Thursday - T minus 2 days and counting

Today was Sea Trial Day! The morning began like the previous few: the refit gang showed up, everyone jumped into work, and the boat went from quiet to full of busy folk in what seemed like a few minutes. Today's focus was on getting the boat ready to take out to test and calibrate the autopilot and navigation system, and test the new turning blocks for the jib sheets. Delivery crew member Bill arrived in the morning, fighting east-coast US jetlag, but got the boat tour in the midst of the chaos (Bill thought balloon: "this is a boat? looks like the aftermath of an explosion in a chandlery...") The engine, under the floor of the mail salon. (Big boat, big engine.) The original schedule - off the dock at 10 - proved a little too ambitious, but at around 2 pm the various bits were all back together, gear stowed safely in case of chop, and we headed out! ...finally moving out from the dock! Turning (love those bow thrusters!)) Open water in front of us at last. Sofia, our first mate/chef/stewardess/deck hand/second engineer/purser/entertainment coordinator. (And who also coils a mean dockline, clearly.) Sofia and our her partner, our captain Sean. Happy Heidi. Happy Anne (Yup, biggest boat she's ever driven.) Alec ponders the Med. Casey and the guy from the engineering company rebuilding the turning blocks. Testing the jib blocks. ("Look, she's almost a sailboat!") Sofia driving in a spot of sunlight. ...meanwhile, Jeff arrived from the US - everyone's almost here... Fantastic day.