Have spent five fantastic days living aboard the SV Illusion, anchored in Store bay, Tobago. We have been waiting for other crew members to join, so far three have arrived, Jake, Joel and Britney and one English guy, Martin has left. Gina from Nepal is coming on Tuesday and some other guy later on.

Let me introduce you to Norman our scouse skipper, kinda cross between an old Wayne Rooney a Paul chuckle and 'hatchet' Harry's henchman (not Vinny j but the other one). Over the next three days we have been entertained with Norman's stories, this guy is 60 and has had a; 'short career as a criminal'; spent some time in jail, as a result of selling a few million pounds worth of Amphetamine; been shot!

As nights draw in Norman entertains us with his life stories and his unique insight into how Liverpool is the greatest place.

His frank description of what he would do to any pirates who came within 100 miles of boat actually made me and Kat feel quite glad we are sailing with a crazy scouse skipper for the next month. I think really his bark is worse than his bite, Kat has mastered his temper by retorting in her best scally accent "calm down kid" and "you talkin' to me kid"

One morning we got the job of cleaning the hull which was heavily coated in barnacles, crabs, sea enamies, and even some brain coral. We all spent the morning diving underneath with snorkeling gear and scrapping the wildlife off the hull. For all you yachties it was three foot deep flat hull with a 10 foot keel. Hundreds of local fish swam around us eating the falling coral while the tiny crabs got scrapped off and drifted in the currents, sometimes down my Bordie's, ouch, or down into the deep blue sea. It was very cool.

Off to Trinidad on Wednesday.


Big Love Dan & Kat

Cooper Out