Madrone’s home for the past nine months(!) has been Marina Estancilla, just outside Valdivia. While we of course would have preferred to be reunited with Madrone much earlier, we are incredibly happy that we chose Marina Estancilla for her winter home.
Preparing Madrone for sailing south we restarted the watermaker
We hired Raimundo to clean Madrone’s hull
The marina was a clean and well-sheltered place to park the boat, but the main attraction of the marina are it’s people. Jorge Bravo is the jefe of the yacht club that manages the marina – he went way above and beyond the call of duty to help us first return to Chile, and then to receive the appropriate approvals to head to the channels of Patagonia. He is now also a friend.
Angie and Jorge- in order to show our appreciation for all Jorge’s help, Angie briefly broke social distancing rules
Marcello is the manager of the marina itself, and he won extra points from Angie. Not only was he willing to do anything he could to keep Madrone safe, he’s also an animal lover who kept the marina full of dogs. When we returned, the main marina dog Samantha was sharing her turf with two new puppies – Luki and Chanel. Angie trained them up in no time!
Angie training up the marina dogs Chanel, Luki and Samantha
While we are happy to be sailing again, we hope that we’ll have the chance to return to Marina Estancilla again.
