Dear all,
It was a good experience to prepare ourselves for the
crossing of the ocean in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. We have met many nice
crews, got useful advice and we appreciated the interactions with the staff of
the World Cruising Organisation. Our final week in Las Palmas was very typical
for an ARC team. We had our ship lifted out of the water to clean it from all
kind of plants and animals that had started living on the underwater part of the
ship. New antifouling made it look super and we hope the antifouling will
protect us from new stuff that will slow us down.
We also did the last maintenance, bought new spare parts
and worked on safety items that were verified by the experts from the World
Cruising Organisation.
Various shops and the mercado (market) at Las Palmas
provided us with lots of food and drinks.
Saturday 6:00 PM we were 100% ready for departure. As
team we could not longer wait to leave.
We have had two first great days at sea. Everything goes
according to our plan. We are making good progress towards the south. We expect
to turn more to the west tomorrow in the afternoon.
Best regards from the Team of Ipanema,
Martin, Roef, Robert, Piet & Henk