One Life ...

After a good night's sleep, we woke early...ish for breakfast. We were hoping for a traditional Indian spicy fair but got a traditional boiled egg, bread and jam. We washed it down with a hot cup of Chai, so all was good. We ventured out in search of a few sites, however were easily distracted by fresh fruit platters, mango lassis and mobile phone cover shops. Next, an ATM stop to test various SBI machines. One small branch failed but the head office one worked. This was near the Mumbai stock exchange, complete with bull outside. We ended up at Horniman circular garden. An interesting name but the garden was being 'refurbished' - dug up. Marine drive is famous amongst the people of Mumbai. A huge boulevard next to the sea for romantic strolls. The stroll today wasn't filled with romance, more noise pollution as the whole sea defence boulevard was being fixed. Almost all of it for mile after mile. We had to walk on the dual carriageway but soon got fed up and headed inla...

Bus, plane, plane, plane, bus, train. A long journey via Gatwick, Venice and Riyadh (Saudi Arabia)... Thankfully, we persevered with the Saudi Arabia visa, even though our experience was painful. Many didn't and found out the hard way with the 9 hour stopover costing them an extra £100 for a visa on arrival. On the flight from Venice we were sitting alongside a young lady who was also continuing on to Mumbai.  She was rather nervous, travelling on her own for the first time, so we agreed we would all stick together when we arrived in Saudi. The night spent at King Kahlid airport went relatively quickly, partly because getting through passport control took soooo long.  Although we had purchased our visa waiver in advance, we still had to join the queue of the masses who had not.  Darryl went through first and all seemed ok.  Christine followed and was photographed and finger printed, although Darryl  was not.  On enquiring as to why, it appeared there was a fault with the system and...

The new adventure begins ...

A short pit stop in the UK and back to France for the summer. We spent 3 months soaking up the Mediterranean sun on the Cote d'Azur. The new pink paddle board was a special treat and provided some amazing opportunities to explore the coast. We saw lots of excellent, live entertainment, including a huge SEAL concert at the beach for free. This year's fireworks were pretty special too! Lots of wind caused mayhem with trying to move, when we wanted to! We often got trapped for longer than expected. Good sailing were days followed by huge periods of calm. Still ...we loved every minute of boat life and can't wait to do it all again. The end of our trip was made extra special as instead of camping on the boat - we stayed in luxury at our friend's house near Nimes. We had an amazing time picking wild fruit, exploring medieval cities and swimming in their pool. A long trip home with a few weeks to prepare for our next journey. One Life Part 2 ...