Christmas in Rubicón, Lanzarote

Stargazer
Andy & Jo
Sat 31 Dec 2022 14:42

Christmas in Rubicón, Lanzarote

Yes, we thought we’d have been heading for (or in) the Cape Verdes by now. So what’s happened? Maybe a little laziness as Lanzarote is a nice place to be, but more so it’s been waiting for ‘proper’ winds. The lows coming over from the States have been barrelling across towards Portugal and many have been centred off Madeira, or even just off the Canaries. Whilst this situation isn’t wholly unusual, the frequency of it seems to be. We’re now in a catch 22 situation in that we’ve waited so long for some decent wind that we refuse to leave until we get it J

That all said, we had a lovely Christmas on board with just the two of us, including Christmas lights and a small (albeit very small) tree. Stargazer was dressed overall for the day, as were another few boats. At least they were until the wind picked up to a near gale when we all got the flags down again in short order. We’d previously stocked up on loads of food goodies which meant a car hire trip to Arrecife. We found a Lidl – the mate was overjoyed! I’ll leave it to her to tell you all about car hire – and Lidl, of course…

Christmas Eve drinks at the beach bar

Stargazer ready for Christmas

Recently, the wind has been relentless and coming from the east, everything is covered in a layer of Saharan sand. As I write, the mate is repairing a tattered club burgee (also covered in sand). Still the repair appears to be going well, so I’ll leave her to it for now.

Over the last couple of weeks we made friends with an English chap and an Aussie on a nice Oyster 485. Sadly, they decided to head off just before Christmas (I was amazed, looking at the forecast). I did get a text saying that they were suffering squall after squall and the mate tracks their position daily, where it seems they’ve had near six metres of swell. One can only hope they are OK and needless to say, those are the conditions we seek to avoid.

On-board Stargazer, boat jobs have continued and we’ve even been able to safely locate an additional 40 litres of diesel in the starboard deck locker. The mate wasn’t happy at first, but when I pointed out the distances involved to the Cape Verdes and onward from there, she saw reason in that we could motor for an additional two days if we needed to with all this ‘stash’ onboard.

Despite the wind, Playa Dorada has been relatively sheltered and really quite warm and sunny. We went swimming, in the sea, on Christmas day – and it wasn’t cold - imagine that! Speaking of Christmas day, we sent out a lot of e-cards to our friends and family. The main ‘chosen’ card was the first free one I came across and we know it was a bit naff, so apologies for the card to all who got one – always remember though, it’s the thought that counts J

We’ll almost certainly be in Lanzarote for New Year, although the gribs are suggesting more favourable conditions for heading to Cape Verde in early to mid-January. A main unknown is whatever will result from the freezing weather in the States. When cold weather hits the warm water of the Gulf Stream off the Eastern seaboard it almost always causes low pressure systems, although the gribs are suggesting, at this stage, no real issues for our passage. We’ll keep our eye on things…

In the meantime, the mate has triumphantly handed me a rather well repaired club burgee and insisted I re-hoist it. Must dash J

Provisioning options around Rubicón and Playa Blanca are a little limited as the area is serviced by ‘tourist supermarkets’. So as we were going to be here for a rather extended period over the festive season we decided to treat ourselves to a day’s car hire and head to the bright lights of Arrecife. Having not had my own car since poor Fred went to the scrap yard early last year, this was a real excitement! Imagine my delight when our car pulled up and it was not only pretty sporty, but also bright orange. We set off armed with a tourist map of the island (see previous blog posts re: Skip’s concern about my navigation skills!) and very soon found ourselves heading over a winding mountain pass instead of along the main road. Luckily Skip grew up tearing around the Peak District hills so was much happier in the driving seat than I was in the passenger seat! We arrived safely in Arrecife (after following a police car along a probable bus lane) and enjoyed a coffee in the sunshine. Previous research (I did say I was excited) revealed a large Lidl and a large Mercadona next to each other in Playa Honda so (after poking around a couple of chandleries which didn’t have what we wanted) we pointed our little tangerine dream towards what turned out to be the commercial centre of the island. I don’t know if it was because it was a couple of days before Christmas, or whether it was just an ordinary lunchtime, but the traffic was mayhem. Luckily inside Lidl was relatively calm in comparison and angels were singing as we cruised around the aisles amazed at the choice of goods on offer! After what seemed like (and probably was) hours we pushed our groaning trolley (including plenty of Christmas Favorina things) through the checkout, where the till op wished us ‘Feliz Fiestas’ J After a slightly (but not by much) quicker visit to the Mercadona the car was full and we were shattered. All that was left on the list was a visit to the ferreteria (hardware shop) on the outskirts of Playa Blanca. Skip was delighted to find some affordable silicone grease (not the €36 in the chandlers at the marina!) so we headed back to the marina rather content after our long day out.

The mate at the wheel – it was more orange than it looks!

The weather on Christmas day was lovely and the beach was busy with people wearing santa hats, reindeer antlers and red and white swimsuits, enjoying fizz in the sun. On Boxing Day the wind started to pick up and did blow pretty relentlessly from the east for a few days, bringing with it what seemed like a very large part of the Sahara desert. Stargazer has now been hosed off and no longer has her red veil. The warmth of the sun has returned and Lanzarote seems back to normal ready for the New Year celebrations.

The weather is looking promising (at long last) for our passage to Cape Verde early in the New Year – hoorah!

Wishing you all a very Happy New Year and a great start to 2023.

Skip with his festive friend J

Addendum: I’m writing this at 0910 on 29 December 2022 and the wind is still howling. The mate is not pleased (she wanted to hose all the sand off deck etc), worse still – our friends (the English chap and the Aussie) have not ‘pinged’ their position since 1430 yesterday but were doing so religiously every hour prior to that. As they were in up to 6m swells (too much for me) we are a bit worried. The mate will check throughout the day if they are ‘pinging’ again; I’m sure it’s comms issues (their boat was big and well-found) like maybe the aerial blowing off or something similar. Even so, it concentrates the mind somewhat… So much so that the mate and are discussing when the marina office is open over the New Year period – fully expecting to go for another extension of stay until the wind well and truly calms down…

Update to addendum (!): our friends started pinging again and are now making good progress towards Cape Verde. They suffered a broken autopilot and then a broken spinnaker pole in a 60kt squall so are now hand steering. We hope to catch up with them in Cape Verde.