Apparently, it’s all about marbles. So my weatherman Ricardo tells me. And little lines of soldiers holding hands, wearing pointy hats or sunny hats, marching towards each other. Meanwhile the fire burns hot around the middle and someone is pouring cold stuff from the top, without remorse.
You have every right to wonder if I am writing this in my sleep or under the effect of some interesting substance. Or, if you know anything about weather systems and patterns then you will know exactly what I am talking about. Right? I am in the throes of my meteorological training, (currently conducted long-distance style with Lisbon-based Ricardo Diniz), and therefore learning about highs and lows and fronts and depressions and trying to memorise more Latin names in my cloud list than I had in my GCSE vocab list.
It is all very interesting for someone who spends much of her life out and about, and makes all those things that you never quite remember or ever understood fully, all make sense. While I like to think I have a tiny half of an idea about the weather, I really think that rowing the ocean would be a good thing to do with a better grasp of the whole idea. Not just for safety but for interest’s sake, as well. So, I look forward to impressing you with my weather forecasting skills in the future, but meanwhile I have some learning to do.
and the canaries?
Well, just one. Gran Canaria in fact. In a couple of weeks I will be heading out there to spend a week training under the guidance of Hungarian ocean rower, Gabor Raconczai. Real live ocean rowing boat, out at sea with a real live ‘lived-to-tell-the-tale’ ocean rower, too. I am super excited about it, though slightly nervous about the email Gabor sent me the other day:
‘I advise you to start taking cold showers. Cleaning the barnacles off the bottom of the boat will be much easier…. ‘
Happy days ahead – there won’t be no barnacles hitching a ride on my wee boat!