21:30 Sunday 24th August 2008. I'm writing this post “off-line” on Sunday evening (so ignore the post date/time stamp which will be the time I next find an internet connection!)
I'm down at the harbour waiting to board the fast ferry (Condor) to Weymouth. Now that experience is normally enough in itself to bring a tear to my eye (I await news on how late today's ferry will be). As this represents the end of my Guernsey adventure – 2,061 days of it, so in a way I'm not in as much of a rush as usual so I will savour my last view of the St Peter Port skyline (for at least a year).
9:55. I've just reached the front of the queue and checked in – they are claiming no delay to the ferry, we'll see.
It's been a weekend of high emotion. We spent the weekend on the island of Sark. Saturday was the wedding of the boys' nanny, Sian (to Andy). Sian has worked for us for two years and before that looked after Joseph at nursery from a very young age (Joseph's age that is, not Sian's).
Sian had a great bond with all of the boys and they don't realise yet how much they will miss her. To be honest I didn't realise how much I would miss her until this week – I thought that I felt sad on behalf of the boys, who obviously spent more time with Sian around. But on reflection I realise that I will also really miss her being around. She fitted so well into the family and there will be a hole in our lives for a while. Sian also brought into the boys' lives some surrogate aunts (Becky, Lisa and Dale) who will be missed (and, I strongly suspect, will miss the boys). So under the cover of Sark darkness I did shed a couple of tears on the walk back to our hotel on Saturday night (Nicola, of course, spent most of the day in tears).
Sian looked great and it was a fantastic wedding day (great weather too) – a few photos are here. One of the major draws which could bring us back to Guernsey is the thought that Sian might come back and look after the boys again!
So, we arrived back in Guernsey on Sunday (today, remember) afternoon. We spent a few hours doing one last drive around some of our favourite places (Footes lane, Cobo, Ladies Bay, Pembroke etc) before heading back to base camp (Mike & Loretta's house in St Martins) to cram our belongings into the car.
22:20. No sign of the Condor yet, looks like they're going to need a record turnaround to get us on board for the scheduled 22:30 departure. At least when we're on the other side of the world we can rest assured that nothing really changes in Guernsey. It will still be the same when we come back in X years and there'll still be an extra wait at the harbour when we next try to escape the rock.
22:46. We are sailing – bye Guernsey, hope it's not too long till I see you again (I wish the same could be said about the damn Condor Ferries safety video).
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