The kind lady of port control checked us out on Friday as our plan was to leave Ascension Island on the Sunday for our passage to the Mindelo on Sao Vincente, one of the Cape Verde islands. This will be our longest passage so far, 1700 miles in a straight line, more than 20 days of sailing. We will go north first crossing the doldrums, the zone around the equator where the tradewind will change from south-east to nearly zero then turning to north-east. Well, that is what the books tell us. The reality in the south atlantic ocean is a bit different: at the point where we cross the wind remains south-east until 5 degrees north then turn north then north-east. Bye bye to the comfortable downwind sailing, from now on beating and tacking against the wind which may last until the Mediterranian sea ….
The days pass, it is wonderfull to be on passage again, this time even more since we are with 2 on board.
This sport is called fishing not catching
But exellent food on route
and deserts and cakes too, mmmm
This is our first time equator crossing in a sailing vessel, so when our chartplotter showed the coordinates where south changes to north we looked for that fine line in the water. What a pitty…no equator visible…just large patches of floating seaweed.
We continue further north in light south east winds which, as predicted, change to north at 5 degrees above the equator. We tack a few days then decide to deviate from the direct route to Mindelo by sailing further east on a single tack, hoping to pick up the predicted north east winds earlier.That worked out fine but at a price of a detour of 4 days and 440nm tacking against the North east winds as we ended up 200nm west of Sao Vincente’s capital Mindelo.The winds are strong we decide to stay another night at sea in the lee of Sao Vincente before entering Mindelo port.
AIS buoys in the middle of the north atlantic ocean...strange... We see Chinese fishing boats, do they transmit that?
After a beautifull 21 days passage we arrive in windy Mindelo!
