Trip Update - 16th November 2008 Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, Canaries
Position: 28:07:74N
15:25:56W Well, we managed to tear ourselves
away from Lanzarote, and left there on 5th November at 1540 in the
afternoon. It is a 95M sail to Gran
Canaria, so we decided to do this as a night passage. Winds were reasonably strong as we left
the shelter of Lanzarote, but in the few hours before darkness, we tried sailing
with twin jibs hoisted on the 2-groove furler. It worked, and was a useful exercise in
setting up the two poles and all the sheets & guys, but it was quite rolly
with a cross-sea. We decided, given
that at that point the wind wasn’t right behind us, to revert to the main and
genoa combination for the night.
Unfortunately, Sarah and Jemima were
both quite sick. I think it is a
mix of the wrong type of seasick pills, and hormones (we ran out of the seasick
pills that worked, French ones called “Mercalm”, on the way over from We arrived off After a quick trip over to fill the
tanks with fuel, we went back into our space and settled in. This is where we will be for two & a
half weeks – the longest we’ve stopped anywhere. We’re surrounded by large boats – the
average size on this pontoon is about 45ft, so we are dwarfed! This is the family pontoon – all the
boats with kids are put on the same pontoon which is really nice, and very
quickly we met various families, mainly Dutch, Norwegian and German. A couple of interesting stats:
I am amazed by all three
stats. The next few days were,
unfortunately, not much fun. With
retrospect, we were very tired from a night with no sleep, and this left us a
bit vulnerable to finding it all a little trying. The catalysts were firstly being told by
the man who does Gas refills that our bottles couldn’t be filled as they were
the wrong type, and secondly finding that we had used more water than we thought
possible, and consequently taking the boat to pieces to check if there was a
leak. The difficult time was
compounded by hiring a car to go to the Gas plant and finding them shut for the
day, and draining the water tanks to find that the whole marina had had it’s
water shut off for the day. I was
not best pleased. Sarah did a sterling job of keeping
the girls out of the way whilst I was fixing the water tank and servicing the
engine, and on Sunday she took them to an Anglican church service where they had
a lovely time. The girls outside church – bit
different to St Nic’s! Time, money and a lot of effort
solves most issues, and we eventually got our bottles refilled at the central
gas plant. On the water front, I
think we just didn’t fill the tank right to the brim when we left
Lanzarote. We might have had a very
slight leak but I bought & fitted a new tank just in case, so now they are
all new and OK.
Emilia being a
figurehead Pontoon 17 However the ARC is what we came here
for, so it was great to meet the other families. Interestingly, there are only 3 or so
boats – much less than 50% - who are taking their kids across the pond on board,
rather than flying. It has been a
common sight to see children being passed from boat to boat to go and play with
their new friends. We have a lovely
Norwegian boat next to us and Jemima’s new friend is Inkaborg, a lovely little
girl who has taken a shine to Jemima’s dolls house. Jemima reading in the
forecabin Someone organized a pontoon party on
the Friday night, and it was a great night, with only one child falling in. During the evening, “Saefthinge” and
“Samba” arrived so we met them with hugs all round – so lovely to see friends
again! The children at the pontoon
party There is a sandy beach next to the
marina which, although it overlooks the port and there are 30-40 “NARC”
(Non-ARC) yachts anchored off, is pleasant enough. One of the other boats organized a
picnic on the beach one day, so all the kids played in and around the water, or
up at the playground.
A day at the
beach I met Sally, who is our fourth
crewmember. She has sailed down
from the Part of the pre-start qualifications
that you have to go through is the safety check which appears to have some
unjustified infamy. We passed with
only one issue, which was quickly sorted (our “steamer scarer” torch was
rechargeable rather than plug-in – which might not give enough light time if
tracking a man overboard). We now have a DIN plug in the cockpit, which will
also be useful for those mid-passage DVD-in-the-cockpit requests from the
kids. The ARC organizers set up a
wonderful family supper at the nearby Club Varadero, and we had a fantastic
barbeque with lots of wine and the ARC staff were really good at entertaining
the kids. Tom’s chimpanzee
impression has probably left a lasting mark on Emilia! In general, the ARC organization and
staff have been extremely good and very professional, more so than I was
anticipating. There have also been
some excellent lectures on topics such as weather & routing, emergencies,
provisioning etc which Sally & I have been to. Tired
girls Everyone is focused on clearing
through their job lists and starting to provision for the big trip, and after
creating an uber-spreadsheet which was passed between Pam and I several times,
we had a shopping list for provisioning Nutmeg. We’ve divided the provisioning into dry
goods and fresh goods, and Sally & I spent about four hours in El Corte
Ingles doing the initial dry-goods shop.
Four trolleys and €680 later, we staggered out! It’s all being delivered on Monday; I
hope we can find space to fit it all onboard. Sarah spent a lot of the week
changing Nutmeg from a family boat into an ocean-going ship for a crew of four
adults. No small task – it is akin
to moving house as you have to go through everything and sort it, bag it and
stow it. We’ve now got empty
lockers throughout the saloon, ready for the provisions to
arrive. Alas, the time I had been dreading
arrived, and I took Sarah and the girls to the airport yesterday, for them to
fly home to the My wonderful
girls When you think of what we have
achieved, I am so proud of my daughters and my wife. Despite seasickness which has never gone
away, and despite the challenges of looking after a young family in a very small
environment, we have sailed without assistance, all the way from the
The proud crew of Nutmeg, having
sailed all the way from the UK to the Canaries However, as one chapter ends, a new
one begins, and whilst dropping the girls off I picked up Rob Neild, who
together with his wife Pam (who is arriving tonight) will make up the crew. We’ve now got a week to finish the jobs,
provision the boat, and mentally prepare ourselves for 3 weeks at sea in a small
boat. Rob and I spent today
whipping through the job list – it is incredible how much faster you can work
when there are two of you and no small children! Well here I am, a week away from
starting the Transat; a week away from being able to fulfil a lifelong
ambition. I don’t know if Emilia was trying to
say something meaningful here |