Monday Dec. 12^th

The first day in Tobago was mostly taken by the administrative things. I went over to customs to find out I first had to go to immigration... :-o At immigration I had to fill in all the forms but nonetheless the rest of the crew had to come over too to present themselves. Then I learned that I hed to write a letter to the chief immigration officer to ask permission to add Clare and Kitty to the crew list, also Jur has to present his hotel booking in order to get him off the crew list....

but first I had to go back to customs to get clearance to go ashore... There they told me I can't sail to the North of the Island without getting clearance first and of course I have to report at Charlotville to get clearance to leave Tobago...

Anyway, after I did all this we went up to King George fort. That was at the top of the mountain ans since it was very hot we had to take a break every 15 minutes and have a drink. At the last stop we had a beer at a Errol's place. We had a nice chat with Errol and when we came down from the foert we had another drink there and asked him for a good place to have dinner. He recommended a restaurant in Plymouth, about 15 minutes by car. He also happened to know this Scotty who would take us there. He would come over soon anyway to have his beer so if we wanted he could call him. So Scotty had his beer and took us to this restaurant. That really was a good place and we had a great dinner. Prices were European but that was okay. Afterwards Scotty picked us up again and joined us for a drink at the bar just 100 meters down the road. The music was good and loud !!

Scareborough is not a very nice place to stay, it's kind of shabby so next day, after we had a traditional Xmas breakfast with all kinds of local dishes at Errol's place, we sailed to Store Bay, some 12 nm further, just round the Southern corner of the Island. That was more like in the brochure... :-) A beautiful bay and beach. Also from there it's a 10 minute walk to the airport where we picked up Clare. The letter I wrote was stamped by immigration and I had to take that to immigration. Clare was already prepared so when they asked her for the letter she could tell them it had actually been delivered. It was a good thing I had gone through all this because she would not have gotten past immigration otherwise. Afterwards we had a drink with the crew from Maja, the yacht we met mid ocean and had just arrived in Store bay too. That had skipped Barbados because of the same letter crap they needed for the wife of the skipper who was flying in on Monday.

Anyway, Sunday we chilled out on the beach. There Franky came along and offered us to take us for a rainforest trip. That was something we already had planned to do when Kitty had arrived, so we booked a tour for Tuesday together with Jur, Elisabeth and her brother who would arrrive an Sunday. Actually, Franky would take us all to immigration first so we could sort out the changes in the crew list so that was very handy.

He also sold us tickets for the step up Sunday School, a kind of tradition where everybody is partying on the street, with life steel bands, food and drinks of course.

Although it was not as crowded as we expected, it was nice and the steel band was very good.

Today we took the dinghy to go to the lagoon, just North of Pigeon Bay. Luckily the outboard still runs. Rutger got capsized the day before when landing on the beach. A wave took him by surprise… Everything was floating is the see and the outboard was upside down. Luckily it wasn't still running so it did start later but obviously it hadn't liked the dipping and ran with a hiccup...

Anyway the lagoon was gorgeous and we had a great time. When we came back at the boat to get ready to pick Kitty up from the airport, she called me to tell me that her flight from Curacao to Trinidad was canceled. Technical problems.... they would try and get another plane but that wouldn't be until tomorrow. Later she send me and sms to tell me there wasn't a flight available form Trinidad to Tobago so it might be she won't be able to get in before Wednesday... :-(

Well anyway, I guess this is Caribbean style too. Too bad she'll miss the rainforest tour tomorrow but she has a good place to stay over with her father.

Scarborough :-)

Thursday Dec. 8th, 22:45 UTC

Arrived and dropped the anchor!!

We didn't make it in daylight, just..  It was one hour after sunset but with the help of the almost full moon and the coastguard vessel TTS Humming Bird stationed in the harbor, we had no problem to find a good spot to drop the anchor, actually only about 2 boat lengths away from the Humming Bird :-)

The last 2 days we had very light winds so we motorsailed to get some decent speed. Except from Wednesday when the wind picked up and we set the gennaker, the one I got from Marc. All our calls for wind were granted at the same time and build up to 30 kts.... I was down in the saloon, plotting my sights when the boat heeled, Rutger could barely hold her. Then Marc took over the helm but he couldn't hold her either. When I came on deck to help dropping the gennaker, it was too late.. so we ripped the storm gennaker too :-( We could get it in though and it can easily be fixed again.

Jur was the first one to spot the contours of Tobago against the clouds. So... finally, after 19 days at sea, there was land again... of course I put on Vangelis and we all felt a bit like Columbus and his crew... :-)

After we dropped the anchor, we launched the dinghy to get ashore and have dinner and another drink to celebrate! Stepping on the pontoon was very weird though... it didn't move!! We all walked like we had  drunk too much. It was very hard to walk straight.

The place was what you expected, lots of people, lots of cars and little 'restaurants' with very loud music. Marc asked a couple that looked like locals what might be a good place to eat, but they were from the US, just arrived with the ferry …. :-o

Anyway, we ended up in the Tobago version of KFC and had fried chicken and fries. That was a good starter but later we had a pizza as well :-) By that time, most of the hectic was over and only a few bars were still open. So we had a rum and coke in a local Karaoke bar and went back to the boat for a good night sleep :-)

Hot, hotter, hottest...

Position: 12°05.974N/55°55.230W, Tuesday Dec. 6th, 15:15 UTC

The rain didn't last too long, the weird clouds were still there for some time but disappeared too eventually. With the rain also the wind left us... it went down to 4 kts, too little for sailing. Two days ago we started the engine to charge the batteries and put it in forward instead of neutral and it still is..

So we're motoring for two days now and that's boring.... We all read, sleep and read some more ….
We're okay on fuel but I don't think we can motor the remaining 300nm.

The grib file I downloaded looks promising for Wednesday though, so hopefully later today or tonight we can sail again. That would be good for our speed too. Right now we're doing no more then 5 kts while sailing our average was over 7 kts!

With no wind it's getting hotter too... a lot. It's now 37°C and since yesterday we have the bimini up.
Otherwise you couldn't be in the cockpit, in the sun it's way too hot!

When the sun sets though it's a spectacular sight. Normally the sky turns red in the West but last two nights, the sky turned red not only in the West but also in the South and even in the East! I've never seen that before. Later when the moon came up, there was this halo, not close around the moon but amazing far from the moon itself. A white circle like a huge wheel with the moon in the middle. Then when the moon set, the sky turned red like a sunset. I've never seen that before either :-)

Anyway, I reckon in two days or so we can drop the anchor.. However, I want to get in with daylight so it might be Friday when we get to Scarborough after all. Then it will be 19 days since we left La Palma, 19 great days :-)

Rain …. ?!

Position: 12°41.525N/51°56.638W, Sunday Dec. 4th, 16:40 UTC

Last night the wind changed... it was due East the whole trip but now it backed to South East – East, all the way to West... So we had to get the pole away for the genoa end ended up on a close reach course by this morning. Also there were a lot of dark clouds, not only in the South but also in the West and East. If you like clouds, the view was spectacular... otherwise it felt weird. On the grib files I downloaded there wasn't anything unusual, except from a not that deep a low just South of us. I guess this is just local and later in the morning the sky did partly clear.

Still, this morning we had our first serious rain since we left Scheveningen. It was actually more than  in the brochure … :-) For the boat it was okay though, rinsing the salt from the lines and the sails and everything... and since I was steering, I had my first fresh water shower since 2 weeks... the others stayed inside and under the spray-hood... They prefer the foredeck salt water shower.. I suppose..

The wind is still West now, but too little to bring us any significant speed, so when we started the motor this morning to charge the batteries, I put it in forward instead of neutral and it still is...

Last night I also discovered that I'm running very low on minutes for my sat phone. I had a 500 minute card which should have been more than enough for the whole trip and back, but the mailasail program I use is crap. It takes at least 2 to 3 tries to get through to check mail and again to send mail, and that takes a lot of minutes. The options were to buy more – 50 – minutes or get a new simcard ….. yeah right, mid Atlantic...  So I got some more minutes but we'll have to cut down on checking and sending emails. We need to get the grib files too :-)

Sending text messages is okay, they cost me no minutes and are free for the sender as well, if you send them via the iridium website. Elisabeth knows ! :-) Calling us is okay too, it's free for me but not for the caller :-o. Keep in mind though that our clock is back another hour today...

So to keep you all up to date, you'll have to do with my weblog-postings for now. In a couple of days, we'll have some decent internet access again, hopefully... to send mails, photos and stuff.

Distance left to go is less the 500nm !

Miles and waves ...

Position: 14°17.939N/46°25.904W, Friday Dec. 2nd , 11:40 UTC

Today we'll clock the 2000nm. and we're 13 days at sea now so we're doing just over 150nm a day.
That would leave us another 5 – 6 days to get to Tobago so next Wednesday or Tuesday we should be very close :-) Saturday Clare and Elisabeth will fly in. Monday Kitty will then come over from Curacao so our timing is very good :-)

Shooting sights every day helps us keeping track on time and dates, otherwise I wouldn't have known … At sea there are just three times... it's getting light so it must be around 6 am, it's getting dark, that means 6 pm and you're starting to get hungry,... lunch time...

Also distance is getting a new dimension.. A trip of over a 100nm used to be a real trip! Crossing the channel is about a 100nm. Now, this feels more like a day sail :-o

Another thing is the constant motion of the boat. 24 hrs a day, non stop, the waves are there. Everything you do has to be synchronized with the motion of the boat. If not, well.... you bump your head, knee or whatever else or you gonna spill whatever you have in your hands... I know that last time I was at sea for 5 or 6 days, I really had to get used to the steady ground again. I actually felt seasick the first few hours. I wonder what it will be like when we get to Tobago. Although..  we will be staying on the boat.... there`re no marinas in Tobago, only anchorages :-)

But, I guess we'll be spending some time ashore too. The Island is very much worthwhile exploring according to the cruising guide and, after 19 days at sea, it will be fun to get to shore again too :-)

Warmer and warmer ...

Position: 14°12.250N/39°53.924W, Wednesday Nov. 30th , 03:45 UTC

Today we crossed the 37½° longitude, meaning I had to set the shipsclock back an hour again :-)

We are not only getting further West everyday, we're getting further South too, and that we really notice. Just North of the 14th parallel, we're in tropical waters now. During the day the temperature gets around 31°C and at night it doesn't really cool off much. It stays about 25°C, which is very nice ;-). The water too is about 25°C so everyday we have a nice and warmish shower on the foredeck, still salt though :-o

When we left the Canaries, I had to put on a sweater and my shoes at night, now a T shirt is more than enough. This night, during my watch, some dark clouds came over and it started raining, not very hard, but enough to get wet... However as, soon as the rain stopped and even before the clouds were gone, the warm wind dried my shirt in no time.

The wind is very steady between 15 and 29 kts and coming just North of East. So, on our course over ground of 260°, it's a dead down wind sail. During the day we have the two genoas goose winged and the mainsail. The two genoas sail like a spinnaker but are more robust and more easy to trim. At night we drop one genoa and pole out the remaining one. That gives us a window of about 30°-35° to sail in. That's works really great. However sometimes the wind picks up a bit more and usually shifts then. Than the waves come from a different angle and that can give a very sportly course to steer. Like last night....  after a while I decided to trip the genoa from the pole and go to a more comfortable beam reach. By that time Marc and Jur also were awake, so we also gibed … it was a really rocky course... :-o. By now, these kind of manoeuvrings are a piece of cake, even at night. The beam reach wasn't that easy to steer too though, until we furled in the genoa a bit.

Today Rutger made an inventory of our remaining food and drink supplies. With about 8 or 9 more days to go we're fine on everything, on bread we're more the fine, with still 18 left :-o

We could have gotten  some more bottled water though, with the water in the tanks we are fine. That is, as long as it stays there... I just went to take a nap before my evening watch when Marc was doing the dishes and then he called me.... there wasn't coming water out of the tap.. ? The water pump was on....  it could be that the starboard tank had gone empty, but all of a sudden no water at all is very weird.

When I checked, it turned out that the hose of the nanometer was loose....  We had turned on the pump for washing the vegetables for dinner. Normally the pump stops when the pressure is on again but when the hose with the nanometer is gone, the pressure never gets there and the pump doesn't stop.... pumping all that was left in the tank into the bilge …. :-(

So we lost about 60 liters... The good news though, is that I have two separate water tanks and that the remaining port tank of about 150 liters is still full. Also I had just cleaned all the filters today, including the one of the bilge pump so pumping the bilge was done in no time :-o

Anyway, we're still fine on everything and if it comes to it, we also have the watermaker :-)

Half way... :-)

Position: 14°27.664N/35°55.519W, Monday Nov. 28th , 16:15 UTC

If the wind stays like this we'll be half way by dinner tonight !!

By then we´ll be 8 full days at sea. That would be about as fast as when Marc did the crossing 5 years ago. Since last night we were following a yacht. That was really nice, we could steer at his stern light :-). Early this morning we overtook her. Mala came from the Cape Verdies and was heading for Barbados. We talked a while over the vhf. She wasn't going that fast, flying only her mainsail but they found it more comfortable that way..

Anyway, we set the other genoa to goose wing with the first genoa. With the mainsail too, she sails more steady and with good speed. We actually have more sail then with the spinnaker but this is more robust and easier to trim. I'm glad I have rigged all these lines and sheets so we can fly whatever sail combination we want :-)

Yesterday we finally caught two dolphin fish. After loosing the fish several times two stayed on the hook. Rutger professionally killed them and put them in the fridge. It was my turn to cook. Because we usually eat in the dark I thought it better to filet them.... otherwise it would have been a spitty meal loosing all the bones... Marc wasn't that excited at first about eating the fish but when it came to it he really liked it, as we all did by the way. I cooked it with onions, spring onions, garlic and mushrooms, served with rice and a fresh cucumber/tomato salad; it was a great meal :-)

Tonight Marc's gonna cook. To celebrate the half way milestone he'll make hutspot :-o Well, with the champagne, I got for the occasion,  it'll be another great meal  :-)