The great news is that Mary arrived in Mindelo on Saturday.
Mary is Christopher's sister. Until this year, we co-owned Galatea, a 35-foor
Cape George cutter, with Mary, and her husband, Peter Neill. This means we have
had the great fortune of sailing every summer with Mary and Peter in Maine, New
Brunswick and Nova Scotia for the past ten years. Mary is an outstanding sailor
and the only one of the five of us to have crossed the Atlantic, which she did
with her uncle 40 years ago. As you might imagine, the list of reasons why we
are glad that Mary is here is long!
It has been fun and very interesting to be in the Cape Verde
islands, our first foray into Africa. We have also enjoyed getting to know
various folks on the docks- most notably a Belgian couple and a French family.
The Deis family have two boys, ages 11 and 15, who speak reasonably good
English so Porter and Jack have had a lot of fun hanging out with them and we
all enjoyed one day in particular when both families hired a pickup truck to
take us to a beach on the other side of the island- 20 minutes by car- where we
all snorkeled, swam, and played soccer in the sand.
Since Mary arrived, we have been introducing her to the
nuances of Sila. An accomplished sailor, it will not take her long to figure
out the details of this boat. And today was our final shop- which primarily
involved a visit to the local markets to buy fresh produce. Once again, a
bleach water scrub on the dock before stowing it all.
By 4 o'clock local time, we hope to be off the dock and
headed out into the bay to anchor. We have found that it is nice to spend a
night on an anchor to help us all get used to motion of the boat before a
passage. In addition, being tied to a dock can feel a bit like glue- so getting
free from the pull of showers and easy access to shore will make for a more
timely departure in the morning.
So what is the bad news? There is not much wind. We have been
lucky up until this point with great wind for our various passages. Now it
looks like the high pressure system that is usually to the north of us is not
setting up as it usually does. As a result, we will have to head farther south
than we originally expected. So from here, we will go southwest until we get to
about 15 degrees north latitude before we turn more west. Ultimately, we hope to make landfall
in Antigua in about two weeks.
It feels a little like Christmas Eve here as we are all
eagerly anticipating the start of our crossing tomorrow and wrapping up the
last few tasks and preparations.
The boat I grew up sailing on was also the Galetea - a 32' sloop moored in Port Washington in Long Island Sound. Hope the crossing continues smoothly and that you find the winds soon. Thinking of you in cold and snowy Leadville - Ellie
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