Crossing the Atlantic
"Crossing the Atlantic Ocean!"
Crossing an Atlantic ocean... it sounds like climbing a mountain and exploring areas unknown. From our workplaces and comfy homes it seemed an onimous and perhaps scary endeavour. But after spending a considerable amount of time on the water, we are confident, happy, and excited to see what is on the other side. The fact that hundreds of boats are crossing at the same time has been creating a buzz since we have left Gibraltar. We are ready. Bring it on....
Mindelo on a regular Wednesday. Not too shabby :-)
Mindelo
The lush green side of Santo Antao.
As we were in dire need for some repairs, we needed to skip Cape Verde almost entirely and head straight to Mindelo. An impressive entrance between two hilly islands. Where São Vicente is full of music, culture and desert like, Santo Antão is lush, green and a nature island. We treated ourselves to a daytrip to explore its coastline, villages and green interior. An excellent way to relax before the crossing.
The colourful gem in the heart of town: Mindelo market.
A large part of our days was filled with grocery shopping, preparing ourselves and the boat, and checking on our repairs. Grocery shopping was difficult. Incredibly expensive and we needed to find produce that could last us two weeks. After checking all produce meticulously, cleaning all vegetables and fruits individually and drying them thoroughly, we still only managed to keep most things for a week at most.
Let's hope more than 60% will stay fresh in the salty air.
Everlasting hilltops of water
WATCH: Compilation video of our transatlantic voyage.
We leave Mindelo and our French friends are just a few small hours behind us. We see them quickly appearing on our screen. And then we get stuck behind the islands...no wind.. confusing wind. We swallow our pride and motor for a few hours. The only hours on engine for the entirety of the crossing. After a few days the rhythm of the ocean starts to control day-to-day life. You adapt to the sleep restrictions. You had your first good night because your body could no longer push forward without it. Your food starts to return on par level, as you adapt to the wobbles of the ocean while working in the galley and as a slightly different crew you start to understand what each and every other prefers, ranging from no talking before coffee, no dirty dishes or wildly jumping and dancing around. Filise seems to enjoy herself very well and sticks her nose in all things interesting and different. On the water we have this unbelievable experience of almost crashing into another boat or; they are almost crashing into us as they tack just right in front of us in the dead of night. We manage to escape them by less than 100 metres. As unbelievable as it may sound - even to us today - it has happened to other boats and we have witnessed it almost happening on AIS with two other boats. Incredible furthermore, because we hardly see other boats at all. We know they are there, we see them on AIS and at times boats make contact on the radio to chat a bit and to perhaps catch a beer later. Making friends in the sailing world is almost too easy : )
Opa Makreel checks his calculations.
Andre shows us his beautiful map. Everyday he pinpoints our position and adds notes of the trip. It is super nice to see our progression on paper and to wonder about the exotic places on the other side. Jaclyn kicks herself for not buying that same map in the Canaries, so she takes notes and pictures and decides to buy a map later to add all this information. Imagine her surprise when Andre decides to gift this map, what a kind and once in a lifetime souvenir!
The generousity of the sea has few limits.
Delicious! What a catch! We are able to catch a mahi mahi and a mackerel and learn new things about fish, cleaning and preparing. It is a bit overwhelming to go from calculating specific foods to suddenly having an abundance of fresh fish. We eat every inch of both fishes in different ways from Hawaiian, to Dutch, Chinese and Japanese ways of preparing. It just means that the set up of our sails is so comfortable we are able to spend extra time on cooking. The first week we are able to sail almost straight. It is almost as if crossing an ocean isn't difficult at all and we just spend our time with reading, playing and stuffing ourselves with food....
This is a winning dish! Sushi and ceviche that came out of the water less than an hour ago.
After 3/4 of the crossing is done, madness starts to kick in. We joke, but we are serious, we sing ridiculous songs and get lost in our thoughts, memories and hallucinations. Maybe it's the movement, maybe it's because of the way we smell after this time at sea. But we are slowly losing our minds. Fortunately we get some bad weather and some refreshing showers. Apparently someone up above did think it was time for us to get cleaned up....Inside we celebrate Sinterklaas with speculaas and put up a Christmas tree. It's beginning to feel a bit like Christmas!
A refreshing splash of rain.
Living circular
This journey we decided to explicitly focus on our footprint. As it was our longest crossing to date we want to make sure our ship can hold our family with extra crew aboard safely. We focused on energy management, sustainable fishing by handline, trash and not using the engine. A very exciting moment was when we were making such speed at night, we could use our alternator to bake bread and have a fresh warm loaf in the morning! We conclude that with careful planning, a good amount of attention for the weather and a good understanding of your equipment it is possible to travel extremely light, in terms of your footprint.
Here are the stats: Distance travelled: Nautical Miles 2100 Days: 14,5 days Crew: Three adults and one 2yo Number of trash bags: 3 (still too much, mostly because of the 2yo....) Fish caught: 2 Food thrown away: a pineapple, a bit of coffee and some cabbage that started to rot Water desalinated: 0 liters
We only used the engine for a few hours. the entire trip. All energy came directly from the sun and the wind. It is still an astonishing idea that just by wind we were able to reach paradise.
360 degrees look at sea.
We were able to enjoy ourselves with talking, playing with Filise, listening to podcasts and music, do some reading, trying our hand at fishing, sailing, navigation and go over the top with cooking. In the two weeks it did not become boring, the ocean remained interesting. The sun comes, the sun goes, the sun comes, the sun goes.
Documenting our trip
If you like what you see, you should remember that you too can join us aboard. We usually publish our plans in advance so you can hop on. If you prefer to follow along from the comfort of your couch, the next best thing to support us is to consider a donation.
Bored out.
Land ahoy!
A moment we had been anticipating for so long. We count the first day of the trip, the middle of the trip, the middle of the second half of the trip. Every day we get a little bit closer according to our maps. And then suddenly it seems to just be there. As it has always been. Martijn sees it first.
Day 14, almost there.
Land in sight! Even when you say it yourself. It keeps echoing through your head for hours and hours. After all the hardships. The wetness. The sleep deprivation. The sleeplessness while being so tired. The bumping into things. The annoyances of mostly your own thoughts. All the noise in your head suddenly flushes away. Gone. The only thing you can think about is Land in sight. Land in sight.
A great moment for a beer. Or a cigarette. or both. Oh no! We have none aboard. Doh!
And suddenly a breath of relief for all crewmembers aboard: Land in sight!.
The cold champagne and wine in the fridge have been anticipating this moment as has a Swiss red fruit cake roll from Gibraltar which look incredibly divine at this point. We anchor and relief sets in. All thoughts from last weeks leave our mouths as jokes. We laugh and laugh and become Neanthertalers. We feast and feast, eat cake with our hands, put bottles to our mouths. And then sink into deep endless sleep.
Martinique!