Looking back over this blog I realise that a landmark in my life has passed almost without a mention - at the end of December 2011 I finalised the deal to sell "La Fulica", so I am without a boat for the first time in about twenty-five years. She's going to a good home I hope - a British engineer working in Montenegro, just across the water from Brindisi. I bought her in late 1999 with the intention of using her for long-term cruising in the Mediterranean. With her very traditional gaff cutter rig she was hardly the most practical choice, but she looked so pretty sat in the boatyard in the shadow of the Humber Bridge.
She became our home when we sold our house in Blackheath in May 2002. They were exciting and anxious times, preparing for our journey and trying to squeeze in as many of our possessions as we could into her slim eleven metre hull. She looked after us well over the next two and a half years before we moved into our house in Puglia. We had one especially wonderful Summer cruising the islands of Elba, Corsica, Sardinia and Sicily, before over-wintering in Rome.
I particularly remember the first time we anchored in the Mediterranean and I looked down through four metres of crystal clear water and saw the shadow of "La Fulica's" hull dancing on the sand below and the joy of jumping over the side and following the anchor chain hand over hand down to the seabed.
But since 2004 owning her has been more of a weight than a pleasure until finally I realised I had to let her go. So, "bon voyage 'La Fulica', thank you for keeping us safe. I hope your new family look after you and you look after them in your turn."
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