Hi there,
We finally turned the lines on the visitors pontoon
of Las Palmas wednesday august the 15th at 22h30 local time,
after 5 days of no wind, and a crual back ache which happened on the evening of
the arrival... and which isn't over at this time...
Great people in the harbour' office, great people
on the pontoon as well :)
Love this quiet ambiance... guess it won't be that
quiet in three months time :)
Divale's kindly waiting for us at the G
pontoon. Back next month in Muelle Deportivo for the early final small things to
be done before november ;)
So, leaving on the 30th of july from Brittany, we
had : ... mainly wind against us : from west as we attended to escape from the
Channel for 2 days.... south west on the end of Brittany, south west F6 forcing
us down to sail to Santander... one day to sail to Gijon, one day and a half to
get out from Biscay... with a wind coming from the west... then 2 days of fog
between La Coronia and Cascais... half a day and night of wind... then we rolled
the gennaker and turned the engine on till our arrival in Las almas 4 days
later...
What we discover while we were
sailing this month :
1/ No matter where you go in august, the wind will
ALWAYS be blowing from where you want to go
to.
2/ Don't lose time making A plans... only brush up the
B and C ones....
3/
YES, there's fog in Portugal in August ( even our british
londonian friends would have loved the one we had to Porto, when you discover at
night the harbour light only 30 meters from the end of the harbour jetee...
)
4/ And yes, it's acceptable to confuse a 25m wind portugese
turbine with a trans oceanic multi hull on its mooring
3 nm from the coasts... but only with fog, at noon and " a jeun"....
:(
5/ Cargos at Gibraltar don't navigate on the 15th of
august week end, right ?....
6/ Gennaker with 20/25 knots of wind is fun at night,
but not between cargos and not when you spend 3/4 of an hour
and 3 times in a row fixxing the damn rolling aparatus on the inox bowsprit....
:/
7/ Hammer sharks love hooked dolphin fishes ( coryphene bream, in
french )...
"Yes!! a couple of small dolphin fishes hooked!! But, what's
that tails following the line... tuna?..."
" Damned!! The bream de-hooked
itself and fell out of the back panel of the boat!!! :("
" Look!!
It's swimming back towards the boat!!!...?!!.... and...
overtaking... the boat?...?!!.... no kidding?...."
" ...
followed by... ok, don't worry, it's only a YOUNG 2m long hammer shark....
hum... :/... slowly ask Patrick to stop jumping from the boat, the shark could
get hurt...."
8/ Don't please your friend by agreeing him to equip your kitchen with
carpet covered with anti-slipping stripes when this friend of yours
doesn't fully aknowledge the importance of installing it in a
longtudinal way rather than in a transverse
way... thank you Patrick for these wonderful culinary curling
moments :(
9/ Sailing close hauled by F6 is fun in Biscay under the full moon...
but helmets are loudly recommended as it is not to vomit on your crew
fellow member when is not keeping the watch but having however kindly a cofee
with you... :(
10/ Yes, it happens to switch from 7 to 30 knots of wind in
seconds when you arrive in Cascais from the north. Crews which didn't experiment
it at Cascais will surely experiment it once or twice at their leaving from Gran
Canaria in november, as ARC and locals say ;) So don't worry, there will
be fun for everyone :)
11/ Our engine burns 2/2.5l an hour at 2.000, and 5/6l an hour at
2.500 ( turbo starts on at 2.500)... some members of our crew have a worst
consumtion per hour than our Yanmar 75hp.... though..... black tank is for
fuel... blue for water... what bout adding red tanks onboard,
seriously?...
12/ Detailed maps of ALL the harbours on your way...
even 2 days sailing from your initial route... have their
importance onboard...
13/ Think twice about what to say to customs
when you fill UP the front shower with wine bags in box... and the front cabin
with a 15kg plastic wrapped bread flour bundle... seriously, Jean, you haven't
been in that flour business your whole life???
14/ Sailing at two people on
the 43 ft down to Canarias was fun, maybe a bit less in the fog
in Portugal, sleeping 40cm from the radar alarm and the lobster pots,
...ok...... would have been even better with my girlfriend, though :D
CU all ;)