FINNROSE 9.00 038:40:80N 028:12:17W THURS 18/07/13
Finnrose
Sat 20 Jul 2013 05:41
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Tuesday 16 Horta on Faial
We got up at 6.30am, moved Finnrose from alongside the old island ferry to a marina berth and helped Liz to get a taxi to the airport. The harbour customs office did not start until 9am so she had not officially entered Horta and was advised to return to the marina to clear in. The harbour authorities, who were now all in their offices, said "never mind" and she returned to the airport where she cleared out again. With too much cloud her plane could not land as the Azores airports do not have instrument systems for landing in cloud and the islands make their own cloud much of the time... An exchange of texts meant we had looked up at the largest hotel saying "Liz will be having lunch up there" and sure enough the flight passengers were all bussed in for lunch and she walked down to say hello, tidy up the hurriedly drawn Finnrose logo on the quayside, and check how well unsupervised men were looking after the boat. The 6.35pm plane did take off so after a long day of generator maintenance and other small jobs between longer periods sat around chatting, we went to the Bar Sport, drank large beers and ate their food. Wednesday 17 From Faial to Sao Jorge We had given 10am as our departure time when we were charged for only one night, tying up to a ferry after dark not regarded as a berth. It was pleasant to get back to more relaxed and efficient European islands after being charged entry fees to every Caribbean island and meeting people imprisoned for staying at anchor too long before paying up. We got out and ran down the channel between Pico and Faial but then the wind had not read the forecast as it came ahead and the crew enjoyed beating into it. The skipper went to sleep again. We slipped quietly into Velas on Sao Jorge, but were immediately spotted by the harbourmaster. All the berths were full so he asked us to raft up alongside a German yacht who were perhaps a little put out and retaliated by leaving at 7.30 this morning so we had to get up. We had only had a couple of tiny little beers in the cafe we found. Thursday 18 July Velas on Sao Jorge........ Another most amiable chat with the harbourmaster: A lengthy description of all the places we should visit followed by: "Pay? No - we will sort that out tomorrow." So we hired a car and visited most of his suggested places - dramatic descents from the high central spine to tiny harbours, viewpoints with cafes and the only coffee growing area in Europe (50 to 100 kg/year) complete with a tiny coffee shop to taste the result. |