Pre-Christmas disaster…we ran out of propane on the 23^rd in the middle of cooking dinner with some half-baked cornbread stranded in the oven. The headlines were looming: “Mullington’s cancel Christmas morning pancakes”, “Harrington denied birthday coffee in bed”. We wolfed down our almost cooked pasta and resolved to head out to Village Hardware first thing to fix the problem.

Village Hardware is my nearest DIY mecca and is managed by a hilarious bloke called Paul. I’m in there almost every day picking up materials for various boat projects, and we’ve already developed some good banter with the staff. Once again they came up with the goods – two 20-pound fibreglass propane tanks, perfect for marine use.

At the till I asked where I could get the tanks filled, and I discovered that I needed to get to Bayboro, 12 miles up the road, and that the gas supplier would close at lunchtime for the holidays. I was just about to walk out the door to find a cab when another customer standing behind me, whom I now know as Heidi, offered to drive me to and from the supplier. Naturally I accepted before she could change her mind, and on the drive I learned that she also has a boat in Sailcraft and that along with her partner Bill is planning to cruise in the Caribbean next year. Heidi is just one of at least a dozen people we’ve met in Oriental who’ve went out of their way to be helpful to us since we arrived here.

Kel and I have been constantly surprised by the hospitality we’ve experienced since arriving on the East Coast, and our Christmas in Oriental has been no exception. Far from being lonely on Christmas day we spent the day in two different homes, well a home and a women’s centre. Firstly we went for turkey sandwiches and wine at Breck, one of the workers from the boatyard’s house, and spent a relaxed afternoon watching old Bond movies on his big TV. Then later in the evening we joined Turtle, another member of the yard’s staff, for the annual Midget family Christmas party (Midget is their surname, they range in height as a normal family would).

This was hilarious. The women’s centre was on a par with your average village hall in rural Ireland, plastic chairs, trestle tables, fluorescent strip lighting and an old rickety piano in the corner. After some great food the eldest of Turtle’s dad’s siblings Hugh gets up to the mic to compere the evening. We begin with each of the siblings bringing their family to the front for introductions, which of course you wouldn’t normally do accept that there were 60 Midgets in the room.

Then, following introductions we got to the entertainment for the evening -’talent’ sharing began. Each family was required to share some talent, skill or creative piece that contributed to the evening’s entertainment. Items ranged from team games such as ‘pass the grapefruit under your chin without dropping it’ to Twinkle Twinkle Little Star on the violin. It was a wide spectrum from laugh out loud funny to cringing in pain and everything in between.

The comedic pinnacle of the evening was one of Turtle’s uncles inviting us to join him in singing Happy Birthday to baby Jesus, which he led on his harmonica – priceless.

So far from being lonely at Christmas, or stuck inside our small boat looking at each other, we are actually feeling very supported and content. Today we got through a couple of important jobs on the boat – the holding tank is now functioning again! – and we’ll keep at it tomorrow.

At this stage we’re aiming to leave Oriental the first week in January, but that will ultimately depend on how the boat repairs go. We have been successfully reunited with our bottom, to significant relief, and now we’re waiting for a new driveshaft and our possessions to make it down from Canada.

A little leafy conflict in our new threads, Keli was a little naive.

We picked up some new wet weather gear this week thanks to Sandy a life long friend of Dennis and Pat. So we took to the garden for some fun raking the leaves in our lovely clothes.

In other news, our offer on the Beneteau First 38 in Deltaville was accepted which is just amazing. We’re arranging a survey next week, and are scheduled to take ownership of the boat on the 3rd December. We’ve been this far in buying a boat before (Rhode Island), so whilst we’re both really happy with the boat and excited about completing the deal, we’re reserving our full celebration until we’ve paid over the cash and collected the keys!

The plan at this stage is to fly out to collect the boat at the end of the month, and sail it South to North Carolina where we will spend the month of December getting ready to leave. We had hoped to make it to the Bahamas for Christmas, and we’ll definitely do this if at all possible.

We’ll keep you posted.