Friday 24th June
We wake up at 4.30 in the morning. We aren’t tired at all because we are still accustomed to New Zealand time.

At 7.00 we get our feet off the ground. The flight was cheap so dad is in a good mood. There isn’t a TV so the only things I have to do are writing in my journal and read my book. It is a three hour journey – so not a long flight.

By the time we land I have brushed my teeth 22 times. We go through the gates and Dad gets in the wrong passport lane by accident. When we get our bags a man named David is there to pick us up. He is from the company that made our boat.

David gives us a quick tour of Carcasonne. It’s a really beautiful old town with modern things in it like petrol stations and cars. Then we go to Nabonne down on the coast where our boat is. On the way we see heaps of vineyards where they are growing grapes for making wine.

When we finally get to the boat I think it is one of those really good brand new charter boats. Dad says he couldn’t believe it was ours either. We take our luggage aboard. Even Grandpa is impressed with the new boat. Of course he owns one of the most amazing boats in my life – the beautiful Dreamspinner.

After we settle down it is time for dinner and for some reason I am extremely tired (because it is 10.00 at night which Daddy didn’t know)

Dad and I go to get dinner. We walk along the pier to a restaurant where we see a little grey and white tabby cat sitting under a bridge, accidentally dipping his tail in the tide.

I have a nice dinner of ham and cheese pizza, then go to sleep for my second night in a proper bed.

Saturday 26th June
When I wake up from a long sleep in I can tell that it was going to be a long and busy day for me.
We have a couple (or should I say a thousand) things to buy from the boat shop. There are two shops that David knows of, so we go to the first one. Neither Daddy or Grandpa or anyone else can find anything we need.

In the second shop we find everything we need and Dad ends up giving the counter man 1600 Euros. The other things we need are food and water but I stay on the boat and help David put the name and country on the boat. We get the name on but the “N” from New Zealand falls off into the water. Now David keeps joking that there is an N-fish swimming around somewhere. (I imagine that there are sharks swimming around arguing about whether it is an N-fish or a Z-fish).

Sunday 27th June
Today we need to do a bit more shopping and I tell Dad that Mum has sent us a text message telling me we have a limit of 50 Euros! Fortunately Dad stays just under the limit.

When we have all the bits and bobs we put them all away and Grandpa puts the “New Zealand” on the back of the boat next to Aurelia. When it is finished we go out for a sail in our new fantastic boat Aurelia.

We are amazed to find out that our wonderful boat Aurelia can sail and motor by herself. After a while I feel very hot so we play “shark bait”, which is a game when you jump in the water while the boat is going along and grab hold of a rope which is attached to the boat and haul yourself in.
We have a great sail and then we go to have our last dinner with David. I have steak and chips, Grandpa has tuna and Daddy has a meat kebab which hangs down from a hook on a stand, with plates coming out from the sides.

After dinner we walk to a tower that was built hundreds of years ago. Part of it is falling down but it was worthwhile going there and I learn a lot about the old town of Gruisson, such as pirates, shipwrecks and where they kept the water.

After a long and tiresome day I snuggle into my wonderful bed made by my father and I am put to sleep by the rocking of the boat.

Monday 27th June
Today is the day we are getting out of this French country and setting sail to a place beyond. The place is an island called Sardinia.
We had brought a swing thingy yesterday and I want to try it out. I spend an hour swinging happily around the mast.
We have to get a few documents picked up so that we could sail our boat so David and Mike went to do this while Dad and I go for a long walk to get a few last minute things from the boat shop, including an “N”. By early afternoon we are on our way to Sardinia.
The sea is an amazing blue – a bit like the color of our boat except lighter more lively and full of shine.
Dad Mike and Grandpa have to sail all through the night but I get to sleep.

Tuesday 28th June.
Today I am getting sick of the same breakfast every day. Luckily for me I have some entertainment about 2 hours after breakfast. There is much excitement on the yacht Aurelia. Grandpa is looking over the side and says that he can see two enormous dolphins. It is Dad who says “what could be bigger than dolphins? Then I shout “Whales!!” which could have woken the dead, except Mike the skipper as he is sleeping like a rock. Dad is so amazed that he forgets to take photographs of them. They are bigger than the boat, shining like huge black diamonds and completely graceful.

The next excitement of the day is as Dad would say, another lifetime experience. Mike is still snoring his head off in his bunk. I look out across the calm flat sea and see a dark shape in the water. They are dolphins and brilliant are they! Seven of them come right up close to the bow of the boat so that if they aren’t careful they might rub their beautiful sleek bodies on the front of the boat. This time Dad takes some photos.

Wednesday 29th June
Today we have the exact same breakfast as yesterday – nothing new about it except that it is made in great difficulty. This is because the waves are up so high that I think if they go much higher they will reach the clouds – but only just.
It is a pretty boring day unlike yesterday but I have my journal to do, my book to read, my bag to unpack, my cabin to clean and help my Grandpa and daddy. In the afternoon I go up to the bow of the boat and there I have an amazing ride. When I lay down on the mattress the boat seems to push me up and down. When I look out of the porthole it is under the water and I think I can see fish inside the big waves. For dinner I have pasta made by my Grandpa. This is created with great difficulty because the up and down of the waves makes his pots and pans keep sliding up and down the counter.

Thursday 30th June
I wake up at four o clock in the morning and find we are in a marina in Sardinia. The people here don’t think they are Italian.
The reason I wake up is because Dad, Mike, and Grandpa are still awake, drinking beer at four o clock in the morning! The other reason was that the boat had stopped. It had been a particularly rough night at sea so I was used to the ups and downs of the waves, and I am very surprised when the boat had stopped. I am sent to bed a little while later.

Much much later I wake up. It is seven o clock in the morning. After breakfast we go for a little walk in the town. After a while we find a dairy that has a bus time table – I am not sure if it is a dairy or a mini super market because I cannot read Italian, but anyway that doesn’t really matter.
We needed a dairy with a bus time table for two very good reasons;
No. 1 - the skipper, Mike, needs to go somewhere so he can go home because his job was finished.
No. 2 - we need to reload our boat with food, water and household things.

There is a police officer at the dairy sitting outside, drinking beer with 5 other people that probably worked there and a old man sitting at a bench. They are all drinking beer and talking to each other in Italian. Every time a car is speeding or something like that, the police officer steps out on to the street even if the car wont stop. The police officer (he was still alive) tells the person in the car off and they both go on their way. The person in the car goes off to where ever he was going to, and the police officer comes back to his beer. Meantime I have a look at the ice-creams.

I choose a nice looking ice-cream (for a nice hot day) and I demolish it in about ten minutes. Dad starts talking to a nice lady for about one hour. Happily I look at the birds feeding their chicks on the other side of the road.

We go in search of another restaurant, unknowingly leaving one behind us. We look frantically for a long time and finally a woman shows us to a restaurant. It is right back where we had started!

I have a pasta dish with cream and salmon. On the table behind us are 19 ladies and they are making a lot of noise. After lunch Dad asks the ladies (who are actually school teachers) for a photograph. The ladies accept, and one of them asks Dad if he is married!!
We go back to the boat and said hello to Grandpa’s old friends, Judy and Rod, who are joining us on board. Unfortunately it is also time to say goodbye to Mike.

After our meeting Judy and Rod go to another place called Island of St Pedro, and the little walled town of Carloforte. We have curry for dinner and go for a long walk in the town.

Travelling in style

Friday 31st June
Today we wake up, have breakfast and leave Carloforte, sailing to Capo Malfatano.

The wind is blowing and the sea is extremely topsy turvy. When I went up to the forward cabin I had a rollercoaster of a ride. The boat is going faster than it has ever gone before (10 Knots) because the wind is so very strong.

Rod points out some dolphin fins and Rod, Judy and I go up to the front of the boat. I have a harness on and a life jacket so if Mum is worried about me failing over board I’m completely safe and Dad is relaxed about it. The dolphins are amazing (they were bigger too) they come right up close to the boat, playing around us for hours. There are five of them and I even have enough time to name and find out about them.

There are: Monty (leader of the group) He is a bit of a show off - like the time he went out a bit and looked like a flat brown dolphin shaped stone skipping on the waves. I can identify him because he is motley coloured and has a scar on his fin; Muffin (Monty’s wife), gentle and she is a chocolate muffin colour; Felix (a bit of a lout) who also shows off and is the biggest and funniest of the group; Snowflake (wife of Felix), also gentle and loving she is really quite white. Lucky last is Skipper (son of Felix and Snowflake and nephew of Muffin and Monty). He takes after his father except he stays close to his mother. He is rather small and is the highest jumper.

A couple of hours later we arrive in the C. Malfatano gulf.
We have trouble finding a sheltered spot and have to drop the anchor twice, but we find a perfect calm place in the end.

Dad, grandpa and I go ashore with our new zodiac dinghy. The beach is packed when we come ashore. There are boats to hire with slides; there are paddle boats and kayaks. The beach is covered in deck chairs and umbrellas. We go to a small café in the trees back from the beach, and have a look at what food and drink they make. When we come back the beach it is almost deserted.
We have beef stir fry for dinner which is made by Judy H, very cleverly. It is delicious – YUM!

Saturday 1st July
Today I can tell by the smell of the air (or because Dad has told me) that we are going to move from this cosy warm little space in the C. Malfatano to a little city, Nora where there are old Roman ruins under water and on the land.

Before we leave we go ashore to the café. We forget to bring our cameras so Dad and Rod go back to the boat to get them. Later when they came back they are told off by the coast guard for motoring across some buoys. Sitting in the warm sun at the café, I have a ham and cheese toasted sandwich and an orange juice.

We go back to the boat, almost getting told off again by the coast guard, and set sail to Nora. On the way there I finish my book for the second time.

Five hours later we are at Nora. I immediately dress into my togs and goggles and jump into the sea. For 10 seconds I can’t see anything and then it all came into focus. There are rocks and stones, a large amount of water grass, sand (hardly visible) and fish (a large amount of them but not as much as water grass)

Dad and I swim ashore while Grandpa, Judy and Rod row ashore in the dinghy boat. We have to move the dinghy because we were right outside an ancient ruin, which are thermal baths.
We go to the entrance and Dad pays for our tickets. The ladies come running after us to give us the money back because they had over-charged us. First we go to a Roman theatre. It is covered in with a wooden floor because the builders are digging holes to find interesting things underneath. The second place we visit is a metal foundry. We can’t get into it either but there is a fair bit to look at from the outside, so we are satisfied. This one doesn’t have a wooden floor, to my relief.
The next thing we look at is the central baths. We don’t spend much time looking at it but I find the first mosaic floor there. We go from there to the residential quarter and go inside. It was great and I have fun running around the thermal baths.

It is finally time to go back, but Dad shows me the cover of a book he had bought. It was a full mosaic floor, and I plead with Dad so much that we all head towards it on the far side of the town. When we get there we take some photos and examine it more closely. It is the temple of Aesculapius, a Roman god. Then I look in the opposite direction and see a little bit of mosaic floor in the distance that isn’t fenced. We look at that for what seems like ages. Then Judy, Rod and I swim back to the boat and Dad and Grandpa row the dinghy.

We move from Nora to Cagliari, moor at the harbour and have dinner – which is pasta. Then we go to bed.

Sunday 2nd July
We wake up to another fine day, which is to be our last day on Aurelia. We have breakfast which is the same as always, except Grandpa doesn’t burn the toast. He must have finally figured out how to use the toaster properly! There is a lot of washing and cleaning done, and we take the boat to another part of the marina to get fuel. Finally the taxi arrives and we say a very sad goodbye to Aurelia, the boat of our dreams come true.
Judy and Rod stayed on board because they are going to deliver her safely from Cagliari to Turkey.

We hop in the taxi and drive off. I think that Dad is a bit upset, as he doesn’t talk much on the way to the airport. I am sad too. We drive past the flamingo ponds – I can see pink ground as we fly over them again later. We arrive back in London and take the train from Luton to Kings Cross station. (No sign of platform 9 ¾!) We don’t know what will happen just two days later, when the bombing killed 50 people there.
We get off the train at Heathrow Airport and go to the hotel. I go straight to bed as it was very late and I am exhausted.

Next morning we catch the plane from London to Singapore and then to Auckland, arriving after 26 hours of flying, watching movies and trying to sleep in my seat. This time we have 8 seats between the three of us, so eventually we all get some sleep.

We arrive back in Auckland to find Mummy waiting for us at the airport with Lorna. I felt relieved to be home but upset that we have left our beautiful boat behind in the wonderful Mediterranean Sea.

Looking back I realise how calm and peaceful I felt on Aurelia. She made me feel like there is no stress in my life. I can’t wait to go back to her and spend more time sailing on the Mediterranean and its many undiscovered secrets.

I think about the wonderful cat that she was named after and I am happy.