The Rope is Rusting

The sky above the Sahara is dry and cloudless. Without the clouds to shade the Earth and to shed the desert plants' elixir of life, water, vegetation grows sparse. What nutrients remaining in the sun-battered ground are consumed by the struggling plants. The sun shines down until the Sahara becomes a near-empty stretch of sand. Some of this sand is scooped up by the wind, known as a harmattan, and carried out to sea.

Out on the ocean, there is the same empty sky. The Saharan dust which is blown out here is unnoticed except in a haze on the horizon. Unnoticed, that is, until the line, sailor's word for rope, starts rusting. A rust colored film covers anything stationary on deck. Incessantly it builds up, giving everything the appearance of rusting. It is easily brushed away but it constantly comes, never halting.

I am amazed; whenever I take my hand away from something on deck, it comes back dusty. The start of this passage, where all was salty, is very similar to the constant sand drifting out of the sky. In the furious fifties, big waves washed over the deck. The water eventually evaporated, leaving behind a film of salt crystals. We were happy to see the salt gone after we had a few rain squalls followed by calm weather. In the same way, a few rain squalls will rid us of the dirt blown up off the Sahara.

I remember the dust from when we last went to the Cape Verdes, in November 2013, but the quantity of it had evaded my memory in the intervening time. I hope we will get a rainstorm once we leave the harmattan winds, although the deck will probably turn red with sand as it leaves our rigging. -Porter

Editor's Note: Porter wrote this blog during his 8-9am watch on April 2nd. At the time, we were at 12°59'N 019°43'W, which is about 175 miles off the coast of Senegal. We are slowly but surely closing in on our next destination, the Mindelo Marina on Saõ Vicente island in the Cape Verdes and hope to arrive there on Monday.