens’ co-op and then to the petrol station looking for a large enough press that could straighten the anchor. No luck there, so Paul went off to Yamba and came back an hour later with a nicely straightened anchor. Wednesday, November 19, 2008 We planned on continuing our way south this morning, however, there is no wind at the present and the forecast is calling for some strong winds in the next day or so. It’s also been raining for a day and a half so, at this moment, we have decided to wait here in Iluka for better weather. |