So where now?

P Santo continues to be absolutely lovely. Hired some bikes yesterday
(for a pittance) and cycled the breadth of the Island. The locals seem
to mainly razz around on Scooters and in MINI MOKES! I don't think
I've ever seen these vehicles in the flesh, let alone the dozens that
seem to festoon the streets here. So cool! Wish I had brought my
driving license...

The beach at the western end of the island is absolutely beautiful -
gorgeous rock pools cut through the soft sandstone, rock-arches and
off-lying islands made from some igneous rock. There was also a
stupendous amount of construction work going on (all villa & hotel
complexes) and a rather out-of-place looking golf course in the middle
of the orange landscape. So I guess things will be changing pretty
rapidly around here.

In the evening we cooked a lovely pasta meal on our new working stove,
and Tetley made 2kg of flapjack from our oats & honey collection.
After dark, we crept along the harbour wall to put the base layer for
our little sign announcing our reaching porto santo.
Once afternoon comes and the temperature stops being quite so obscene,
we'll add some writing to it... And then set off on a ridge walk -
there's a lovely series of peaks that lead to the Eastern extremity of
the Island, and I'm sure there's a path somewhere...

Found a cyber cafe with facilities to upload digital photos - hurrah!
But its slow as molasses, but I should get them all up there
eventually.

The big question that we're currently debating is where to go next. We
lack charts for Africa & Cape Verde, which means we'll have to stop in
Funchal or Tennerife in order to buy some, which will also cost a fair
bit of muulah. The running rigging on the boat was pretty worn by our
trip down from Falmouth - the Jib halyard is starting to fray where it
runs over the pulley at the top of the mast when the Genoa is set; all
of which costs money to replace while the kitty is looking
increasingly empty. The sailing's been amazing, but I don't think
doing twice the sailing will result in twice the experience, and I'm
feeling increasingly keen to get back to the UK before the autumn
storms set in - especially if I'm going to be solo'ing it.

So Africa is looking rather far away, and rather down-wind and
down-current. Alternatively, and what is more likely to happen at this
point, is that we'll head off either for the Azores direct and then
back to Blighty, or a quick jaunt down to the Western Canary Islands
(Gomera, Tennerife) before similarly swinging out.
Tet is considering jumping ship at these destinations - entertaining
the possibility of either visiting Africa by plane (since he has all
his expensive anti-malaria pills with him) or maybe even flying out to
the Picos in Spain to join the currently extremely successful Oxford
caving expedition out there.

Porto Santo

For the Çruisers:

Absolutely lovely here. Tiny Marina only half full. About one foreign
yacht a day coming in or out, about a half-dozen currently there.
Beach is similarly semi-deserted (at least during the week), a
smattering of people to make it seem friendly but not crowded.
Fifteen Euros a night, free electricity, lovely water. Immigration
formalities take ten minutes and involve triplicate signatures, got by
happily with English - no costs. Building is just by Marina and also
serves the ferry. Breakwater covered with logos from cruising yachts.
Marina also has boat hoist, Fax, Washing rooms, mail drop & etc. No
Chandler, hardware shop in town. Also two small supermarkets, ok
collection of foods - good canned vegetables. Not too pricey, but I
assume must have import costs added to it.
Once in town, Internet access at the Taskaki bar or the attached cafe,
just opposite the bank. About 2.50 euro an hour for speedy access, 1
machine in cool bar 4 in cafe.

Town has a lovely plaza and outdoor stage / concrete amphitheatre.
There were posters for some sort of festival, but we appeared to have
missed it - a shame.

Crossing Biscay

Tet & myself are relaxing in Porto Santo, Madeira, after a 15 day
passage from Falmouth.

Sailing was great, very hot - not much wind but otherwise very
pleasant. Thirty-Six hours running before a Force 7 with just the
storm-jib up, as the odd wave collapsed and gave us a good old wallop
but otherwise nothing at all dangerous. Once out of Biscay and the
shipping lanes off NW Spain we saw just a handful of ships all the
way. Went some 3 days without a single sighting. Just long days
listening to Crazy Christians on Shortwave from the bible states,
swimming with 4km of water below you and reading every last printed
word on the entire sloop.

The best aspect has probably been the amazing wildlife that we´ve seen
as we drifted down to 36 degrees North. Whole fields of sea-potatoes &
surreal algae light-bulbs drifting below the keel. Every 24hrs across
Biscay we were ambushed by a school of dolphins that seemed to take
great delight in racing alongside (easily outstripping our speed) and
then leaping our bow-wave.

One particular day we were joined by four friendly dolphins, who
stayed with us for a good quarter of an hour - their sonar squeals
echoing through the hull. They had a peculiar way of swimming just
below the surface on their side, looking up with a beady eye. I wonder
what they thought of us! As I gaped from the bow, a familiar
splash-splash came from behind, as another gang of dolphins came
leaping along. Suddenly we had over a dozen writhing around in front
of us - corkscrewing, diving under the mid rift & jumping.
I´ve got some amazing film footage on my digital camera, but
unfortunately this machine doesn´t seem to have any way of
uploading...

The best 24hrs was probably the day before we arrived at Madeira - the
sky cleared to a perfect blue, we swam simply to cool down. Streaming
a rope behind the boat you could hold on and get dragged along &
washed effortlessly. We were tempted to try and swim out with a
digital camera to take a photo - the boat looked absolutely amazing
surrounded by blue with the pretty red wind vane - but decided it was
too risky. Must buy a disposable digital camera when we get the
chance...

As the sun dropped lower, we sailed past a sea turtle, a killer whale
surfaced and blew its blowhole just a few meters to the stern and then
we were overtaken by an enormous army of big black porpoises, leaping
again and again as they zoomed past us.

Will probably only be here a day or two, to take on some of the lovely
Madeiran water (tasty stuff), restock our tins and then head off -
perhaps direct to Dakar. Legs very sore after only a little walking
into town, will be hiking up some of the volcano cones later today to
get a little exercise in before leaving land once more.