Relaxing days in Mindelo

Life has - so far - been very good to us here in Mindelo.

The marina is well run and we feel safe both from weather and crime.
The islands has a lot of unemployment it seems and people try to find jobs doing on the street car wash help tourists with shopping etc. Some beggars, but most want's to do an honest job for money.

A church in town center

The market scquare

We will be here another week. We are still waiting for our new grandson to be born in Norway and
won't leave here untill we know all went well and to have a picture of him :)

Been very windy here the past few days. Today it was very calm and temperature rises. Its 25 C now.

Arrived in Mindelo, CV

We had a great trip sailing from GranCanary to Mindelo.
The first few hours out from Puerto Rico we had smooth sea and light winds.
later the wind and sea increased. During the night we had gusts up 28 knots.
The next day wind eased off a little and sea dropped some. We motor sailed
to keep the speed above 5 knots that would get us to Mindelo in 7 days.
To conserve diesel we motor sailed with just 1000 rpm's.

3rd day wind increased from the NE to 20 knots gusting 25+ knots.
We turned of the engine and set the Hydrovane to steer the boat.
Wind stayed unchanged untill we reached Mindelo in the afternoon on the 7th day. (27.01)
It was great to arrive Mindelo. Geir had been there 48 years ago.
At the time he was a sailor on a Norwegian merchant ship.

Safely moored in Mindelo Marina

The marina is very well organized. We called them on VHF and a small boat came out and guided us in to our berth.

Happy to have arrived Mindelo

After check-in Grete prepared a delicious Indian curry pot.
Later we went into a floating bar here at the marina. Here we met the crew from Swiss sailboat Fitz Roy.
Geir had kept daily radio contact with the captain Alex who sailes with two vegetarian ladies.
Grete tempted Alex to come onboard and have some leftovers from her Indian pot. He came over later that night and left with a portion and a great smile.

Gretes Indian curry

 Mindelo and the island of Sao Vicente looks to be a nice place.
We are looking forward to explore the town and the island in the coming days.

Mindelo sunset Tuesday evening

Enroute to Mindelo, Cape Verde

Hello friends ;)

By 1400 UTC today we are 140nm west of West Africa and Mauritania and have 276 nautical miles to go to Mindelo.

Yesterday we were blessed with 10-15 knots of windfrom Northeast which enabled us to turn of the engine.
About time, as diesel consumption has been too high. But we still have plenty left if needed.
During the night the wind increased to 20 knots and with gusts 25+ knots. Sea also increased and resulte in a very bumpy ride but with good sailing speed. Our new Hydrovane performed ecellent in the rough seas and the wind generator and solar panels kept our fridge, navlights and nav station well supplied as charging the batteries.

Yesterday we had a proper dinner. German burgers (Frikadellen) with fried onions, peece and boiled potatoes.With a gimbaled stove cooking is OK in lumpy seas.

The weatherforecast for the coming days is Northeast winds 10-15 knots gusting 20 and wave hight 2 meters.

We hope to arrive Mindelo by sunset Monday the 27th.

Puerto Rico to Mindelo - day 1

We have started our 7 days sail from Puerto Rico to Mindelo, Cabo Verde.
Distance is approx 840 nautical miles.

After having filled the boat with foods, long life milk, ice tea, large bottles of drinking water.
we sailed from Las Palmas to Puerto Rico on the southwest side of Gran Canaria.
We went there to meet friends who were on holidays away from cold Norway.
We had a great night out on one of the many restaurants found in the town.

Next morning we set off after having topped up with fresh water and diesel.
We departed the 20th January at 1030Z and we hope to arrive in Mindelo around noon the 27th.

First 5 hrs we had calm weather and nearly no sailing wind.
That changed as we got further out from GranCanaria and both wind and sea increased.
Wind went up to 20-25 knots gusting 30-35 at times. Sea was pretty choppy with breaking waves
coming in to the stern. Gradualy we also got swell on top of that. Speed increased from 4 to 7-8 knots and we made good progress.

When daylight arrived wind had clamed down to a few knots and sail speed dropped to 4 kts.
Sea likewise and we could have ourselves some well deserved sandwiches.
Sun is shinning temp is 26C and we are enjoying life sleeping/reading and reading/writing emails.
Will write more tomorrow.

Back onboard the boat in Lanzarote

We are back in Lanzarote after almost 4 weeks in Norway celebrating Christmas & New Year.
We flew home via Zurich and Copenhagen og the return via the same cities.

Arriving Zurich for stop-over

All flights went on time and was un-eventfull.

An hour more and we are back in Lanzarote

Our luggage was filled to max allowed  weight with Norwegian food stuff and spares for the boat.

We were back onboard OV the 9th at 1300 Local time. Unpacked and stowed away Clothes, food and spares.  We had our dinner at the nearest restaurant and went to bed early.

Next morning we prepared moving the boat to the boatyard, which is located in the marina.

They were ready for us at 10 AM. We were lifted out of the water.

We have rented a apartment 10 minutes walk from the boat yard.

The first day was spent relaxing and also an early night.

We were still tired from our travel from Norway.

Next day (saturday) Geir was up at sunrise and went over to get started with the job.
The yard people had cleaned the hull and placed the boat on a secure stand on the hard.
The hull over waterline cleaned and taped ready for painting with new antifouling.
Hull below waterline scrubbed and hosed down with fresh water.

Sunday came with nice sunny warm weather and Geir applied the anti fouling.
The old one looked quite good and therefore one layer of the new was enough.

New anti fouling

We are getting help from the yard to replace the old Bow thruster propeller with an upgrade prop.
And we will also fit a grounding plate - that we hope will help to gives better signal when we are on the shortwave radio.