The Queen is dead, Long Live the Queen!

Hi, well it’s been a while since we last updated everyone. I write this from the Amel in Cardiff, UK in February. We’ve been back in the UK for 9 months and have spent most of that time on the new boat, or She-Who-Will-Not-Be-Named if you prefer.

The Captain is a methodical, thoughtful man. Who likes to make sure all angles and possibilities have been carefully considered. This is the perfect foil to what I like to think of as my Dr Pepper approach (think of the 90s adverts … what’s the worst that could happen?). Some may call this slapdash, the very opposite of strategic (The Captain wins more chess and scrabble games than I do, that’s true). I like to think that we compliment each other perfectly, I place carefully pointy shoes in delicate places to encourage momentum & the Captain points out the many fatal flaws of my plans. Together we manage to meet a happy medium and plans progress.

Back in 2021 we spent a month scribbling potential boat names on Post It Notes and adding them to a pot. Candidate’s ranged from G’wan (inspired by Mrs Doyle from Father Ted),

Shenanigan (inspired by this genius clip that’s had us giggling like lunatics many a time https://youtu.be/ORO1FcEqBV8)

New Rose, Trev’s favourite Dammed track. We had moons, stars, films, even a play on the kids names and eventually decided on Ava. Taking the ‘a’s from my name & the ‘v’ from Trev’s. All was settled, Trev was busy drawing options for the new logo and decals.

We sailed back to the UK, isolated, moved from one boat to another, visited family, found a winter berth, got to know the new boat and happily reacquainted ourselves with all the food goodies we couldn’t get hold of easily in Europe. This gave Trev time to think. About all sorts of things, boat jobs, more boat jobs, how we would pay for the boat jobs, the order that the boat jobs needed to be done in, what we needed to do boat jobs, oooh new tools for boat jobs!

He also had time to ponder on the all the benefits of Ava, the fact that it’s short, easy to pronounce in many different languages, it’s a pleasing palindrome. When calling other boats, marinas or harbours on the VHF you say the name 3 times, so we wanted a short name, so as not to confuse me too much when tired.

When you finish your sentence and open it up to the other person, you say OVER. I think you can see where this is going.

Trev’s ‘Safety First’ musings gave him to understand that this might cause issues. Back to the drawing board we went. Lists were considered, Contract work was applied for, boat shows were attended, a project list was installed in prime motivational viewpoint in the saloon. Slowly the jobs migrated to In Progress and then Completed. She-Who-Must-Not-be-Named, remained, unnamed. Or simply The Amel.

On one of our weekend walks we finally whittled it down to 3 names, yes Ava was still in the mix! Yvaine (the star from Stardust) was another and Elice. Yvaine made us think about the deliberate mispronunciation of the mountain Y Garn, in North Wales, by our very good friend, Paul. Knowing that he wouldn’t be able to resist this, gave us another reason to continue to mull it over.

Elice came about as we’d researched some of The Captain’s original bosses (his Mum) family tree. On one of the census reports the name Elice came up and we all looked at each other & said ‘that’s a good boat name’

I had the shortlist and went for the one that had zero other connotations and had the bonus of having a lovely family connection. The fact that there is a meaning of picked by God, had nothing to do with it. I’m certainly not liking myself to any deity out there. Not at all, nope.

So there we have it, Sea Love has been reregistered as Elice, all of the paperwork has gone through. She’s getting a smart new look, the wipe clean seats, ceiling mirrors and droopy headlinings are being replaced. We’ll do the renaming ceremony before we leave the dock again and are gathering the necessary bottles to make sure that the Sea Gods have been appeased.

I’m off for a good think about what I’ve done. There are more boat jobs to do and things to buy for boat jobs!

Elice & her crew Captain & First Mate Mac signing off until next time.