Knapes continue world trip

Dear Carolyn,

Here is probably the last letter from John and Lucy Knape and boys. They are now on the ocean on the way to Barbados or Grenada. We heard through a ham radio operator via California that they are about halfway on the ocean, because of the El Nino system they had very little wind. In August we met and spent a couple weeks with them in Holland and Germany, and they are all well, and the boys are now 11 and 9 and the twins are 7.

They spent last Christmas in Italy, traveled through Turkey and Greece and all Europe, England, Scotland. They are pictured at the Marcus Aurelius monument in Rome.

They bought a camper trailer to do all the traveling, and when they came back to Spain, they sold it again to somebody who wanted to do the same thing they did. The only thing what was expensive is buying the gas for it, what is about $4 a gallon. They will be back in Michigan by August 1998 after sailing and visiting all around the world. (Nellie VanDorp)

We've made it to Tenerife in the Canaries after three weeks in Madeira. That was a great island full of plants suited to tropical and temperate climates. Many a day we hiked for six hours or so along irrigation canal that criss cross the entire island. The boys are good walkers and the scenery was beautiful. We collected apples, pears and chestnuts along the way.

Halloween was celebrated there with kids from six different boats and four different countries. Kids everywhere like to dress up in costume and have a party. Mike was an Egyptian mummy, Jim a tiger, Charlie a red devil, and Chris a robber. They made their costumes from gear we had on board. We found six round pumpkins to carve after quite a bit of searching. It's hard to tell the farmer why the shape is important when they figure you only want to eat it.

But the Portugese do quite well in English, because much of their TV and movies are in English with subtitles. After our Halloween party we cooked and ate the Jack-o-lantern. I bet most American kids don't do that but we all really like pumpkin and squash and it seems such a waste to not eat it.

Now we are preparing to go in the next week or so. We'll have our Thanksgiving feast somewhere here on a beach, because I'm sure we'll be at sea for the real date. We have rejoined many of our old friends from earlier in our trip. It's been fun to get together to hear where others have gone. Some have gone to Africa, to Black Sea, up the canals to England, etc. Lots of stories to hear and tell.

The boys are doing really well. Chris is teaching himself to play harmonica now. He enjoys music alot. I've been able to copy some Christmas music for him to practice on the ocean crossing. School continues to take up many of our mornings but yesterday they built a tremendous Lego ship after school. There is also a good safe roller blading area for them to get exercise. It's warm and pleasant weather here but the islands don't have lots of beautiful beaches. But soon we'll be back to the Caribbean again. Christmas should be on a sunny beach island nearby Barbados. Then we'll go south to Venezuela and Trinidad before heading northward to Virgin Islands, which we plan to reach by March or so. We don't plan to go back to the ABC islands this time. But you could be thinking about where you'd like to visit.

We will call before we head out from here. Take care and love always.

John, Lucy & boys

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