Monday, December 12, 2016

The night before - by Elsie

The night before….

Well, here we are the evening before the ‘big’ one. Everything on the list is ticked off, well almost, the water has still be to topped up and we need to visit the bank to get some dollars.
The stores have been a problem. Capo Verde is definitely African, very little European food. It’s a cheap place to eat as long as your diet is the same as the locals – fish and rice. The rice comes in huge 25kg bags. No tasty cheese, the local goat’s cheese is tasteless and bland, no Parma ham, only very fatty bacon ham, no chicken breasts, only salty fish. Thank goodness we did a huge provisioning in Santa Cruz. The tins of curry chicken and the Fray Bentos pies don’t seem so stupid now. Even the chopped ham in tins will be a God send. Vegetables and fruit are very expensive compared to Spain but the good news is fish is plentiful and cheap. So, the fridge is full even though it’s not our usual fare.
I checked and rechecked the weather – it’s as it should be, northeast to east force 5 to 6. The swell is forecast between 2 to 3 metres, not good. There are about six weather models we use and all have different variants but high winds prevail. The Christmas winds have come early. According to Predict Wind we will zoom across to Barbados in 13 days. I have persuaded the skipper to head south so we will miss some of the highish winds. The passage should take between 15 and 18 days, I’m a wimp. I know 25 knots of wind is not high when it is behind the beam and we will have three reefs in most of the time but I am still having misgivings.
Nervous, scared, terrified are all descriptive words to describe my feelings tonight. I knew once we left Tennerife there was no turning back, onwards and across we go, but now I am facing 2000+ nm at sea I am now having second thoughts or even third or fourth ones. To turn back is not an option, it would mean beating into force 4 winds which is not comfortable to say the least. This journey could take take up to three weeks. I don’t think it will with the winds forecast but that’s what we have provisioned for. Three weeks at sea, with the nearest piece of land five miles straight down. We know Ruby is ready. We have talked through all the ‘what if’ scenarios so all the emergency procedures are in place and we have back up plans for our back up plans. Steve is primed and ready to receive our 12 hourly position and state text via the satellite phone and the life jackets, emergency beacons and life lines are all primed and ready. Even the grab bag and survival suits have been moved to a more prominent home. We are taking nothing for granted and safety is priority so why am I so terrified?
It’s the biggest adventure I’ve ever contemplated doing and now we are on the eve of it starting reality has hit me. The skills I have learnt over the last five years could save not just my life but Lionel’s as well. Watch the sails, watch the compass, listen to the noises around you. Think about what you are doing and do it correct first time everytime. There will be no wind steering, Hattie is still not working so we will be relying entirely on George or autopilot.
If I make the wrong decision in a moment of panic it could spell disaster for us and Ruby. That’s the key, I must not panic. I must be level headed and work out the best action to take at a moments notice. Reef. Reef. Reef. Watch the radar for squalls and reef. Watch the sky. Watch the sea. Anything which indicates we are going to be hit by high winds, reef. It is very difficult to see the signs at night. When we start tomorrow we will have a full moon which is good but in two weeks time there will be no moon so I have negotiated with the skipper and it will be three reefs in the main sail for my six hour night watch, easiest thing to do.
Now I can see the advantages of sailing in company and rallies. You can’t let the side down, bravado rules, show no weakness. Even talking to random cruisers I show no hesitation. Yea, the wind will be force 6, won’t that be fantastic sailing? Inside I’m a quivering wreck but to look at me you see a confident upbeat sailor who can’t wait to get out there and sail.


One way or another we are all actors.

Sunday, December 11, 2016

December 2016 part 1.

In which we continue around the Cape Verde Islands and prepare for our Atlantic crossing.

We started December at anchor off Porto de Sal Rei, Boavista, Cape Verde Islands. It was our intention to spend another few weeks going round the islands and set off across the Altantic around the end of December. The next leg of our island hopping was about 90 miles, to Sao Nicolau, just too far to make it in one daylight so we decided to make it a night voyage. Having failed to test our wind steering since re-fitting it in Santa Cruz, we felt that we should do so now to check that it was now secure and that we could plan to use it on the crossing. So we got out Hattie’s rudder and fitted it.

We lifted anchor at 1700 and, with one reef in main and Genoa, set off on a beam reach with a NNE’ly F4 making a steady 7 knots. Hattie, at first, performed immaculately but, after an hour or so, the clacking sound returned. The lower bracket was still moving, so we had to lock the wind steering and revert to George. This was a big disappointment as we had little idea of how to proceed with it other than a complete re-fit – a dockyard job. The voyage, otherwise, went very well and at dawn we were rounding the SW’ly point of Sao Nicolau. As we did so, we came into wind shadow and had to motor the last 5 miles up to anchor off Tarrafal. There were only 3 other (active) yachts here, but 2 that sat at anchor without masts with every appearance of decay. We wondered what the stories were.
Sad yacht.

A leisurely breakfast and dinghy ashore to seek port officials. For once, the pilot book gave good directions but, when we got there, we were told that they had no interest in us and we should go to the national police. Here, we filled in the usual papers and handed over our ship’s registration document which is routinely held until departure. A wander around the well kept town showed the usual selection of mini-markets. These, as in Boavista, seemed to be owned and run by eastern Asians. Since my experience of West Africans is that they are very enterprising I cannot understand this.
Boavista from anchorage.

We spent a further 3 days here, mostly relaxing in the sun but we did make one foray into the interior to visit the island’s capital, Ribiera Brava. This was about an hour away and we could have taken a taxi, at a cost of about 25 Euros. Instead we found an aluguer (public transport) minibus who was happy to take us for 5 Euros. This did mean waiting 20 minutes while he drove around picking up sufficient trade to make his journey worthwhile but we were in no great hurry. Unlike the previous islands, the road was tarmac all the way, though very windy through the hills. Our driver stopped several times for other passengers, including a lady with severely disabled young boy. They both seemed to bear this affliction with good grace and Elsie got a smile from both in return for a gentle stroke of his arm but one does wonder what his future will hold when he is too big to be carried, in such a poor country. R. B. was, once again, very well kept but with no better selection of shops than Tarrafal. We did manage to find some flaky internet in a square and admired the decoration in the cathedral before returning in the same aluguer. Our driver mistimed his departure, following two others who picked up the majority of trade, including a large group from just outside the town. We managed to get in the lead to get the next passenger, but she took so long to board that the others overtook and managed to clear the route of further trade. Back in Tarrafal we tried again for internet (I still had my data SIM but some things are just so much easier on a lap-top than on a phone) but, having bought our beers at the one place that offered free WiFi, we were told that only the owner knew the key and he was absent. We needed a refill for a camping gas cylinder and found a supplier. The price for this service seems to get cheaper the further south one is. The most we have paid is £30 in Shetland (£10 per kilo!). In the Canaries, it was anything from 15 – 25 Euros. Here it was less than 3 Euros.
Ceiling picture, Ribiera Brava cathedral.

We witnessed a variation on ring net fishing one morning. One boat laid the net round an anchored yacht which was sheltering a shoal of fish. ‘Divers’ in snorkeling gear maneuvered the ends round the yacht and prevented escapees. The net was drawn tight and the meager catch was emptied into a huge floating basket brought by a second boat. Another crew, using a more conventional approach of laying a horseshoe of net from a beach at slack tide and pulling it in got a far better catch, the downside being that everyone in the area lent a hand at the recovery and wanted some payment in kind.
Fishing, Boavista style.
On the 6th, we heaved up and proceeded the 26 miles to Santa Luzia to anchor off a beautiful deserted beach in crystal clear waters. Here we, once again, indulged ourselves by lazing in the sun, the only downside being the constant strong wind and the moderate swell which prevented our landing.


As stated, our intention was to spend another couple of weeks in the area, but we started to get itchy feet. We could see that the ARC and Odyssey rallies had, after a slow start, made good progress and were nearing the Caribbean. Another group of our friends, Dana de Mer, Mary Lou and Emerald Bay, were in Mindelo about to depart and the Trade Winds seemed to have settled into the classic NE’ly F4-5. Always flexible, we decided that we wanted to join the fun and decided that Mindelo, instead of just being a staging post back to the South East group of the C.V.s would be our point of departure. No rush, as we had missed our friends anyway, but head over, top up provisions, water, batteries and fuel and head off. Ruby’s bottom was getting a bit slimy so I took the opportunity of my daily dip to have a good scrub. This would have been easier without the 25 knot wind with consequent chop and surface current but I probably needed the exercise.
Bottom scrubbing at Santa Luzia
We heaved up at 0900 on the 8th and proceeded to Mindelo. At first, in the shadow of Sao Nicolau, we got a SW’ly F3 but after 5 miles we cleared that island and had a NNE’ly F4-5. To go round the top of Sao Vicente we were close hauled, making 6-7 knots with 2 reefs. We arrived at Mindelo at 1330 and moored at the marina, our first in over 3 weeks. The marina has been very cleverly planned with the pontoons lying across the, almost constant, prevailing wind and different arrangements for mooring lines depending on whether you are up- or down-wind of the pontoon. Usual formalities with Marina (cheaper than expected) and port authorities (who held on to our ship’s papers again) and ashore to check out the provisioning prospects. Given that the town is very cosmopolitan, by area standards, this was a bit of a disappointment. Basic and dry stores were available, though much more expensive than in the Canaries, but luxuries such as charcuterie, cheese and ‘fine pieces’ were unobtainable and the fruit and veg. were not of the same quality (and very expensive). The water, however, was good and the internet from the local cafe was strong enough to be be picked up by our amplifier, meaning that we could catch upon 3 weeks worth of I.T. and store some BBC podcasts for the crossing.

We had a plan of minor maintenance, stores etc. and all was going to going well until Friday afternoon when we looked at the weather forecast for the crossing. This had changed and it now looked as though our planned Tuesday departure would take us out into a forecast F6. As our experience shows that reality is usually 5-10 knots more than the forecast, from our current source, this meant that we could be committing ourselves to a week of gale force winds. If we hurried up with our preparations and left the following day, we could beat the weather but, guess what? The port offices had just closed for the weekend. Oh Bu**£r! A sleepless night while we pondered what plan ‘C’ should be.


We were woken on Saturday by sounds of drums which, on investigation, came from a parade of schoolchildren to celebrate United Nations human rights day. This led us to a part of town which I hadn’t visited but which, unfortunately, didn’t reveal a Waitrose, Tesco or even Pingu Doce. Back to the boat, a check of the weather and hurrah! The forecast wind had dropped sufficiently to make a Tuesday departure a reasonable plan again. So on with gentle preparations while another group of yachts, including an Israeli rally, departed.

Sunday was spent relaxing and Monday on final provisioning.  Unfortunately, fruit and veg are not as well stocked as on departure from Tenerife but we will survive.

Tuesday morning brought a few last minute butterflies but it was time to go.

To be continued...    

Monday, December 5, 2016

November2016

In which we cut our bonds to Europe and head down to Cape Verde Islands

November 2016 started with Ruby in Santa Cruz, Tenerife. Lionel was in the U.K. for routine medical checks and family visits and Elsie was on board, organising provisioning and having some overdue dental work done.

Lionel returned on the 7th with usual small chandlery items, including Caribbean flags and a piece of marine ply. This latter was for an attempt to re-fit the lower wind steering gear bracket. On the voyage from Gibraltar this had moved, sheering a bolt. The hope was that by substituting a wooden packing piece for the existing plastic, the bracket would be more firmly held, enabling us to actually use the system on ocean passages. A happy day was spent trimming, sanding and varnishing before re-installing the bracket. We also had a major shop for dry stores as we were sure that these would be either much more expensive or unobtainable over the next few months. Ruby is blessed with many spaces beneath the floorboards, seats and beds and these were well packed though even with our best efforts, we could still have fitted more in.

One of several food stores!

One of the major items was bottled water. We have 330 litres in the main tanks and, with practice, we have learned to extend the duration of this from about 4 days to over 2 weeks. We have a sea water pump in the galley sink and, when at sea, this is used to wash everything – dishes, clothes and ourselves - before a final rinse with fresh water. This should mean that, for our planned voyages, we should have sufficient but ‘should be OK’ is not good enough in the middle of the ocean so we bought 20 X 5 litre bottles so that, if all else failed, we would not get dehydrated. The weight of this, together with 4 cases of beer and 20 litres of wine was definitely having an effect on our water line.

The weekend of the 11th - 13th was spent attending a series of seminars with the Jimmy Cornell Odyssey organisation. Jimmy was the originator of the ARC (Atlantic Rally for Cruisers). He has passed this on now but still organises smaller rallies of 20-30 yachts. Having made countless ocean voyages and supervised literally thousands of others he is definitely someone who knows what he is talking about and we were grateful to be able to pick up what tips we could from him and his team. We were re-assured to find that we had got most things right in our preparations but took enough new stuff away to make it 3 days well spent.

Monday was spent with final provisioning for our leg down to Cape Verde Islands, including lots of fresh fruit and veg and a new fishing lure. As we were settling our bill with the marina, we spotted an advert for anchor chain. A German couple had bought 70 metres of 10mm chain, only to discover that their spurling pipe wouldn’t accept anything larger than 8mm. Our existing chain was both a little short, at 50 M and worn, with the galvanising being almost exhausted over much of its length. It would last another year or so but the price asked for this length was so attractive that we decided to go for it and our evening was spent checking that it would fit our windlass and stowing it in the chain locker. Elsie wasn’t convinced that it was a perfect fit so we were loath to dump our existing chain before proper trials and we now had an additional 200 kg on board. As this was at the bow and the beer in the cockpit locker, I reasoned that at least we would be well trimmed!

We finally left Santa Cruz at 1100 on the 15th. The forecast winds to the South were not good but the atmosphere with dozens of other aspiring Atlantic crossers making their own final preparations and having their own doubts was starting to affect us so we wanted to get away. We had a good sail down the Tenerife coast, starting stately in a F3 and finishing spiritedly in a F5, broad reaching all the way to anchor at our familiar place at Montana Roja. The plan was to spend a couple of days here and then pop across to La Gomera for a top-up of fuel, water and fresh food before our crossing. On the evening of the 17th, however, the forecast showed that the following morning would give us our best chance of good winds for the foreseeable future so made the decision to go for it. Accordingly, we lifted anchor at 0900 and motored the 3 miles to San Miguel to top up on fuel. There was the usual chaos here, but only wasted 20 minutes or so and at 1010 cast off and headed south.


This was a major decision point. Up to this now, we knew that we could change our minds, spend another winter in the Canaries and remain in Europe. We were now losing that possibility – we were committed to the big crossing!
There are many debates about what sails to set for downwind passages. The ‘conventional’ way was two headsails, wing-on-wing or in tandem but Jimmy Cornell had impressed upon us that this was far from ideal as, once in a big swell, hoisting the main might prove impossible and heaving-to would become impossible if required. His view is that a main, however well reefed, is required at all times and we were happy to accept his wisdom so set off with 2 reefs in main and Genoa in a F6 quartering wind. This gave us a flying start and we averaged nearly 8 knots for the first couple of hours. The wind gradually abated as we left the land affect but for the following 36 hours we had at least F4, giving us about 6.5 knots. On the morning of the 19th, we shook out one reef, putting it back in that evening for the night watches. This proved to be wise as, for the rest of the passage, there were periods when the wind rose to over 20 knots and it was much easier, on single handed watches, to adjust power using just the furling genoa. The average wind, however, dropped and with it our speed. The first day’s run was 159 miles; this was followed by 143, 123, 114 and 122 mile days. Not classic by any means but we had plenty of food and water and no deadline to meet. Our progress was monitored by my kind brother-in-law who got twice-daily messages of our position, course and speed with instructions of what to do if they stopped! This almost failed when one of our messages went, inexplicably, to his spam box, but he queried us and we were able to re-assure him that all was well. Our new Iridium Go hotspot device was also used to download daily weather forecasts. While these were not totally accurate, at least we were re-assured that nothing nasty was heading our way.

We had not shipped our wind-steering rudder and were relying on George. The battery monitor showed that we were building up big amp-hour deficits and ran our little petrol generator daily to try to close this. This was only partially successful as the charging rate dropped sooner than expected. As the voltage was holding up well, there seemed to be a miss-setting somewhere but we were loath to run the batteries down and damage them. The big deficit continued after our arrival. We knew that, with the wind and sun that we were experiencing, we should be reducing it but it continued to increase. Nothing to do but continue to monitor the situation until we could have 24 hours on shore power and know that we were fully charged. Something else that we had picked up from Jimmy Cornell was to set the autopilot to wind angle rather than compass heading. This may result in a slight meander but it means you don’t have to keep re-trimming the sails to sail efficiently. It also means that, if there is a squall and big wind shift, you should keep the same wind angle and not round up – this could result in an even greater apparent wind speed with attendant dangers. A further benefit is said to be reduced steering movement and power consumption.

At mid-day on the 23rd we had 95 miles to go and with the wind now forecast to continue at 15knots on the beam, we decided to reduce sail and speed to ensure a daylight arrival. This, of course, put the jinx on the wind. It dropped and backed until we had less than 10 knots from directly astern and we even had to motor for an hour or so. It did pick up again in the small hours and we arrived off our destination, Palmeira at first light on the 24th. All the best anchoring spots were taken but we found a place not too far out.

It would have been nice to just collapse but I didn’t want to start off on the wrong foot with the authorities so the dinghy was dug out of the locker and inflated. Motored ashore to land at the little dock where the locals land their fish from open boats. The fish is cleaned then and there so the dock is a little ripe with scales, gills etc. I had not visited Africa for over 25 years but the village was immediately recognisable as belonging to that continent; the unpaved streets, buildings either unfinished or brightly painted, shops with small, barred windows. I was neck-and-neck with a Frenchman who had arrived the night before and was on the same mission. While I located the building which the pilot book suggested would hold the port officials, he looked in the one next door, which actually housed them so got ahead of me in the queue. This would be the story for the next couple of days, with lots of time spent waiting, having missed my turn by seconds. However, my old experience of Africa stood me in good stead: be patient, it would be good to do the job today, but tomorrow is also a good day. Paperwork completed, after a mere hour or so, I moved on to the next task: water carrying. From now on, we would be relying on carrying all our water to the boat, except when in a marina and there was only one of those in the whole island group. Most houses have no running water and there is a village ‘fontanerio’ to fill cans, buckets etc. Most of it is carried away 100 litres at a time in wheelbarrows so I looked a little pitiful with my 20 litre carrier, but every little counts. It was then time to return for that much needed rest. We made another foray ashore later, to show Elsie the village and get more water but the fontanario was locked for the night. We were met at the fish dock by a teenager who offered to look after our dinghy. I tipped him a Euro and his wide grin told me that this was over-generous but it didn’t seem a lot to spend to share a little joy around. I also ferried a couple of local fishermen from their boats to shore so, hopefully, we did no damage to the reputation of European sailors.

On Friday, we decided to make a morning trip to the big town, Espargos where wonderful things like banks and supermarkets could be found. After one round trip with the dinghy to get another 30 litres of water, we found the way to town. We were hailed by a passing minibus which then did a tour round the village picking up more passengers before heading off and dropping us just outside the town centre. This area was again very African, though the centre itself looked more European. We had a good walk round and did a little shopping before returning. Although it was now 10 days since we had provisioned in Santa Cruz, we still had fresh fruit and veg on board – very encouraging, so it was mostly fresh (or, rather, frozen) meat and a few treats. We had noticed mobile phone shops and I decided that I needed to get a data SIM card, so we returned to the town in the afternoon, hoping to spend 15 minutes getting this and then spending a leisurely hour over a beer downloading a weeks worth of ‘The Archers’ and other stuff at a bar we had spotted advertising free WiFi. I went into the first phone shop, but there was a bit of a queue. Elsie returned a few minutes later to report that the other shop had no queue and an assistant who spoke perfect English, so we moved to there, only to find that a queue had now formed. After half-an-hour’s wait, I got my SIM at a very good price. It was Black Friday and there was a special promotion. Elsie insisted that they activated it for me. A good idea as 90 minutes later they had not managed this task – it seemed that everyone else on the Islands had taken up the offer and the system had crashed. So, back to shop 1 where I eventually got connected. We did go for our beer and ‘Archers’ download but had to cut it a bit short as it was getting near sunset and we try to avoid dinghy travelling in the dark.

Queueing for water

The controller of the fontenario

On Saturday, we had an early trip ashore for bread and water. While looking for the former, we came across a family butchering a pig on the front verandah, not something you see every day at home. Final farewells were made to the lady at the fontanario and to our boat watcher, Gonias. We then heaved up and proceeded 5 miles down the coast to Mordiera, a beautiful bay where spent the next couple of days in almost perfect isolation. The only thing missing was the sun, with overcast skies and frequent light showers. As this end of the Island group is basically desert (the drinking water comes from a de-salination plant) the locals were probably pleased but our tans needed topping up. Instead of doing this, we spent Sunday on little maintenance tasks including a new joker valve for the heads. Anyone familiar with marine loos will know about the joy of this and the associated de-scaling. Others will probably prefer not to.


On Monday we heaved up and headed south to the next Island, Boavista. The wind was forecast to be light so we left early. In fact it was perfect, with 15 knots just behind the beam and we had a fine passage, anchoring just to the south of Porto Sal Rei shortly after 1400. A hurried lunch and dinghied ashore to find the port officials. Their office was closed and looked as though it had been for some time. A bit of research that evening suggested that they had moved to the main port but when we went there the following morning, no interest was shown so we concluded that we had made an honest attempt and gave up. After the joy of Palmeira, there was a depressed air about Sal Rei. The poverty may not be worse and, judging from the lack of water carrying, the facilities may even be better but there was not the same feeling of happiness. Tourism, albeit on a small scale, has reached the town and possibly the inhabitants are suffering the envy from seeing not only those with much more but those locals who are making a good living from the visitors. On Wednesday, we hired an aluguer (pick-up with seating in the flat bed) for a half day tour of the north part of the island, visiting a (very small) sandy desert, complete with locusts. From under a bush emerged a local artist with his sand pictures with which we were very taken but we have a rule of no souvenirs so I just took a couple of photos (and made a small donation). We also visited a couple of very well kept villages and saw the local agriculture which consists of free range goats and the occasional acre or so of market garden, surrounded by wind- and animal- proof fencing. Our driver, who spoke excellent English, came from one of the villages and said that he would rather be there, tending crops but agreed that the money from driving was much better. It was a very enjoyable trip apart from the spiders. Where the road passed between bushes, there were huge webs with dozens of monsters lurking. As there are no large vehicles using the roads we, sitting outside, passed inches below these. On the way ‘home’ we bought a bottle of the local Grog, a spicy 92% proof rum. Definitely an acquired taste.
 Aluguer

 Boavista road

 Elsie in the desert

Sand art


Monthly stats:

Logged 885 miles

Over ground 845 miles