Day 355: Monday 4th June 2018 - Jobs day and meeting up with friends.

We woke to a lovely calm morning in the anchorage and we quickly assigned an hour to schoolwork as we wanted to try to get on to the town quay late morning to allow time for shopping even if shops shut for the afternoon. AJ really wasn't feeling like learning so opted to read instead (potentially one of the benefits of our new "300 points per week" school regime, hopefully he will catch up later in the week.) He is somewhat perturbed that reading doesn't count as "school" but I recently read one approach to home schooling which advocated not calling anything school that they would voluntarily do anyway. This seems to work for us with reading as AJ would happily read all day and I read with Esmé at night which she really enjoys too. Both are reading well above what is expected for their ages.

We spotted what looked like a couple of boats motoring away from the town so headed over there. We did a slow drive into the "marina" and spotted a big German boat alongside the one pontoon. As we actually only needed to be alongside to pick up water I shouted across to see if we could raft up just long enough to get water.... he said he didn't understand but some other guys on the pontoon said there was space to go stern to further up. After a failed run up in astern I adjusted our starting point and did a textbook med mooring (I think much to the amazement of the worried looking guys on the pontoon). We were then followed in by another boat crewed by yet more British that had perfected the salty old sea dog look much better than I ever will, however unfortunately their approach wasn't quite so uneventful and they managed to get the anchor chain of the boat next to them wrapped round their prop. It took a long time for them to sort themselves out!

AJ and I then headed off with rucksack, bags and the granny trolley to find a supermarket while Esmé and Patrick were left to fill up with water. Patrick came to meet us on our way back and took some of the bags back to the boat, quickly packing the cold items into the fridge,  while I picked up Gyros for lunch.... definitely not as good as the ones in Sivota!

We wanted to make the most of freely available water before we headed to the anchorage so left the non perishable shopping to be put away later whilst  while I cracked on with a couple of loads of  hand washing by which time Patrick had completed two diesel runs with the granny trolley and the whole family took decidedly longer than usual showers. Note the absolute carnage, including the shoe basket which usually lives in the heads (bathroom) but needs to be turfed out for us to have showers! Last job was to refill the tanks with water before finally heading back to the anchorage to catch up with the crew of Titania, the kids eagerly looking out, trying to spot their friends that they hadn't seen for a couple of months!

After anchoring we quickly hung the newly washed clothes out whilst checking that the anchor was holding. We then dinghied over to Titania bearing drinks and snacks as well as Annabelle's birthday present and card. It was lovely to catch up and after a while Patrick dropped the kids on the island before the adults decided to grab picnic stuff and meet ashore for a light dinner.

Still more catching up, with the kids running wild over the island. Including the girls negotiating a finish line for their little sprint race! All too soon it was getting dark and the mosquitos were out in force so we parted company and arranged to meet the next day for fun and games.