Yesterday we were finally able to entertain Bill and Christy from Veranda for dinner after a few schedule changes brought on by various emergencies on Kintala. It led to a bunch of cleaning up and rearranging and by the time they got here things were looking pretty spiffy and a good variety of aromas was wafting from the galley. We had a good couple of hours swapping stories and drinking some good wine and eating good food. I had to laugh though, because we never took the "Hey look we finally met these friends" picture in the cockpit so I've stolen this one from their profile. 

As I mentioned in my previous post "The friends you haven't met yet", relationships in cruising are a truly unique thing. Because of the limited time you spend with folks between travel, deep friendships are formed quickly and generally last a long time. Unfortunately they also have a downside, the fact that you say goodbye to so many people so frequently, but in the back of your mind there's always that belief that you will see them soon down the road. You become a part of this community like no other.

This was borne out again tonight when we had a potluck on the porch to get together with David and Nancy and John and Pat and Hannah before they all take off. We will be the last ones out, leaving after the boat show, so we wanted to get together with all of them before they leave. This will be one seriously quiet place then, so it's a good thing our friends are coming up for the boat show. We had another good evening sharing food and laughter and music. It just doesn't get a lot better than this.