They’re at It Again!

Once again we are at sea. This time it is the Mediterranean’s turn to get sliced up by Coco’s keel. Right now we are progressing along the Spanish coast line. After just about 18 hours of motoring we have raised sails and have been gliding along nicely since this morning. 

As is tradition, Henrik served his soon-to-be world famous spaghetti bolognese for the first evening at sea. Sebastian and Peter were only happy to be served and quickly finished the meal, one giant piece at a time, as is tradition. What is not tradition is the show that ensued throughout the meal; a flock of killer whales surrounded CoCo for a while and did something we can only assume is a graceful dance. 

The destination on this leg of sailing is Cagliari on Sardinia. We expect to arrive sometime during Sunday afternoon or evening. 

    

Land Ho

It is around eight o’clock aboard CoCo. The crew has had their hunger extinguished by a giagantic lasagne prepared by Henrik. The sun is setting as Peter and Sebastian make ready for their night watch. Visibility is poor in what appears to become a misty, windless and starless night, but the lads nevertheless expect to spot signs of land at any minute now.
Sebastian is on the look-out as Peter finishes the last few pages of a novel by Jon Michelet about a young, Norwegian sea-faring lad. Fitting. Just when Peter has finished his book and is on his way from the galley with some hot chocolate, Sebastian spots what appears to be a single candle with a yellowish hue flickering on the horizon through the mist. It is the lighthouse of Sagres.
As the light grows stronger, a breeze picks up from the north-west. With it comes a scent that is strongly familiar, but almost forgotten after a week at sea. Dirt? Pine needles? Do they even have pine trees in Portugal? Peter and Sebastian fill their lungs with this landly odour as if it was their very first breath after a long and deep slumber. In a mere hours, CoCo will be making berth in the city of Lagos.

Somewhere Beyond The Sea…

… is she there waiting for me?
Just when you thought you had heard enough fom CoCo for a while and another blog post appears. Presently, we are more than halfway from the Azores archipelago to the strait of Gibraltar. We will not be heading straight through the strait, but are planning to stop for a day or so in the Portugese city of Lagos. The reason for our little pit stop is not because of an emergency or other reason for worry. We are just going to stop to wait for a bit of wind. Thursday morning some fairly decent north/north-westerlies will be coming our way and we can swiftly pop through the strait.
For almost a day now we have been having no wind at all, but the days before we have been cruising along at a daily rate of two hundred nautical miles. A tremendous feat!
Apart from sailing we have been eating well and spotted animals of both nautical and avian varieties. Schools of dolphin (not sure that they should be called schools, because they are mammals. Please correct me in the comments below), always have a good time playing around CoCo’s hull, and a large whale passed us at a distance of five metres. What is more, we have seen swallows and butterflies – not a very common sight this far from land. They probably found CoCo to be a nice place for a bit of rest.
Positive spirit! See you in Portugal?

VLOG Episode 08: Returning (Our Second Atlantic Crossing)

Our Second Atlantic Crossing – Day 14

DIST SAILED: 2074 nm
DIST TO GO: 186 nm

Most likely this will be our last blog entry from sea, as we expect to arrive in Horta just in time for lunch. For the last two days we have been making our way towards this detination in a very uneventful manner. We have barely seen blue sky or sun in over a week and we have therefore concluded that the universe now consists of nothing but infinite greyness.
As we have a constant situation of on-again/off-again rain, the nicest place to be is down in the belly of the ship these days. An entirely different world compared to Infinite Greyness (we will file a scientific report specifiying the parameters of this universe soon). Yesterday afternoon, Peter and Sebastian made popcorn and strapped themselves to the sofa in the saloon to watch a film. This was while Jon and Henrik took command up on deck in waves 3 metres high and with rain coming from all directions.
Infinite Greyness do have some tricks up its sleeve, though! This morning a swedish sailing yacht appeared out of the mist: S/Y ISMINI. It appears that we now have someone to race against for the last 186 nautical miles in to Horta.
Positive spirit!
CoCo.