Photo: Santo Antao
Garry, our crew for the passage to the Caribbean arrived Friday evening, 25th November and Bill, crew for Wind Pony arrived on time the following lunchtime, so it was time to clear out of the Canary Islands and drop the mooring lines, Cape Verde Islands here we come. As we motored out of Santa Cruz marina the town clock chimed midday and we were off on the 830nm passage south. As predicted the winds increased as we headed south down the Tenerife coast, the winds funnel between the Canary Islands, we started off with 10 knots and then had a period of 30 to 35 knots which gradually eased as the day progressed and we cleared Tenerife by nightfall. With Garry aboard giving us an extra person for the watch system, we decided to go with rotating 3hr watches, less formal during the day but not negotiable at night. It worked well, the cooking duties were shared and everyone got enough sleep. It is always eerie sailing along at night in the dark, we had no moon, it is hard to distinguish the horizon from the sky, making it difficult sometimes to decide if the light you are seeing is another boat or a star rising. Without the lume of city lights, the number of stars in the sky is amazing and you never tire of gazing at them. The passage was pleasant, we motored more than we would have liked due to the light winds but as we all said we would rather have that than strong winds from the wrong direction. We did have a couple of days with the gennaker up and reasonable sailing, but also a fair amount of motor sailing. Each night at 19:00 we had a sched on the SSB radio with Scallywag and Wind Pony to keep in touch and share fish stories, which as everyone knows can get exaggerated. We saw lots of dolphins and a few birds but mostly lots of blue water.
Each evening before sundown, Brian walked around the boat and did a check of all shackles and the rig to check for anything that might cause an issue. Before we left Santa Cruz we had put a Walder Boom break on the boat which aims to assist in controlling the main boom in downwind conditions and gybing, Brian was happy with its performance and as we have lots of downwind sailing to do in the next couple of years, he reckons it is a good addition, along with the Iridium Go and Predict Wind Offshore which worked well for emails and weather.
Garry had bought some new fishing lures with him so out went the lines on the second day, surprisingly for us we hooked and landed a Mahi Mahi, the first one for us. It was bright yellow and green when we landed it, but as it died, (after the photos had been taken) it lost its colour and became blue and white. Dinner was sorted, pan fried Mahi Mahi, beautiful. Two days later we put the fishing lines out again and had a double hook up, 2 Mahi Mahi at the same time. We kept one and let the other one go as we didn’t need that much fish, so by 10:00 in the morning, the fishing lines were put away and we had fresh fish in the fridge again.
We sighted the lights of the Cape Verde Islands Thursday night 1st December and gradually closed arriving in Mindelo Harbour, Sao Vincente at 07:45 local time, after 6 nights at sea. We averaged about 143nm days and motored or motor sailed for 100 of the 150 hours, all in all not a bad passage. We anchored in Mindelo and had breakfast then lifted the anchor and went to the fuel dock to fill up. Then it was time to put the dinghy in the water and go to Immigration and Port Police to clear in. We met Lynn, Dick and Bill “Wind Pony” ashore along with Paul, Gloria and Phil “Scallywag”, walked around town, had lunch then returned to the boats, getting together later in the afternoon on Dol for drinks and nibbles. While ashore the guys organised a big game fish day for Saturday, good luck guys the girls are staying ashore. As it transpired the girls did not miss anything as the boys never even got a strike and came home empty handed, oh well no fish for dinner.
Sunday was a chores and maintenance day. Monday everyone with the exception of Paul and Phil “Scallywag”, who stayed to keep an eye on the boats, took the local ferry across to Santo Antao. The ferry took approximately 50 mins, leaving at 08:00 and returning at 17:00. Once off the ferry in Porto Novo we took a taxi van for the day complete with driver. We set off across the island via the mountain road, wow what spectacular scenery, no photograph could do it justice. As we neared the top we stopped to look down into the valley, we were level or above the clouds looking down into what could have been the crater of a volcano that was lush green, with craggy mountain ridges surrounding it, in the distance we could see the ocean. From there we continued up the mountain through very fertile green land with sugar cane and bananas growing, across a ridge with steep fall offs on both sides and down the other side to a town called Ribiera Grande. This was a small town with lots of new development and older buildings on the waterfront. We continued along the coast watching the surf roll in and discussing how this would be a highlight for surfers if it wasn’t for the rocks close to shore and the breaks. From Ribiera Grande we visited Ponta Do Sol, a smaller town and watched locals fishing with bamboo rods in the surf of the harbour. Also in the harbour were lots of small fishing boats, more like large colourful wooden dinghies hauled up on the beach. We stopped for lunch at Paul and then the driver took us up a beautiful gorge with high hills, lots of sugar cane, mango trees and lush green vegetation. We turned around and headed back down to the coast, following the coast, dodging cows walking down the road back to Porto Novo. What struck us was the roads on the island, they were cobbled, and we did not see a tarseal road until mid-afternoon. It was hard to comprehend how long it took to lay the roads over the mountain passes and around the island, we saw guys doing maintenance, laying all the cobble stones by hand, very labour intensive and time consuming. We arrived back at the ferry building in time to catch the 17:00 ferry back to Mindelo harbour.
Mindelo was busier than we had envisaged but not a bad stop. Looking at the weather it looks like the trade winds have filled in and we will probably leave Mindelo Tuesday 6th December, mid-morning and head across the Atlantic 2080nm to the Caribbean. We estimate the crossing will take approximately 12 – 14 days.