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"Peter, have we lately seriously risked our lives? But I mean it, have we? Apart of risking it when we were nearly slaughtered by terrorists on January 13th? Or when we were nearly cut into pieces by crows, gathering around the sand-stuck car? Or on January 9th when we nearly killed ourselves riding invisible motorbikes?" "Of course we have," he replied. "Yesterday when we nearly missed the ferry." But he wasn't afraid that we would be condemned to something long and unpleasant in Tunisia because we missed the ferry. He was having in mind our "displacement" in the highest gear under the highest revolutions around Tunis lagoon as we finally realized, some 15 minutes after embarkation deadline, that we were on completely wrong side of the port, some 30 kilometres away from the ferry terminal. It was exciting but Peter was holding on very well, he new dying in Tunisia wasn't one of my life-plans. Have you noticed how many times the word "nearly" had been nearly used in this paragraph? Up to now, no one has become pregnant due to "nearly".

"If you go to the desert alone with a 2WD car like Tilen's it's no surprise he has it covered with sponsor logos. Namely, there's really a slight chance he's gonna die out there and the story becomes interesting," Oliver expertly analyzed it. By the way, there's been no update on his web page www.gilles-unterwegs.de since the Christmas Eve – was he maybe betrayed in Sudan by his 4WD? I hope not, it would be a pity to see Sandra never again.

We're moving up and down Victoria like two drunkards as she cleaves through the waves at 22 knots. When I'm writing this we are same distance from Milan as from Sofia (the Bulgarian one) and we see some Southern Sicilian lights on the northern horizon. The moon rose a few minutes ago. Orange coloured and flat as if somebody would have hit its bonce with a heavy hammer. Imagine a heated upper deck swimming pool with a bar and pretty female life-guard, dance-hall with live music, casino with slot-machines and a roulette, discotheque, room-service, 8 music channels to choose from in the cabin… We also are only imagining all this, yet it's true that our cabin is really huuuge (we opted for some extravagance so we are also enjoying a window in our cabin's wall which we use for watching – through salty crystals on the window – white waves, pushed by the some 200 metre long bark).

I was thinking about pushing Peter off the deck so I could test if the life-hoop really lights when thrown into the water. I'll leave it for later, more to the north where the water is colder. Then I can sing "MY heart WILL go on to Genoa." Now Peter is adding that if we swap our places and he watches the hoop, disappearing at 22 knots in the darkness of the night, he would sing "It's my party and I'll cry if I want to." Ah, it's time to stop writing and try to get Sicily signal (the one that stretches and looses your brain cells in the well-known rhythm "tacTACtacTACtacTACtac, tahdahdahdahdahdahdah") and try to use the incredible new technology (not yet available in Africa) for sending these lines, written by a person whose brain cells have suffered a severe damage during long months of far-away desert life, to the world wide web.

What are our plans for the future? There's plenty of them, they are extensive so I'll limit myself to the following few days. A man would imagine that we'd use the shortest way to get from the Genoa port to Ljubljana. But a man would be wrong. Before that we'll have to pass through Milan to do a couple of things, then we'll have to cross the border, then… we'll go skiing to Kanin ski-centre in Julian Alps (Slovenia has some great ski resorts – www.slovenia-tourism.si) and then over the Vršič pass (if it's not closed due to high snow-cover) slowly slowly towards Ljubljana…