Very exciting news !   We now have a proper gangplank.    An auspicious day for Davemham and her crew.
Created by the marvellous Wayne H, who sketched it one weekend on our kitchen / galley cum room-where-we-do-everything table after saying he could design and execute such a wonderous feat of engineering.  That day dawned, Yesterday.  Crisp, so cold your breath announced the temperature in front of you, but with a hint of sushine.

After several visitations including from Karen and Mike of the sparklingly shipshape and prstine looking Amiens (and how very lovely to see you twas, freshly 'happy new yeared' and now up to speed on all News,  then we had kind Dave and Sue his lovely wife.  They came bearing gorgeous Gifts of frankincense, myrrh ... NO.  Stop!  Wrong blog and film.  Rewind:  in fact they came bearing Wood. 
What good and kind friends they have turned out to be.  They probably don't realise how grateful we are.   Without them our woodburner would be starved, cold and insert.   They have brought us several Leylandii in chopped up form (burns like petrol) over the last 12 months.  

So, they came again, bearing gifts of lots of more wood in all its many different but highly combustible forms such as carpet track, logs, interiors from wardrobes and wooden shelving, chip board, loft insulation stuff etc.

Then arrived Wayne the Gangplank Master, the lovely Karen / Kip and Billy, their friend, a lovely kind man who has been assisting Wayne with the gangplank's coming into being.

The Admiral-Grease Monkey was also very much in attendance, running hither and thither, creating scrumptious venison casseroles, sweet potatoed mashes and gourmet cheesecakes, interspersed with handing me ropes, tying knots and moving our deck furniture to another part of the ship as we manoeuvered the gangplank into place.