When the Dutch / Belgians / Anne invaded

No, this is not a pro or anti Brexit post. Far too much is being written about that sad subject already. Instead this is about a visit from Alex and Gisele who have been mentioned in here before. Alex is yet another ex airline pilot person who fancies a slow old Nordhavn. There seem to be so many of the "Fly fast boat slow" people about. You've met the shortly to retire Captain Rae, the still in harness Capt (male) and Capt (female) Baggaley, Note the lack of comment on Capt Rae's gender - long time readers of this junk might recall some earlier questions that were raised and are still unanswered.

Now, Alex and Gisele are the guys with a beautiful Contest yacht. Anne is known simply as Izzy the spoodle's owner and someone who consumes copious amounts of gin. By the way, there is nothing wrong with that.

Anne came along first and left our goddog with us for a little holiday:

You can see how stressed she looks. Even the crew's penguin slippers didn't faze her.

Alex and Gisele arrived in style and left the same way. Wonderful registration plate for a Corvette:

and those drainpipe sized exhausts. Proper petrolhead stuff. In-between they slummed it on our elderly Nordhavn.

Now, we did a little boating, some eating and drinking and some Izzy grooming at which Gisele proved to be most adept:

Alex got the hang of Nordhavn boating after initially bringing along full wet weather and cold weather gear - not really needed in the pilothouse with the heating running. As you can see, he has mastered the critical art of coffee underway:

whilst remaining totally focused on the navigation bit. Impressive stuff, must be his air traffic control and flying background. So that our guests got a flavour of Nordhavn boating we pottered up to Cowes, then to Ocean Village. On the way, we were overtaken by a brand new N63 undergoing trials:

We have one very special picture of the boat that we cannot share with you for fear of inflaming female passions even more than an all male ballet could. Yes, Phil Roach the Nordhavn Europe man was on board waving to us, wearing a kilt. Kilt is not a typo. And he was waving his hands.

We left the crew in Ocean village who went off to get some culture in the form of an all male ballet at the theatre in Southampton. Well, she said it was culture. Alex, Gisele, Izzy and the captain brought the boat back to Lymington. Leaving Ocean Village with a good lookout:

Before you ask, the captain has not followed Capt Rae and taken to painting his nails. Gisele has way more elegant hands too. The boat was topless - no bimini which had been taken off for the winter:

Hope you noticed the lack of wake - Alex was being very good in the restricted areas. Izzy seemed happy sniffing the wind too:

all in all a very social and sociable time. Sadly it had to end as we waved bye to the "BYE" plate, drinking in the engine noise. Old petrolheads never die, they just end up with a Nordhavn and a Defender it seems.