Transat #18
Catmojo
Matt
Sat 25 Nov 2023 08:20
Overcast and grey this morning but it’s getting sunnier. Mojo is about 70miles S of Hierro on course 240 degrees heading towards 20N 30W about 4+ days away. I’m motorsailing at 6-7 knots sog with 5-6knots apparent wind vaguely inflating the foresail at 170P.
I decided to Just Go on Friday morning. So I ripped up the anchor and went. Sunny and calm in LP means it’s best to hug the coast for 15-20 knots behind and then turn hard right away from Africa and possible refugee boats.
I think I ruined El Legado’s morning, an even more monster catamaran which started the same place but went offshore 2miles ahead and lost the wind. My previous track shows the fish farm has moved its marker buoys further out. Maybe my fault and I was a bit close last time.
This my 18th transat on sailing boats and I’ve been preparing for months as usual. It’s cumulative, lists etc. and the boat is good. This time I’ve brought more dried goods: most stuff in Carib supermarkets costs twice or more in the Carib so it’s worth having several months supply of coffee, dried milk, cereal and more. I suppose the lockdownery was instructive too. Also I saw a YouTube video about supervolcanoes, hum. Even a moderately grumbling volcano stops Transat jet travel for a week as we saw in 2009. A more spectacular one would take out Starlink, satphones, GPS and North Star visibility too. Hm.
Meanwhile everything is actually perfectly fine, and I’m simply hoping to dodge the extremes of tourist-trap supermarket rapacity. I saw the owner of one supermarket in SXM drives a Porsche Panamera for crissakes. They also charge $11 for an organic lemon, yeehah!
Target is SXM, that’s the airport code for St Martin. Down to the last 2600 miles already. I’m guessing I’ll be there Dec 10th ish.