The calm seas lasted for 24 hours before the wind picked up enough to start sailing again. We put the spinnaker up all day and that drove us along at a nice pace with winds of between 11 and 18 knots from behind. We took it down at dusk as a precautionary measure and a good thing too because during the night the wind gusted to 23 knots which would have been a bit out of control! Sailing the following day and night saw us arrive into Porto Santo at around 6am after 3 and a half days at sea.

 

This was Steve's first longish passage and the boredom of it all was something that took a little getting used to. It didn't help that the wildlife was almost non-existant - just a couple of turtles. It would have been nice to see a whale. Mick was with us as well and slipped into the routine quite easily. Mick will be joining us on the passages to Rio and Cape Town at the end of the year.

 

We were in Porto Santo for 2 nights and then sailed the 40 miles from there to Funchal on Madeira. This was a great days sail and once again we got the spinnaker up. Steve and Karyn perfectly executed a 2 pole gybe along the way and also took it down as the wind started gusting to over 20 knots. We arrived in Madeira at around 1800 and luckily found a berth alongside another yacht in the harbour. Funchal is very beautiful and we celebrated Steve's last night with a wonderful dinner (thanks Steve), although his determination for us to see off a full bottle of sweet Madeira wine after the meal left a couple of us the worse for wear the following day.