Ahoi from Sima,
After 7 days at sea we have found our rhythm and are not as sleep deprived as in the first few days. So it’s time to finally give an update on what is happening on board sima.
First let me introduce you to sima and her crew. Sima is a Bavaria 42 built in 1999, her name comes from the pigmy Pottwale cogis sima, she is as sturdy as this little whale but hopefully laks its ability to dive. Navigating sima are Flori, Tim and myself, Isa. This whole adventure was Floris idea, a great one by the way.
Flori and myself are on parental leave for two years to travel and discover the European coast, the Caribbean and the middle American coast for two years. So this summer we have left our homeport Kiel to return only in 2024. Accompanying us on this crossing is Tim. Tim and Flori were each other’s best man and have quite a sailing history together. A special thanks has to go to Tim’s wife for lending him to us for such a long time!
An then there are the two reasons for our parental leave. Merle (4) and Laura (2) having been dragged along the dream of their parents. Both luckily have similar interests at the moment. Their idea of a perfect day includes the visit of a play ground followed by eating ice cream and topped of by hours spent in the water of either the ocean or a pool. Merle also enjoys visits in fish museum (aka. Aquaria) and Laura’s favourite animal are cats.
This is the crew we have been planning on for this crossing. But then, at the end of our stay in Las Palmas another travel companion was happily welcomed aboard sima: Sailor Ted!
Sailor Ted has already sailed the Atlantic several times, always with another family crew. He is very cuddly and lightens up everyone’s days. Of course he has his own bed in the kids Koje and even his own little toilet. If the girls are occupied by other things than playing with him, he has Charlie and Lilly, two other bears on this boat, keeping him company. So far he is coming along great with the other stuffed animals, even through the jelly fish can be quite scary.
What has happened so far:
We generally had a very nice sail so far. Few mishaps and lots of us time. In the first wavier days we learned that rice is good to precook but definitely not good for the shaky days. After the first meal we have a salon full of rice, to search for and snack off if something went wrong during provisioning. However, „search the rice“ also seems to be a fund childrens game.
We have also shortly lost our Laura and Sailor Ted under the salon table after being hit by a wave. Both were recovered unharmed and we all had a good laugh.
As the sea got calmer, we finally hoisted our gennaker. Sailing smoothly we started an eager discussion of our fishing strategy as we were unsuccessful so far. This moment of inattentiveness was used by the gennaker to start an affair with the forestay. During the break up of this unhealthy love we also had the chance to try a completely new fishing strategy. Fazit: the snuffer is as useless for fishing as the lure we were using.
Merle über Sailor Ted
„Sailor Ted gehts gut. Ganz viel gekuschelt hat er auch schon. Sailor Ted knetet und spielt Ubongo mit uns. Später tanzen wir wieder zusammen. Ich hab mir ein tolles Lied über Kuscheltiere ausgedacht als ich geschlafen haben und ihr draußen rumgespielt haben. „
Translation:
Sailor Ted is fine. We have cuddled a lot. Sailor Ted is playing ubongo with us and helps forming figures with play dough. Later we will dance together again. I have thought of a great song on stuffed animals while I was sleeping and you were playing around outside.
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