New ground

Today we broke a 5-month embargo, and had a coffee in a cafe; the first time since March. Pic shows said coffee and Nic's hand with Sirena IV in the background. We were in the Royal North Sea Yacht Club, where we are moored. Despite expectations we had a quiet night because the wind and waves dropped away. Sitting over a late breakfast we said where is the promised (threatened) big wind today? About 10am it went from calm to F7 (almost a gale) in about 30 minutes - extraordinary. Since then the boat has been rolling and plummeting like a frightened horse straining against its tethers. 

Nic spent 2 hours doing a research peer review task for the NIHR (NHS Research),  and some tasks for ROS, while Lesley went Zooming to church and then did some passage planning for the next legs. 

The coffee thing was ironic really, in that we've been so very carefully risk-averse throughout this journey. It wouldn't do to catch Covid-19 whilst the 'wrong' side of the English Channel. And unlike the Netherlands where no-one was wearing masks, here in Belgium everyone is wearing masks all the time even in the street; Belgium is the sick man of Europe when it comes to Covid-19. But we went in to have a look around the Yacht Club, and the bar was so welcoming,  and it was so nice to sit looking at the boat for a while without bouncing around on her - we weakened. Much hand-washing ensued.

For similar reasons we went for a walk around Ostend this afternoon, took more pictures of the boat, and visited the "early 20th century neo-gothic church" called Sint-Petrus-en-Pauluskerk van Oostende. It felt more like 19th C though the stained glass windows (pics) are clearly newer, post-war. There was a strange feeling in the town; a long trail of a certain kind of men walking through and a lot of police about -some kind of protest march perhaps though without banners. Later we saw many of them filling the cafes of a square like starlings filling a tree. Police vans were around the corner. We treated ourselves to large icecreams - we really are losing the plot today - though we did wear gloves to handle the cups and the change.

We bought a huge piece of unidentified white fish in the fish market and poached it for dinner served with a large ratatouille. Accompanied by a small glass of sekt (aka cava,  prosecco) brought all the way from Fehmarn. Pudding in a moment will be a portion of apricot crumble, imported from the Netherlands, with a dollop of yoghurt and perhaps a small brandy. Well ... it is the weekend.