Yau Ley day - Roy's yacht on the way home

Unusually Chinese NY has been fantastic – clear, warm (where is the winter?).  Yesterday we went to Yau Ley for lunch on Tracy and Simon’s boat and met the rest of the Sheung Sze Wan and Lobster bay people there – had a fantastic time – after lunch we all went to Mils beach, jolled around, played touch rugby, soaked up the sun.  Roy asked me if I would take a pic of his yacht on the way home when we all left, because he wanted to run its spinnaker and thought it would look cool.  I asked Simon, and on the way back the sky had got quite dramatic, and he caught up with them, and I took some pics, one of which is attached.  I think it’s just about the coolest yacht picture I’ve seen – so wanted to send it to you.  Check this out:

 

A bit of road on an early clouded morn

I will never get tired of waking up here - love every, different, morning vista

Rugby Tournament

Aiden's team played in a tournament today and were back to their best.  Unfortunately he took a nasty knock to the head (a clash of heads with a team-mate, really unlucky) and had to go off.  A reminder of what a daft game it really is.  However, before it happened he was having a storming time, both with the ball and tackling - which he has developed a real appetite for.  He's really strong on his feet and retains the ball well.  If you have a look at the picture sequence below, you can see how many of the opposition were required to take him down on a good run through the midfield.  Considering that they play nine a side, that was more than half the team, and because he eventually got his pass away too, this particular adventure ended in a try scored by his mate Gary.

As you can see here however, no such numbers needed when he is doing the tackling, he just homes in, gets his head in the right place, most of the time, and brings the guy down.  He's really enjoying it all, and outside the nasty bangs, is enjoying the rough and tumble of it all.

Pancake faces

After rugby practice - Sunday morning pancakes - not good behaviour, but funny.  Destroy Conformity.

Sailing J-80s with Simon

I went sailing on a J-80 with Simon yesterday; it was fantastic.  We raced Greg and Pete.  These are fabulous boats.  When the wind gets up, which it did, they really motor, and have a crazy angle of lean - getting the rail right into the water, which feels somewhat precarious to someone who usually sails a dinghy - apparently you cant flip them though - which is a good thing, because they are quite big small boats.  Never thought I'd find a sailing boat outside a windsurfer thrilling - but it really was.

Pete and Greg - gentle cruise out to the open sea - where the wind gets going.

Simon at the helm.

Game face portraits

These are "game face portraits" - Saturday morning and a bit of Wii before banning.  They played far too many screen games for their own good over the holidays, so we're whittling down to term-time rations now.

The rugby warrior marches on...

Aiden is getting better and better all the time, and enjoying his rugby.  He plays wing, though he's quite tall, here he is with his mate Luke.  Unfortunately his team got beaten in all three games that the grand parents came to watch (having been promoted to the league 1 group was a bit of a step up - in the previous tournament they won all three without having a try scored against them), but they played well in all.

Looking suitably grubby... and he takes it pretty personally too.