April 11, 2010 -Scarborough, QLD

We finally made it back to Australia after an eventful time in the US.
Our home of 24 years, painstakingly groomed, carefully priced, professionally staged and artfully photographed, sold very quickly at the asking price. We are happy with the result, but exhausted. Small world – it turns out the buyer is the principal at Lakeside, the alma mater of Tom, Eve,and Amy. Technically homeless, we will rent furnished places when we return to the US and have put our dwindling inventory of possessions into storage.
Our mailing address remains the same: PO Box 31267, Seattle WA 98013 USA. E-mail: rasamanis@gmail.com .
We had some wonderful times with our family, the highlight being a reunion with all the kids in late March in Florida. Tom audited a course on the anthropology of rock & roll at University of Washington (lots more fun than real college). Ellen did a bit of spring training with her old rowing club.
The health front wasn’t that great: Ellen spent a lot of time with her mother, who suffered a nasty leg injury following a fall. Tom had two root canals and then had to have emergency eye surgery for a torn retina that manifested itself in Florida just a few days before our departure date for Australia. We ended up postponing our return to finish his treatment and nurse Ellen’s mother through a surgical procedure.
Here in Scarborough, Queensland, about 20 miles north of Brisbane, it’s sunny and hot and quiet except for the sounds of many, many different birds around dawn and dusk. We are staying in a little villa overlooking Moreton Bay while we get the boat back in order for cruising. We will head up the east coast of Australia along the Great Barrier Reef, then across the remote “Top End” to Darwin. There, in late July, we plan to join the Indonesia Rally – a loosely organized three month nautical tour that will take us from Australia through the islands of Indonesia to Singapore. Though we are not accustomed to sailing in big groups, the rally offers many benefits – cultural festivals, natural wonders, official assistance with Indonesian taxes, bureaucracy and corruption, and security in numbers.