Arrival in Cape Verde (11th Nov)

Surfinncrew
Tue 14 Nov 2017 12:14

16.53.163N 24.59.493W

We have landed in Cape Verde! 

 

We all woke up early in the morning in anticipation of crossing the finish line, all 6 of us sat up at the helm watching the approaching lights of Cape Verde. It was a tight race in the end, as we were approaching Cape Verde we were able to see two other boats from the ARC + Rally; these were Cayuse ( a fellow catamaran) and Jarramas. We ended up in a dead heat with Cayuse, not that it is a race but if it was, we won! We managed to cross the finish line a nose in front of Cayuse. At the moment we are 15th on the list, although we expect that we will drop as we used our motors more than the other boats.  

We crossed the finish line at 5:55am on Saturday, and we were having our first celebratory cocktail by 9am! As is tradition we had to blow our horn to signal our arrival. We thought it would be hilarious to play a practical joke on our neighbours, so John stood on the back of the boat pretending to blow into a large ocean shell while Chad hid in the saloon blowing the horn. All our neighbours were suitably impressed! The joke backfired when the skipper from Opturr came out with his own shell  and started practicing. It was all fun and games until he was actually able to use it as a horn. We immediately hid our shell so no one asked for repeat performances… 

 

Once all our official docking duties were over and we submitted our arrival declaration to the ARC office we were free to explore the local bars. We followed Russell down some questionable streets, where he asked a local to take him to a bar. We ended up in an establishment that only had a bench with a standard kitchen fridge behind it. Our beers came straight out of the freezer - very chilled, perfect! In our excitement to be in Cape Verde John and Scotty decided to shout the bar drinks, before we knew it the entire neighbourhood came in to get a free beer. Luckily the beers were as cheap as chips! As the bar got busier and more questionable characters came in we thought it best to leave and we found a delicious pizza joint by the marina. We continued drinking beer, and foghorn Finnemore lived up to his name - I think the boats still coming down from Las Palmas could hear him! 





unknown.jpg


unknown.jpg

We got back to Surfinn about 4pm - a lot of our crew decided to have a tactical nap so that they could make it to ARC welcome drinks at 7:30pm. A few of the crew woke up feeling hungover, so I am not sure how tactical that nap really was. Once we were all up from our naps and had eaten a delicious spaghetti meal we started celebrating our arrival all over again! We made some new friends from the surrounding boats and they came over to join in. Before we knew it we were up at the welcome drinks celebrating with fellow sailors! A lot of sore heads this morning that is for sure, although it hasn’t prevented some of us from enjoying more beers today. The more sensible of the crew have decided to remain sober during the morning hours. 

We are all looking forward to exploring more of the island on Monday.