South to The Algarve
Rachel of London
Andi Healey (Skipper)
Sat 7 May 2011 18:10
We left Bayona on Wednesday morning 13th April, after day spent trying to
get hold of a Spanish Raymarine engineer. A creature we now believe is
related to dragons, unicorns and mermaids! A great mornings sailing followed
by about 20 pole and sail changes until we felt we had the right set-up. At
least we got some practise in! More dolphins and Tony’s superb corned beef
hash for lunch. (The boat is now sitting a little lower in the water and
Mike has blown his slimmer of the year award!) Luckily, Paul appears to be
the worst tuna fisherman in Christendom, as nobody could face much for
dinner, so tinned tuna to the rescue.
The wind dropped overnight and the combination of engine and swell made for
not much sleep and lots of tired, grumpy sailors. The variable winds
continued all the way to Vilamoura, but at least the sun was out!
Monday 18th saw us tracking back to Lagos to try and get the autohelm fixed.
Very windy and very rough and Adam, Mike and Paul had gone home, so just the
two of us. We had to stand off the harbour entrance for about an hour
waiting for the tide to rise so we would have enough water to get over the
bar. When we did eventually enter we surfed in on our “£4 million surfboard”
to cheers, mobile phone video recording and the news that the maritime
police had just closed the harbour as entry was too dangerous! Oops! It
wasn’t that bad (or the bits I saw when I had my eyes open weren’t!)
13 days later and our autohelm was fixed, a depressing tale of woe that is
hopefully now all in the past.
It’s now Saturday evening (7th May) and I’m just waiting for Tony and a
couple of friends, we’re all shipshape and ready to go. The plan is,
Gibraltar for a day to stock up on all the things that are cheap in
Gibraltar (fuel and fags!!) then Cartagena for an overnighter, then off East
to Sicily, Malta, Greece, Turkey and wherever else the mood and the winds
take us.
Catch up soon!
