(Nov 24th - Dec 5th)
Nov 16th - Left Gibraltar in the evening, got to watch the sunset on the Rock, also had to sail against 7 knot tide in the Gibraltar Strait, leading to a 20 degree heel!
Nov 21st - Sailing along at a steady 4-6 knots, in the right direction too!
<------- Tom succeeding at fitting a whole biscuit in his mouth! whoopee
Nov 23rd - We're roaring along right now at 8 knots!!
Nov 24th - Seems like we're settling into the groove. We could do this for 3 weeks!
<--- Tom's Zoolander impression!
Nov 24th - LAND AHOY!! Just in time for sunset, you can see the Canaries in the distance.
A 6 day passage over all, and our first through Atlantic waters! The first three days we were all very sea sick, except Tom, thank goodness! But we eventually got our sea legs, and then were visited by Dolphins. They obviously were enjoying the 5m swell more then us, jumping from the waves and diving back in. They were everywhere from the horizon, right up to the boat, and they were beautiful. They were so close that we could see their eyes, and blowholes! After 2 visits I guess they lost interest and we didn't see them again, but hopefully they'll be back! We also got to test out our foul weather gear. We had 40 knot gusts, a gale, with pouring rain and 5m swells. it carried on for about 4 days, and the sea was so bad you only caught glimpses of the horizon, if anything! But we were cracking along at 8 knots! Our record so far has been 9.4knots.
Nov 24th - Jordan and Karen arrive at the boat via our high class taxi service (the dingy). It's a lovely sunny day too! Right now we're surrounded by boats about to cross the Atlantic for the ARC, a race to the other side!
WELCOME ABOARD J+K!
Nov 26th - Tonight Iasen, who we met in a cafe down the road visited us on the boat with his son Jon. Had a good chat, and Jon loved being on a boat!
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-----hehe, checking out the news in England!!
Nov 27th - Well had an eventful day today! we planned on sailing around Gran Canaria to Mogan, about a day's sail away. We were motoring out of the habour, then suddenly after about 3 hours the prop started clunking. Uh oh, turned out that we somehow got a fishing net wrapped round the prop. So Tom dived down to try to cut it of, but it was a HUGE wad, to we decided to turn back to Las Plamas. Easily said though, now with no engine, we had to sail back and with barely any wind, being in the lee of the land, it took us 4 hours to get in the habour. Then we called the rescue to give us a tow so that we could anchor with out sinking someone's boat! So we're STILL in Las Palmas, with a fouled prop, well all in a day's work!
Nov 28th - Tom bravely dived down and unfouled the prop today. Now we're just waiting for him to get sick, the water was full of oil and who knows what else!
<---- all that net was round the prop!
Tom went windsurfing after fixing the prop, his first time since he left Greece, but there's no wind!
<------ Awww aren't they cute!
Nov 28th - Went to an American rib house for dinner, and stuffed ourselves!
Nov 30th - Karen gave us all haircuts today, out on the dock. Loads of people asked for a trim, so she ended up cutting the hair for the family next to us, in return for a bottle of wine!
It was also Jordan and Karen's last day so we to a wander round town. We visited the famous wall where people paint a message before crossing the Atlantic.
<------ "Happy the man, and happy he alone. He who can call the day his
own. He who secure within can say : Tomorrow do thy worst for I have lived
today"
The famous wall
We then went to a cafe and had some tapas!
Dec 4th - Our last night on land, we're leaving tomorrow for the Caribbean! 3 weeks at sea here we come!!
