Monday, September 10, 2012

Swapping the Med for the Atlantic


Gibraltar to Madeira our longest offshore passage so far, 600 miles with no ports of refuge once we leave the Straights of Gibraltar.
Exciting and a little scary.

We had been studying the long term weather forecast and knew we needed to leave Gibraltar with an easterly wind, but we also knew that an easterly would mean gale force winds near Tarifa as the wind gets squeezed and accelerated past here as it’s the narrowest past of the straight. We also had tides to deal with again and the meeting of two seas.

We weren’t disappointed we left Gib with a favourable tide and reached Pt Carnero, another English yacht motored past us here but within about a mile they seemed to have stopped, as we approached them we noticed the water texture changing and within a 100m we had sailed from a favourable tide (+1knt) to a foul one (-3knt) the change was so dramatic it was a fight to stop magnum spinning on the spot. Virtually all forward motion stopped !!!

The 2 yachts further out were hardly moving so we decided to re-cross the “tidal line” and keep close to the Spanish shore to see if we could keep out of the tide. Sure enough once inshore we picked up a favourable tidal eddy which we hung onto all the way to Tarifa. The wind was now 25knts and we were speeding along at 7-8 knts, by the time we reached the lighthouse at Tarifa the yacht that had past us near Gib was a dot in the distance still fighting the tide, very satisfying !

The light house at Tarifa

Tarifa sand dunes in the distance
From here onwards the wind increased to 30+knts and the ride got wilder, off the shallows at Cape Trafalgar the water didn’t seem to know what to do, we had waves from all directions.

The weather forecast showed that even stronger winds would be howling out of the straights overnight (35+) so we altered course to go north for 20-30 miles where we should have more manageable winds.

In reality the wind dropped at sunset and we were left wallowing in a heavy sea with only just enough wind to fill our sails. I hate these conditions, and in no time at all we both succumbed to mal de mare L

Pretty skies

Overnight and the next day the wind filled in again, but we had a miserable time in a confused sea, dodging the shipping and feeling very rough.
We had made some good miles though 136 in the first 24hrs.

The next afternoon we finally cleared the straights and picked up the Portuguese trade winds, the sea changed and we now had regular Atlantic rollers racing down from the north.
The sailing was amazing, wind was pretty constant at 15knts, we set full sail and surged off towards Madeira, the next 2 days we barely touched a rope or altered course.

On the way we spotted a whale (breeching) a turtle, dolphins and had a squid join us on deck !



ahh squid on deck!
About a day earlier than planned we had our “Land Ho!” moment, very exciting as Porto Santo reared up out of the Atlantic.
600 miles under sail, what a contrast to our Mediterranean sailing experience !


Wow we can see land

Port Santo ahead



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