12/3/09
12.00 Checked out yesterday so all that was left this morning was one
last run ashore to spend last local currency. Down by the fish market there
are various friut and veg stalls. Actually, everywhere in Dakar there are fruit
and veg stalls. Fish market:- big fish, small fish, dust and dirt, trucks, horse
and carts, big women in big bright clothes laughing, a few kids begging. Pure
Africa everywhere. A kilo of onions and a few avocodos uses up the last money.
Back on board quick tidy, engine on, now muddy chain and anchor up. A moment
into the wind and the main's up, engine off. Nice to sail out of a place. SE
out of the anchorage for a mile or so then gybe round southern end of Goree
island. One time slave market, how many took their last glimpse of Africa from
here? To horrible to think about, back to today. Sunny, warm, wind backs a fraction
as I clear the headland. Clicky click on the aries windvane and a few cranks
on the jib sheet, main in a tad and it's time to settle into the passage and
watch Dakar dissappear into the haze astern.
13/3/09
15.00 Wind died. for an hour then back again. But still light. Averaging
about 5kts, 300deg. Pointing as high as poss cos weather forecast is for winds
to lighten even more and back round to about 330. If I don't get a bit of north
in while I can then I'll miss Cape Verde altogether or have to motorsail upwind.
That's dull.
21.00 Wind backed a touch, now west of north. Almost caught a fish but
fishy got away to fight another day. Pity, fresh fish would be a nice treat.
Sailing slow but quite tranquil. Moon hasn't risen yet so pitch black outside.
Lots of phosphoressence here, explosions of eerie light in the wake, balls of
light for a split second, some about 4' diameter underwater. Spookey first time
I saw them.
14/3/09
12.00 Slow but steady. Wind over the deck about 10kts, boat speed around
4.5kts. Can't complain really. In the right direction. Slowly loosing the northing
gained yesterday. Might end up motorsailing tomorrow to point high enough for
Praia. No traffic, empty ocean. Like it better that way. Cloudy at the moment,
water temp slowly rising, 21deg now instaed of 18 in Dakar. Quite a few flying
fish, none landed on deck yet so no fresh fish brekky for skipper. Otherwise
a few storm petrols and that's about it. Empty ocean. No dolphins yet.
15/3/09
07.00 Alarm wakes me as a ship passes ahead. Heading towards Brazil at 2kts
so engine on. Fast tickover just to point a bit higher. Looks like another night
entry. Looks easy and at least here there shouldn't be much if any traffic.
If it looks dodgy I'll heave to and wait for sunrise.
22.00 Dropped anchor near fishing quay at 21.00. Tired now! Can't see
any other yachts, might be just me here. Delights of finding where to check
in tomorrow morning. First unbroken sleep.....
20\03\09
20.00 Beautiful wind! Left Praia at 5pm, sailing in convoy for the first
time. Myself, Douglas and Isabell on Christine and Joey on Primera Vida. Bound
for Brazil. 15kts wind dead astern and it´s great to be sailing in decent
wind straight away. Rolling bad though, hopefully that will calm down a bit
once we´re further away from the islands. Joey´s caught a fish already
so I´m jealous.
22/03/09
16.55 11deg 12'N , 25deg 19'W
Wind dead astern, about 16kts. Our 3 little specks on the ocean are all with
a mile or so of each other. 256 miles so far. Sailing in convoy is rather nice,
I´m glad I bumped into these guys in Praia. We speak now and again on
vhf, somehow the ocean seems a little less vast than when completely on your
own. It´s still vast though. 1250 miles to go and the equator to cross.
Temperature is nice, about 24deg with water temp the same. Very little life,
saw a few dolphins earlier surfing down the front of waves in formation. They
didn´t hang around for long though. Some storm petrols as well. No fish.
I still have some (rather tough) meat from Praia then it´s tinned tuna,
corned beef or whatever else there is in the locker. Plenty onions, tomatoes
and spuds so I won´t go hungry for a while yet. Fresh fish would be nice
though. The bigger waves must be about 16', nothing major but enough to send
the boat into a rolling fit every few minutes then it goes quiet again. I'm
settled in already, night time make sure that I'm clear of the other guys but
still close enough to see a masthead light then sleep an hour at a time. Alarm
goes off, I have a look around, alter course a touch if needed then back to
sleep within a couple of minutes. Not so bad really. Wedged in between the leecloth
and the back of the bunk to try and not get tossed about too much when the boat
decides to go for a roll.
23/03/09
18.00 9deg 31n , 26deg 06w
Its music time here in midatlantic. On VHF. You would get lynched for doing
this in UK but we´re midatlantic and there are no rules here cos there
are no people. Hold the mic next to speaker and press the button. I started
off with some Bohemian Rhapsody and Beatles and Joey has broadcast Girl from
Ipanima. How appropriate. Other than that, grib file looks good for next few
days, might even get to sail across equator rather than motor but that´s
maybe wishful thinking. Right now the wind is NE and we´re going SW so
perfecto. Time for me to run engine for half hour just to give batteries final
top up, solar panels just Aren´t quite enough. And think about a spot
of dinner, and tonight lets listen to scissor sisters. LOUD. Who´s gonna
complain about the noise?
24/03/09
08.30 8deg 27´N, 26deg 35´W
Another day dawns. Getting hotter now, more humid. Air temp 24 deg, water temp
27deg. Wind still dead astern about 12kts. It veers and backs a little but is
pretty consistent in velocity and direction. Nice wind. Dougy is about a mile
or so to my starboard and Joey about mile and half behind him this morning.
We´ll bunch up some more during the day then slowly spread out through
the night. Seems like I´ve been doing this forever already. Lets see,
Tuesday today and we left last friday so only 4 days gone. A lot more days to
go.
25/03/09
07.30 6deg43N, 27deg27W Another uneventful night. No ships, just more perfect
wind dead astern. Missed a big fish yesterday, weeeeeeezzzzzz went the reel
but the line got caught as I picked up the rod and snapped. Shame, felt like
a goodun. Just missed anotherone a few minutes ago, got off the hook before
I got it back to the boat. Fish are definitely winning this time round. Apart
from Joey just after leaving Praia none of us have caught any. 6 degrees to
the equator, must think of some ritual to appease Neptune. Just spoke to Joey
on VHF, Spanlish, half Spanish half English. He sounds happy. Another singlehander
but with a dog for company.
16.00 Another fish!! That´s 2 in about an hour. Fresh fish for tea tonight.
2 nice sized Dorado or mahi mahi. I might brag on VHF and give one away as obviously
I am the fisher king and will catch as many as I want whenever I want for ever
more. Probably. About 600 miles gone with another 900 to go.
27/03/09
04.30 3deg 36N, 28deg 58w. Ship just passed about 2 miles in front. See
about 1 ship a day, maybe less. Hot. 26deg air temp and sea 29deg. Sticky. Still
sailing good, beautiful wind from astern. About 240 mile to equator. Wind has
to leave soon, itcz looks south of equator on latest grib file. Not lookin forward
to motoring after such a good sail. Over halfway there now, Brazil waiting.
Time a bit meaningless out here, utc (gmt) is 04.36 but boat time doesn´t
really exist. I eat when hungry, sleep when it´s dark. Getting up every
hour for a look around or when the ais alarm goes off. Otherwise time is a bit
meaningless.
16.15. South of the sun! The sun´s declination is now 2deg50 north and
GPS reads position of 2deg 49.2N. South of the sun, cool. Equator next. Wind
still great, last night went round slightly west so I got pushed east and pulled
quite far in front of the rest of the fleet. Running under just furled genoa
as they catch up. No fishys for anyone today. Still got a whole Dorado in the
fridge, delicious just grilled with a bit of butter. Not much wildlife, quite
a lot of flying fish, few storm petrols and that´s about it.
19.30 1 week gone. Over half way there. 1 week in bare feet wearing just a pair
of shorts or nothing at all, without mobile phone, email or any connection with
rest of the world. Rather nice once you get used to it.
Feeling good today, felt a bit off colour yesterday, maybe from some cheap Cape
Verde wine. It´s gone over the side to the murky depths just in case.
Dry boat now. I´ve just been on deck watching the black nightime sea listening
to David Gilmour and generally feeling rather good about life, should have wind
tomorrow then maybe the next day it slowly fades and the itcz makes it´s
presence felt. For non sailors - itcz, inter tropical convergance zone, or doldrums
where the weather systems of the north and the south meet. Known for lack of
wind and squally conditions. Apparently, I haven´t been there yet. Will
find out in a few days, seems to lie just south of the equator at the moment.
28/03/09
21.45 00deg 44´N 30deg 17´W. I could sail forever like this.
45 miles to the equator and still the breeze pushes us south. I thought it had
finally faded out earlier but back it came and south we sail slowly through
the night at about 4.5kts. Should pass the equator tomorrow morning. Caught
a flying fish just before sunset, about a foot long. That´ll do for lunch
tomorrow and still have half a dorado in the fridge. Douglas lost a big one
earlier, straighten out the hooks on the lure somust have been a monster and
Joey pulled in half his lure, the other half taken by a shark. 308 miles to
Fernando De Naronha. A tiny group of islands belonging to Brazil where its possible
to anchor, but costs something like $100 to go ashore. We might anchor there
for a night and have a meal on one of the boats. Would be nice, I only really
know these guys on the vhf despite having crossed over half an ocean with them,
and we all have diferent destinations in Brazil.
Quite hot and sticky, buckets of sea water over the head in the cockpit help.
There was a small squall went over just after sunset which cooled things off
for a moment and cleaned the boat a little. Might get a few more of those in
the coming days as we pass throught the itcz. First time I´ve seen rain
for a long time.
29/03/09
22.00 0deg 19´S 30deg38´W. In the southern hemesphere! Crossed
this morning. Feels, well, the same really but the gps has an S instead
of a N next to the latitude. But no. it does feel pretty cool. Firmly in doldrums
now, not a breath of wind. Dougies starter motor blew earlier so he´s
engineless, Joey and I will hang around with him and see him safely into Natal.
Which means tonight it´s oh so quiet with 3 boats floating peacefully
in the middle of the atlantic waiting for some wind to push them on their way.
I gave up with the slatting sails a little while ago and motored over to join
Joey and Douglas. Dropping the main sail in the pitch black moonless dark with
ábsolutely nothing on apart from a head torch and Steely Dan on the hifi.
1000 miles from Africa and 500 from south america. I had a wave of contentment,
fridge full of fish (caught a nice big tuna earlier), a dry boat and some friends
to speak to on vhf. What more could anyone ask for? OK, maybe a little wind
from the east tomorrow would finish it off nicely.
31/03/09
19.45 1deg 28´S, 31deg 17´W. Hot and slow. Averaged about
2.5kts today. No wind in the morning, that´s just a little bit horrible.
Boat rolls about in the swell and sails slat from side to side driving you nuts.
I dropped the main after a while as it was driving me a bit close to the edge.
Slight breeze appeared about lunch time and we continued inching south. Please
let the south atlantic trades be found tomorrow!!
1/4/09
06.15 2deg 01´S, 31deg 31´W. Wind, lovely wind. Picked up a
little last night, had a good run overnight. Died off just now but thats probably
because a squall went over, they do their own thing when it comes to wind. Water
temp 29.5deg - that´s hot! Air temp 26deg. 323 miles to Natal!
19.20. Wind still fickle as ever. Some squalls this afternoon scared it away
for a few hours but it´s back, light south easterly. Speed 3kts but pretty
much in the right direction. Less than 100 miles to Fernando De Noronha, a archipelago
200 miles of the coast of Brazil. We may stop off there but costs loads to go
ashore so will be to anchor only. Dougy is missing his engine in these light
airs I think and will be a lot happier when safely in Natal.
3/04/09
11.45 3deg 55S, 32deg 40W. This is more like it, I feel GREAT! Hove to 10
miles off Fernando De Noronha last night after many frustrating hours spent
slowly clawing south through the doldrums. Back in the trades now, little fluffly
coulds above and gentle breeze on the beam. Natal here we come. The archepelego
of Fernando De Noronha looked inviting but another time maybe. Right now Brazil
calls. All 3 boats sailing close, happy in the wind again.
4/04/09
20.30 5deg 09´S 34deg 23´W. Slow hot day. Wind died this afternoon
to near zero, hot hot hot. But now absolutely beautiful. Light breeze on the
beam and sailing through the moonlight at about 4kts. I was just sitting in
the cockpit with eyes shut just listening, boat almost completely silent, tiny
creak of a block now and again or a gentle little flap of a sail and the constant
chuckle of the sea going past the hull. So calm we could be on a lake somewhere.
But no, Altantic it is, big and beautiful. Landfall tomorrow, can´t help
thinking a few more days out here would be nice, seems such an intrusion going
back to land after the simplicity of life out here. One day blends into the
next, yesterday an age ago and tomorrow unimportant, just living today.
06/04/09
Brazil!!!! Wind not playing yesterday morning so I towed all 30 tonnes of Douglas
boat for 12 hours into Natal. Bit stressy at the end getting past the breakwaters
into the river against the tide, almost stationary more than once but we got
in and anchored up and drank some beers. Then slept the sleep of the dead. And
just now we all checked into the country. Not as you may expect in a dingy office
with some scary bloke in a uniform with a gun on his hip but sitting next to
the pool at the yacht club with a very pleasant chap from policia national in
a polo shirt. Sharing jokes watching a beautiful sunset. STAMP. Welcome to Brazil.
Thanks, think i might like it here.