Mast lowered

Kalessin is out of the water and her mast removed and ready for storage or transport. Sam said that the hull was clean and lovely, but the poor old propeller was totally coated in growth - it's not surprising they made such slow progress when motoring from Badalona to Blanes, and just as well they sailed all the way from Blanes to the Rhone. Fouling on a prop is always a problem as you can't paint it with hull antifouling (it attacks the bronze or something).

Sam phoned me on Friday morning to apologise for being bad tempered. He said they had a really good passage with four rolls in the jib and one reef in the main, around about a force 5, and at times were making 7 or 8 knots through the water.

He's managed to meet up with the people he contacted through the ybw.com forums, who have been really helpful and offered transport to Arles for shopping or catching trains, and in addition on Thursday night they were tied up next to someone Robin knows from years ago. Sam has even acquired a couple of the essential Navicarte charts for the canals, for free. Sailing is a small world.

Must go and start hoovering so Sam comes back to a clean house on Monday...

Right, this is what a fouled propeller looks like (this is not ours)