Porto Santo
'Sarf & West mate, Sarf & West'
Pete Bernfeld
Thu 28 Aug 2008 08:19
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33:03.635N 016:18.899W
We arrived in Porto Santo at 2315 local time on the
26th August. There were three other boats at anchor, but a load of small mooring
buoys so in the dark there didn't seem to be much room. We dropped the hook near
Moonshiner, and at the fourth attempt were happy with the way the boat was
laying, so had a couple of beers & went to bed.
In the morning we were advised by the marina
staff to move the boats as we were both a bit close to where the ferry from
Madeira turns, so we were able to anchor inbetween the small yellow buoys and go
ashore to complete the formalities.
Porto Santo is, happily, pretty much as I remember
it, everybody is friendly & laidback, including the port officials. Abbey's
kids arrived on the afternoon ferry on the 27th and we will move into the marina
today (for convenience sake). Having said that, as I'm typing this I see a
couple more boats have arrived overnight so there may not be space for us. No
problem, it's a couple of minutes dingy ride to the dock and a short walk to the
shower block.
Statistics, we did 482 miles in three days, eleven
hours fifteen minutes (refuelling berth to anchor down) or an hour less if you
say setting course to harbour entry, an average speed of 6.4 kts, all of it
sailed bar the last 20 minutes spent entering harbour. We could have sailed
faster, but if we said an average of 6.5kts then that's a pretty good indication
of the average speed for the Atlantic crossing, so all being well I'm
anticipating a crossing of 17 or 18 days.
Today, we will be mainly recovering from
(respectively) the effects of a good lunch yesterday followed by an even better
evening meal, whilkst the 'younger elements' of both crews will be recovering
from the effects of the trip out here and a night out on the
town!
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