Howzit!
So my last blog ended with us leaving Gib and my last day
was spent franticly buying up most of the high st (including 8 monkeys for my
nephews/nieces/godchildren). A superyacht called Flying Fox pulled up next to
us the last 3 days. Due to the weather up towards (and including) the ominous
Bay of Biscay, we were being cautious about when to leave Gib. But when Flying
Fox left before us, I tried to drop a few hints to our captain that we should
follow suit and just take a bit of a beating if necessary, or we would be stuck
in Gib for the rest of my life. So the next day we were informed that we would
creep up the coast to Vigo, in Northern Spain, just before the Bay of Biscay and
then as soon as there was a gap in the weather we’d take it.
Vigo- another industrial shit hole town. We felt the cold
the minute we arrived. An 8 degree drop from Gib. There wasn’t all that much to
do there except shop, so I purposefully stayed away to avoid the temptation.
Flying Fox was there again and I decided to make friends and went out for
dinner with them twice. Some of the menu items had us in giggles:
We finally arrived in Portsmouth last Saturday- English
speaking, first world civilization- thank fuck, I was about to do my head in.
After 2.5 weeks in shitty Gibraltar and then 3 days in Vigo, I couldn’t wait to
get a train to London the second I arrived. Holy cow Portsmouth is cold though-
2 degrees. When we left Antibes it was between 12 and 16 in the day, so it’s a
huge drop in temp and clever fish here came to Europe in Winter without a coat
(fail). So Saturday morning after we anchored, I wrapped in the warmest clothes
I had, put on my new long suede boots and pretty much ran to the train station
fantasizing about the joys of London and seeing my hot kiwi boy (whose name is
Harry by the way), who was going to be in London for the weekend and whom I
haven’t seen in about 3 weeks.
The train ride to London is about 2hrs so not so bad. The
kiwi was at rugby with the boys, so I went to visit one of my best friend’s
brothers- Ian and hung out with him all afternoon. Later that night I went
through to the kiwi and his crew who were staying like 45mins away (I forgot
how far away everything is in London). We had a bit of a party and then Sunday
morning I went to go see my cousin and we went ice skating! For someone who
hasn’t ice skated in a few years I did pretty well! I asked my chief stew if I
could stay another day to spend some more time with my kiwi boy and I was super
stoked when she said yes! I went back to meet the crew and we headed off to a
kiff little pub in Wandsworth called The Ship, which is awesome! God Harry is
hot, flip. Makes me tingly every time I look at him. And turns out he can also be really sweet. His
friends are just hilarious and I spent the entire night laughing. Decided that
kiwi’s are pretty awesome.
So after a rather sad
goodbye from my side, I headed back to Portsmouth and started planning a trip
back to Antibes. Which is now booked and
paid- radness! I pretty much land in Heathrow the get on another plane and go
straight to Antibes for the weekend- jet setter of note! Can’t wait! Equinox
here I come (if I’m allowed back in this time)!
My roommate finally arrived back from her holiday on Monday.
I was a lil nervous of meeting her incase she didn't like me or would get fed
up with my snoring and beat me over the head with a pillow in the middle of the
night. But she is pretty kiff! She is small like a gnome; pretty and has the
most contagious laugh and we get on like toast and jam. We decided to head out
for some shopping after work this week and I managed to get some rad Christmas
presents, but as usual (I can’t help myself) I fell in love with a gorgeous
cream dress and some black ankle boots.
There was also a pair of patent, dusty
pink Kurt Geiger shoes, but I managed to summon the will power to say no to
them.
So I’ve covered my eat/love and now back to the “pray I
don’t get fat” bit.
Well...
With 2 week’s till the wedding I stepped up my exercise
routine a few weeks ago and then tried to start this weird super strict diet
for the last 2 weeks where If I want to eat carbs I have to run off and do 40
squats beforehand (something about it opens up your muscle fibers so whatever
you eat is absorbed into your muscles as opposed to being stored for energy-
fat). And I have been trying to have a
shake as a meal replacement once a day for either dinner or lunch. I could do
that, but then 3 hours later I’d be found raiding the snack cupboard, munching
chips and eating biscuits like a squirrel that had just come out of winter
hibernation and discovered his secret nut pile. So after sitting down and having a stern chat
with myself, we agreed that I have no will power and can’t live without food,
so I’d just try to exercise more and eat tiny portions of as much healthy food
as possible (no starch, but can snack on the occasional biscuit or small
choccie) and if I don’t have the body that I did when I was 23 then sod it, I
don’t actually care anymore (Bridget Jones moment). Food is the second most
pleasurable thing in the world to sex and I refuse to go through life missing
out on the joy of eating. Life is too short.
I have also successfully managed to stop drinking wine (my
favourite thing) and treat myself just once every 2 weeks to a glass- which I
think has actually had the biggest impact on my weight. My first month in
Antibes was just a booze fest and I went through a few bottles a night. And
this coming few weeks in Cape Town with Tam’s wedding festivities and
Christmas, is going to be a huge piss up, so I’m glad I’ve had a detox.
Well me and the girls finally managed to see Twilight the
other night and it was even better than I had worked it up to be! We had a lovely
dinner beforehand (I was stoked to see there was "Cape Town" pizza on the menu), then each got a tub of Ben & Jerrys which we scoffed
down.
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| Me and Lara Para |
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| Alice, El and La |
We sat in the cinema, wide eyed, shrieking when Taylor Lautner took his
top off in one of the first scenes- omg he is ripped. You don’t know what to do
with your hands cos you just want to reach out and touch those muscles- aah!
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| Die hard fans.... |
We
put up the Christmas tree in our crew mess on Friday and ate mince pies and
played Christmas music. Lara and were so excited, like little kids, bouncing
around with Christmas decorations and singing (very out of tune) in everyone’s
ear.
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| Decorations! |
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| Alice and La |
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| Me and El |
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| Our finished tree! |
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| The gingerbread man on my cabin door |
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| All the girls (crap photo quality thanks to Olly...) |
I spent the whole of yesterday shopping for Christmas
presents and think I managed to ace most of it, including some Percy Pigs for
Harry. The shopping in Portsmouth really isn’t that bad- there’s a big shopping
centre with a Topshop, Miss Selfridge, Primark, Next, H&M etc and then
Gunwharf Quays (the marina where our boat’s berthed) has all the outlet shops
for Ralph Lauren, Hugo Boss, Ted Baker, GAP etc. Restraining myself was
incredibly hard and took a huge amount of will power. I had to tear myself away
from GAP and a silver sequined skirt that fitted like a glove(I actually hid it
behind a pile of clothes incase I wanted to come back for it later this week).
We literally have the marina outside our front door. The boat is pretty much
parked inside the wharf- I walk out the boat and can fall into Ted Baker (or
fall out Tiger Tiger/The Slug and Lettuce and into the boat...).
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| View of the marina as I step off the passarail. Tiger Tiger on the right... |
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| View of boat from the shops |
On watch today so spent the day polishing silver
(thrilling). Cape Town soon- cannot wait! Beach, sun, driving a car, sushi and
wine at Wakame, wedding, Christmas, Tiger Tiger and seeing all my favourite
people (yes that’s you). Lots of loves, see you soon!
