In Angra, Terceira, we attended one of the last days of the festival. Unfortunately, we did miss the running of the bulls. Our friends on Teka III were here in time to see this event when they release several bulls into the streets as brave souls run, hopefully, in front and ahead of them. We have seen pictures of this event and were sorry to have missed it. We spent only a few days here and enjoyed the lovely local shops, convenient internet access, and close local produce markets and supermarkets.
We hauled up anchor and headed for Ponta Delgada, Sao Miguel, this was to be our last Azorean island. This is a popular stopping point for yachts making their next jump across the Atlantic to Europe. We caught up with Teka III again as well as our friends from the VIs on another sailboat, Equus (Pat and Steve) and new friends on a sailboat called, Good Company (Marvin who was a member of Raritan Yacht Club in the late 50’s! – small world – we are currently RYC members). Along with Teka III, both of these sailboats are going to Portugal as are our plans. Teka III, a trawler, left the day before us; the three sailboats decided to leave on the same day with a good weather window predicted.
We highly recommend visiting the Azorean islands, by sea or air. We particularly enjoyed the islands of Flores, Terceira and Sao Miguel. Horta, Faial is a good stop off especially for boaters needing repairs, etc., however, it was a bit too crowded in the anchorage for us.
We found the people most helpful and friendly wherever we visited. Although English is less common, communication was never a problem. We were lucky to be visiting these islands at the time of the hydrangea season; absolutely spectacular purple, lavender, white blossoms that were in full display all around the islands. These plants grow everywhere and grow into large bushes. The farmers use these plants to separate and border their fields, so you can imagine the beauty along the hillsides. Check out the web page photo gallery to see some of these flowers.
While sailing along the last stretch of Sao Miguel’s coastline to begin our trip to Lisbon, Portugal, we were given a fantastic farewell show by several herds of black and white Bottlenose dolphins. They swim incredibly fast as they come along side the bow of the boat. They leap high out of the water as they dive into the waves; they are quite impressive.
The trip to the mainland of Lisbon, Portugal is 776 nautical miles from Sao Miguel. This is a trip that will take Terry and I approximately 5-7 days to complete; that is, non-stop sailing. Since we are offshore nonstop, we will share the watch schedule. This is how we have decided to do this: Terry sails the boat from 6 pm to 9 pm; I sail the boat from 9 pm to 12 am; Terry picks up from 12 am to 3 am; me again from 3 am to 6 am; Terry again from 6 am to 12 noon and me again from 12 noon to 5 pm. This schedule seems to be working for us in that the late evening and early morning hours only require each of us to take 3 hours while allowing each of us to have consecutive 5 hours of sleep/rest time during the day.
We have had consistent winds since leaving Sao Miguel. Yesterday, we had a close crossing with a large freighter. We saw him on our radar as he did us on his. We were a bit uncomfortable with his proximity to our position, so via radio he agreed to alter course and pass us at only about half a mile between us; still too close with all this water around.
We stay in close radio and radar contact with the three boats we are traveling with. We also check daily with a popular weather router, Herb out of Canada, through our single sideband radio that we have onboard. Herb routes boaters going in all different directions. When you speak with him on the radio, you give him your GPS position and he checks the latest weather forecasts for your area and destination and lets you know what to expect relative to winds and sea conditions. For example, there is a sailboat rally of quite a few boats heading for the UK. Herb is helping many of these boats with weather; of late, they are facing gale force winds (35 knots and higher). So, he is making suggestions as to where these boats should sail to minimize the impact of gale force conditions.
We had anticipated making landfall in Cascais, very near Lisbon on Friday, July 13, given our current position and wonderful boat speed. We currently have 278 nautical miles to go. However, tonight Herb alerted us to the predicted high winds (25-35 knots) directly in the path we need to sail to make landfall into Lisbon. So, tonight, we basically put on the brakes. One would ask how do you put on the brakes on a sailboat. Well, we had three sails up going about 7 knots. We took two down and reduced the size of the mainsail (we double reefed it). We are now rocking along at 1.5 knots. In fact, Good Company, one of our fellow sailors was about 20 miles ahead of us and decided to turn around and sail back to our position at which time they would also slow down. Our strategy now is to slow the boat down enough to hopefully stay out of the high wind region. We will wait to hear again from Herb tonight as to whether or not we should speed the boat up or continue to move slowly in the hopes that the winds will subside and we can then make our way into Lisbon by the weekend. So, the two other boats and Zelda are here in the Atlantic ocean wobbling along ever so slowly hoping to get a better weather window to continue our trip with more reasonable winds.
Stay tuned for the next update sometime after our arrival into Lisbon.
Check out the photo gallery and check into our guestbook—we really enjoy reading them when we connect onto the internet while landside.
Marie & Terry – S/V Zelda in the Atlantic Ocean
great since we had to cross one of the busiest shipping areas in the world. It was like crossing the Garden State Parkway on a summer weekend! We cleaned the boat in the afternoon (almost no damage, nothing major) and got together on Zelda with friends from 3 other boats that had also
made the crossing, TEKA III, Equus, and Good Company. After a delicious meal ashore it was back to the boats and SLEEP! We will stay here a few days and then continue our journey around the Portuguese/Spanish coast to Gibralter before going into the Med.
Terry and Marie