Tuesday, December 9, 2014

10 December, 2014  AGADIR, MORROCO

For anyone who is interested, our latitude and longitude is 30 degrees, 25 minutes North, 9 degrees, 37 minutes West. Since most of the world is now more GPS savvy, you can plug those coordinates in, or google map it and see where we are.

The trip here was 406 miles, from marina to marina. It's a new look, this marina thing. Normally we are swinging by the anchor, in a bay somewhere. But we found, as we got closer to Europe, that anchorages were being replaced by marinas, and expensive marinas.at that. To find a nice anchorage was becoming harder and harder to find.
Here is Jabez steering us out of the Portimao harbor/river entrance and into the big rolly ocean. Philip was busy checking the rigging as this will be our first sail with all the new rigging we installed. We were 5 miles or so from the entrance before we had greeny blue water instead of brown rain water.

From the Captain's log :

Our trip consisted out of a start with the remnants of 8 M sea and swell from the NW, wind from the N of 20 Knots and another swell from the SE due to the wind that had being blowing from that direction 24 hours before we left @ 30 knots or for laymen 50 km/h.  So to state it mildly,the rolling and pitching in the trough of the waves were enough to make us lose books out of secure shelves, and at some point, the floors where covered with them, but no one seems to have what it took to bend down to pick them up. Maybe it was due to the possibility that your eyes might just fall out.
With this we also had rain squalls and 2 big lightning storms that lit the sea up and gave you a clear view of where you were. At times the lightening was close enough to make the hair on the back of your head stand up.
Starting 30 miles off the coast, the traffic separation zone starts, with 2 lanes going west and north then 2 lanes going east to Gibraltar. Ships that are bound to Southern Europa ports from North America, South America and North Europe must go trough the Gibraltar straits, as well as any ships that are bound for North European ports that had come from Asia, Middle East, or via the Suez canal,  or Mediterranean port to North Europa and the Americas. So the traffic can be quite busy and dodging them at night, in rain storm and lightning storm, since we are heading 190 degrees south can be like a 2 step dance in a very liquid bar ,but it truly makes you feel so alive.

The next day sail was one without wind or very low wind,  and the sea swell slowly getting smaller. Even using the motor , which we have a diesel 60 hp , but since diesel does cost a bit less in Morocco, I decided not to fill the boat up in Portugal but wait for the savings .We are only talking about the size of tank of a sedan car, so who cares, right?  Not if there is no wind and no diesel and every one is dreaming of tajine in the souk with mint tea. That makes the crew look at you and wondering what that decision was based on in any case.
The 3 rd day I was woken up by Jabez @ 4h30 to tell me that he thinks the wind is sufficiant to turn the engine off and sail her, and so we did that and by that night time we had 25 knots of wind from north ,our sails where set goosewing, downwind, and we where roaring between the waves south to Agadir between 6.8 knots all the way to high run of 9.6 down a big wave.



We arrived outside the port @ 12 at night and weaved our way between fishing boats and later, in the dark,  anchored Dows and anchored ships, waiting for their turn in the port,  to the entrance to the marina. We tied up to the fuel dock and drowned the last of the bottle of bubbly. 2am.
Every day is a celebration but some days (or early mornings) do need to have an exclamation point.
With the sound of Arabic rock music from a bar next to the fuel dock , Sky Lounge, we savored the sounds and smells of our Morocco. Man it is good to be back .  


And one final footnote...some wonder what it is we do all day and I just wanted you to know, why, we sit around eating bon bons and take selfies!!! Of course!!!


When the captain isn't looking!
 Oh, alright. We DO watch for ships that might be on a collision course with us.


Monday, December 8, 2014

Once the painting of the bottom, the antifouling, was completed, it was time to ask the travel lift to come. The travel lift carries the boat to the water, but before we go in the water, we needed the lift to pick Abracadabra up. The places where the boat was being held up, the bottom of the keel and the where the supports met the hull, those places needed to be painted also. We slapped a few quick coats on before going in the water.




 When you see Philip in the background, it makes the boat seem pretty huge!

Driving North

Since bad weather and sickness made us miss Torres del Paine, this was the next best thing for me. The colony of Rock-hopper pen...