Punta Gallinas 12.25N72.17W
Salsa af Stavsnas
Ellinor Ristoff Staffan Ehde
Tue 26 Feb 2013 02:53
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Again, one of those moments when there is time to
write and reflect.There is a full moon above, looks like cheese according to
Ellinor.
We are sailing along the Columbian coast, the rock
and roll has calmed down. It has been a wild rollercoaster for 24 hours, a great
current and big waves have moved us along at speed from 8 to 10 knots, with very
little sail, most of the time a poled out genua and a bit of headsail to
stabilize the rolling. Everybody on board is in good spirits only the fishing
has been a disaster.
We lost four baits yesterday because the fishes are
simply to big for us. Now the fishing pole is just sitting there with an empty
line moving in the wind with no weight.
We have experienced a new type of sailing with
Sunrise, an american boat from Vermount. A lovely family that are very easy get
along with. We took off from Bonair at the same time and by Curacao they decided
to keep on instead of stopping there. So we have kept radiocontact and sailing
along wich has felt safe and easier on the descition making. We have discussed
tactics on radio along with the weather forecasts.A good thing nowadays is that
you can call a ship with their MMSI number and have private call on VHF. That
feels also better when you are passing the Venezualan coast for instance, where
you have no intention of giving away more information than
necessary.
Last night we had some contact and it was a busy
night for those on watch! The traffic outside Aruba was the worse I have seen
since the English channel. And on top of that they are "fishing around" for oil
with a seismographic cable with the length of 5 nM. You can imagine how a thing
like that affects the traffic for everybody. The Norwegian ship doing this was
very friendly and kept track of everybody but still, we where forced to go close
to the coast of Aruba on our leward side, wich I do not like, I always want
searoom to coast when the wind is hawling at 30 knots towards the coast. We had
to sail with the jib on half wind that also meant sidewaves of great
magnitude, but I cannot believe how well protected you are in this boat.The
water is washing around on deck but the cockpit is dry!
Maybe you can notice that there is less written on
the blogg days just before leaving an anchor.
The amount of work to get Circus Salsa going is
astonishing. Well, apart from spending half a day biking to the airport in
Bonair to get stamps in the passports and then going to Customs to get a zarpe
etc We have a lot out, bicycles have to be packed away. All snorkeling gear and
I dont know what has to be cleaned and stowed.. Food has to be bought and
cleaned (no cockroaches so far....) Good Bye, fare wells have to be greeted. The
outboard has to come out (probably it is why it is called so) of the water and
fastened aft (oh yes how many things can you have back there? Well the good
thing is that you can hardly see the waves coming at you). The dinghy has to
come out and all air too. And then we fold it, and fold it again until it cannot
be folded smaller than it was unfolded. So we pretend it is small and get it in
a soft bag, sort of... and tie it to the deck in the aft....
That was the small part of the job to get ship
shape, the big one is to stow all the toys and guitars so the boat can roll
without us going bananas. The trick is to make sure you cannot get a razor blade
between the bottles for instance, or you will have a hell of clonck and clink,
and clonck and clinck, and then a cabosh to starboars and a booom on port, clink
and booom, kabush, shrooonk, clink, kabosh, rooooooolboom!, rooooollknock,
kabonk
You get the picture?
So at anchor in lovely Bonair it takes only
fourteen days to get used to a "flat" life, and then it is time stow away. And
Ellinor gets friction mats everywhere so you can leave at least an empty plate
and find it where you left it. We usually do not have friction mats on the
plates so the food comes off. So we have given up the plates out at sea and eat
in Bowls. Bowls do not care about friction mats, because they roll alltogether.
So when you get your Bowl, one of your hands is busy holding it. When you get
your eating tool, then you cannot hold on for yourselfe, so then you fall around
and as far as we know there are no friction clothes for boat crew.
Oh yes I was writing about leaving, then we have a
check list, engine oil,water etc CHECK!
Fuel Water has to be filled up CHECK Riggcheck
CHECK Grab bag safety equipment CHECK! All vents and portholes closed CHECK
Bildgepumps, gas alarm, fire alarm function CHECK Charts for coming waters,
pilots CHECK Weatherfiles downloaded and DP informed on coming route
CHECK! and so on it goes.
Then you let her go, you leave harbour and you are
on your own and your own responsibility
There is an article where we are seen in the latest
issue of Båtliv, I think you can get it on pdf on their website.
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