Furthest north - 22° 07' .5 N - Cienfuegos, Cuba

Furthest south - 00° 38' .3 S - Bahia de Caraquez, Ecuador

Furthest east - 060° 52' .9 W - St Anne, Martinique

Furthest west - 080° 32' .1 W - Cabo Pasado, Ecuador

How we spent our nights...

In marinas: 32 nights Less than half the number of nights we spent in marinas last year - yippee! We were forced into marinas in Trinidad and Venezuela in order to do some engine and rigging repairs, and the remainder of the nights were spent in Cuban marinas when anchoring was "no permiso".

On mooring buoys: 18 nights A few nights in Bonaire where anchoring isn't allowed in the marine park, then several nights on the free moorings in Grand Cayman. The remainder were when we left Do It on a mooring in the river at Bahia de Caraquez whilst we travelled inland.

At anchor: 259 nights This is more like it - 70% of our time was spent lying to our trusty Delta. Only in the Cuban cays did it fail to hold, and there we added our aluminium Fortress on in front to cope with the thin mud.

Sailing: 28 nights Half the amount of night sailing we did last year - an indication that we haven't been crossing oceans this year. Just wait til you see the numbers for next year!

On the hard: 28 nights The joys of life on dry land... Four weeks sweating in Trinidad as we treated Do It to a shiny new paint job.

Cruising budget breakdown

Our trusty notebook has been recording all (well, most anyway) of our cash expenses this year, whilst Quicken has been crunching the numbers. In good management style, we haven't included the cost of the paint job in our anual budget breakdown - we've assigned it to the "capital costs" column, to be amortised across the duration of our cruise!

Cruising costs

• Boat expenses - see breakdown below
• Communications - covers phone cards, mobile phone top-ups, postcards, stamps, internet access, SKYPE charges - and this year, our Sailmail subscription. We probably don't save money by using Sailmail rather than internet cafes, but in the Pacific, there are few internet cafes.
• Food - there is a 4% increase over last year, explained by the massive amount of stores which we took aboard in Curacao and Panama in order to see us across the Pacific. At the end of Year 2, we could re-supply a small supermarket with what we have on board.
• Medical - here we have a 4% reduction, having decided to forego medical insurance. Will this cost us more money in the long run? In two years, we have only had the occasional cold or bout of food poisoning. If we ever find sensibly priced medical insurance we may change our decision.
• Excursions etc - this is the "fun fund". Whilst counting the pennies, it is important to remember to have FUN. This covers our meals ashore, ice creams, a few beers, visits to museums, excursions inland….
• National Insurance - still paying it, will there still be a government pension when we get home?
• Human running costs - Yes, we needed to buy some clothes, replace a camera and buy a bits for the PC.

Boat expenses

• Clearance charges - a big hike in this during year 2. If you thought that the Caribbean countries cost a lot to clear in to, just wait until you reach the Americas. The authorities in Cuba, Venezuela and Ecuador each relieved us of close to £100, and then there were the charges to transit the Panama Canal.
• Domestic - the principal expense in here is laundry! Yes we could hand wash everything on board, but we'd use a load of precious water, and I'm not a masochist!
• Maintenance - this is the cost of ongoing preventative maintenance. There is a significant increase this year, which reflects that the spares and stores which we had on board when we left are being used up and are being replaced. We were aware that cruisers reported their maintenance charges were always least during their first year.
• Marina charges - didn't escape them this year, maybe next year?
• New equipment - many new "toys" this year - the Pactor modem and the weather fax being biggies. We've also added a series drogue with 350ft of line, a Fortress anchor, several jerry cans and enough Sunbrella to make covers for anything that doesn't move fast enough. Also included here are all the charts and guides for the Pacific.
• Repairs - nothing in the scale of last year's lobster pot incident, but Polly the Perkins accounts for most of this. We've had the injectors and injector pump serviced, the head gasket changed, and we fried the engine starter battery. Angus is learning to love our easy access engine!
• Running costs - this covers the relatively small charges for water, petrol and diesel, and the substantially larger costs of yacht insurance. As expected, the cost of insurance doesn't get any less as we cruise further away from the most conjested shipping lanes of the world (i.e. the English Channel).

Bouquets & Brickbats

Marinas

:-) Puerto Amistad, Ecuador - more of a yacht club with moorings than a marina, but an operation run by someone who knows what is important to cruisers. A great laundry service, fuel and water delivered to your yacht, and a convivial bar perched above the river where you can enjoy a cold beer and a good meal for cruiser-friendly prices.

:-( Cuban marinas - they force cruisers to use the marinas, but don't maintain the concrete wharfs, they charge "first world" prices, but don't provide the equivalent services, like proper showers...

Showers

:-) Puerto Amistad again - immaculately clean, with freshly laundered fluffy bathmats every day. Almost as good as being at home.

:-( A close call between Santiago de Cuba (shower block with no light, and only water in the gent's) and Cienfuegos (plentiful supply of water in a shower block with no roof - and filthy)

Update - We hear that Marina Quinta do Lorde in Madeira from last year still hasn't completed their shower block, and are still using their mouldy porta-cabins.

Scenery

:-) Cuba - our wanderings around Santiago de Cuba and Habana delivered everything we hoped to find in Cuba - fantastic 50's cars, beautiful architecture and amazing misic.

:-( None really.

Bar/restaurant

:-) Jambe de Bois, Pigeon Island, St Lucia ties this year with the Roti Hut, Powerboats, Chaguaramas, Trinidad. The roti is the cruisers' ideal meal - everything in one wrap, washed down with a cold beer, and all for under £2.50.

:-( Hammerheads Bar, Grand Cayman - at $11 for two small beers, we could have been in a London bar. Probably unfair to single this bar our, but we certainly couldn't afford to wine and dine in Grand Cayman.

:-/ Cayo Largo Marina Restaurant, Cuba - the menu looked fabulous, but sadly there was actually only one soup and one main course on offer. We should have taken note of the fact that we were the only clients. The four piece sal band seranaded us in a soul-less empty room, as our soup was served in a coffee cup, followed two minutes later by our main course - which could have been saved by a competent vet. The coffee at the end of the meal was made with salty water. The saving grace was the waitress who on seeing our distress at her lack of "mojitos" (rum, mint & ice), sent out to the local bar who provided two huge pints of the stuff! After that, we couldn't be unhappy.

Anchorages

:-) Best snorkelling: San Blas islands, Panama - the only place where we saw both good coral gardens and a wide variety of fish, in clear water.

:-) Best beach: Tortuga Island, Venezuela - straight from a picture postcard - see photo

:-) Best hiking: Quito - OK it isn't really an anchorage, but it is the one place where our hiking boots got good use this year.

:-) Best social atmosphere: Chaguaramas, Trinidad - we spent several months in Chaguaramas, and made so many friends that Angus had to kidnap me and take the boat over to a nearby island in order to get me to do any work.

:-( Worst everything: La Playita anchorage, Panama - a necessary evil as it is the only place to anchor having transited the Panama Canal. The local tripper boats run their generators all day, the onshore bars really crank up the volume for the parties at 4am, the water is icy cold, the only dinghy dock charges $5 to get ashore, the local taxi sharks rip off unwary cruisers for the trips into town, and the air pollution is foul.

Equipment

Breakages:

• Head gasket - Oil in the water, and water in the oil dictated this had to be changed. Thank goodness for Complete Yacht Services in Florida for getting us the spares so quickly, and for Sim from "Alianna" for showing us what to do with them!
• Injectors - Not really a breakage, but more of a long overdue service.
• Water in the engine cylinders - this could have been really nasty had Angus not spotted it a soon as he did. A syphon break in the engine cooling water line is on the "to do" list for New Zealand.
• Adverc battery monitor - This started giving us strange readings, so was returned to the UK for repair. Adverc found no problem, and the Panamanian customs officers/postal service "lost" it, so I guess we'll never know for sure what the problem was...
• Engine battery - The long motor down to Ecuador raised the temperatures in the engine compartment for so long that the battery boiled dry. Polly the Perkins seems much happier with the new engine battery - since installing the new battery, we haven't experienced our intermittent starting problems. Also on the New Zealand work list is improved ventilation for the engine compartment

Gold star equipment:

• Aries wind vane self steering - For the second year running, 'Arry the Aries has made this trip possible. In anything above 5 knots of wind, he will hold a steady course and allow the on watch crew member attend to all the other watch activities - reading, plotting, cooking, washing, repairs…
• Pactor modem - Yes, we joined the modern world of onboard communications, and love it. Receiving emails during the long Pacific crossing was the highlight of my day.
• Crusader cruising chute - This sail makes down-wind passages a pleasure. It is fading a little, but still announces our arrival from may miles off.
• Rented air conditioning unit - We could not have survived the four weeks of hard labour on the hard in the heat and humidity of Trinidad without this piece of kit.
• Sinergex Pure Watts 1000 - Our little inverter is one of those bits of equipment that just works - there is no fuss or bother with it, we just plug everything in to it - from the sewing machine to the lathe - and off we go.