33:03.67N 16:19.19W

All was looking good for our planned departure on the morning of Monday 11^th September. Very light winds to start with but building later and all from a good direction. We had planned to sail in convoy with Galatea and Northern Lights II until we were all beyond “orca alley” and into the relative safety of the shipping lanes to the east of the Cape St. Vincent TSS.

Then the last-minute gremlins started to appear.  Infinity and Northern Lights had satellite comms issues and Galatea was struggling to get alongside the fuel berth.  By 10am both comms issues were resolved and Andrew had given up on fuel, so off we went!  Later that afternoon a sailing breeze materialised and Northern Lights split to head further east for the Canaries.  The breeze died for a while the next day and the engines went back on but it wasn’t too long before we were sailing again.  A white sail reach on starboard tack all the way to Madeira.  Great opportunity to try out the reacher (sail) we borrowed from Graham.  It fills a little gap in our wardrobe when the wind is light and on the beam.  Worked really well!  Lovely sailing except for a couple of squalls on Wednesday night when the wind peaked at 27kts.  The rest of the time, the sun came out and the water turned into the beautiful hue of the oceans.

A small pod of whales was sighted on Tuesday and we were relieved they weren’t killer whales!  Giles was somewhat alarmed when sitting at the helm on Wednesday night and felt a thump in the middle of his back, followed by a drumming noise.  What had broken?  Fortunately it turned out to be a flying fish!  Not so fortunate for the flying fish though, as it wedged itself into an inaccessible gap and gasped its last breath.  Josh found another boarder on the deck one morning.  A tiny squid had somehow leapt out of the water and landed on the leeward side deck. There were plenty of dolphins to accompany us again but this time we were also able to enjoy their night-time display as they were illuminated by phosphorescence.

Catering of course was excellent.  Scrummy nosh despite a galley which was rolling violently and unpredictably.  All went well until Giles started to pour three G&Ts for the 6pm sundowner.  The first batch departed from the “safety” of the cut-out in the table in a particularly violent roll and gin, lemon and ice ended up on the floor.  As we had no more ice cubes, the second batch had a certain fluffiness to it but was nonetheless devoured enthusiastically.  Lessons learned.

We arrived at Porto Santo at 13:53 on Thursday 14^th, just 7 minutes earlier than Giles’ guess, winning him the Bestimate prize.  Of course, this might have had something to do with Giles deciding to shorten sail on Thursday morning “to let Galatea catch up”!  The harbour was fill but we both anchored just outside on a lovely sandy beach.  Josh was in the clear, warm water just after the anchor hit the bottom and dived to check the anchors were holding.  Barren landscape but delightful sheltered anchorage.  Photo below of Infinity on the right and Galatea on the left.