Exploring La Gomera

Yesterday was the only bright and sunny day on the forecast for this week so we hired a VW Polo from the most laidback rental company ever encountered and headed for the hills. The geography of the place is stunning - the island was described in one guidebook as being a bit like an orange squeezer, amost perfectly round with sharp ridges and valleys radiating from the centre. The flaura and fauna change dramatically - in the centre of the island the hills scrape moisture out of passing clouds and there is dense Laurel rainforest, to the north there are huge areas of cultivation (bananas mostly) on terraces painstakingly built over the centuries whilst to the south the land is dry and rocky.

The roads are a testament to the road-builders' art as they cling to the sides of ravines and climb in many hundreds of hairpin bends. The poor little Polo was in 3rd gear for most of the day, with quite a few 1st gear hairpins. Anyway we drove all over the island and absolutely fell in love with the place!

Here are some photos of our motor tour:

San Sebastian and our marina in the foreground, with Tenerife behind

Heading up towards the rainforest

A climber's paradise

The contrast of forest and barren rock below

Graham makes a new friend at the forest visitors' centre

Farming, the hard way!

Banana plantations at Hermigua on the north coast

The Valle Gran Rey - an incredible view but quite a touristy place

The clouds swirl in

Today, by contrast, has been wet and the hills above us are shrouded in mist so we've done food shopping and general boat jobs. The local forecast said Force 4-5 with gusts up to 57mph and they were spot on! We've just recorded over 50 knots on our windspeed instruments and the marina is a hive of activity as people try to tame flapping awnings and yawing boats. Glad we're snug in the harbour and not at anchor!

Photos of the passage to La Gomera

The red-sky-in-the-morning signs were all there for the last few days in Porto Santo as the gale approached but as we left the harbour on Thursday morning we had a beautiful rainbow behind us:

There was relatively little to photograph on the voyage - no dolphins and very few vessels but as we approached Tenerife and La Gomera at sunrise we had a brilliant view of Tenerife's volcanic mountain La Tiede in the half-light:

Having eaten very well on seafood at a local restaurant whose dining area was half room, half cave (the place was dug into the cliff) we collapsed into our bunk and slept the clock round. The weather is really on the odd side here, as well as at home (we've read about snowfalls in the north east) with rain coming though and high humidity. The mountains behind us keep disappearing in thick cloud so this isn't the day to go exploring inland but we hope that tomorrow will be better.

Looking forward, there's more interesting weather heading our way so it doesn't look as though we'll be moving from here for a few days. This is the forecast chart for Wednesday:

We're right at the bottom of the map, just below the '1004' and right in the path of the dark blue rainfall. So our recent theme of sailing then hunkering down to wait for the weather to clear seems to be set to continue! We just hope that all these strange weather patterns will sort themselves out before the start of the ARC in less than a month's time; we have no wish to be the first ARC to beat to windward all the way to the Caribbean.

Safely into San Sebastian, La Gomera

We're delighted that we had a really good crossing from Porto Santo – 309 miles in just over 48 hours and the first 24 hours under sail delivered a very respectable 165 miles, probably our best yet in Maunie. A few days of those sort of speeds would be very welcome on the trans-Atlantic.

 

As predicted, the wind gradually died away last night and we started motoring at about 19.30. Thankfully the swell dropped away as well so we motorsailed without rolling so each of us got good sleep off watch and we both feel in reasonably good shape. Gomera looks fascinating – almost a perfect hemisphere with banana plantations cut in terrace in the lower slopes and rocky hills inland. The marina has a good reputation and seems well organised so we've spend the last couple of hours washing the salt off the boat and our waterproofs and enjoying a cheeky little beer in the very warm sunshine. Rafiki should be in fairly soon so we'll look forward to comparing notes.

 

Photos to follow once we get the wifi organised (a code purchased from the petrol station apparently).

On Passage to La Gomera

It's 09.20 and Porto Santo is about 140 miles behind us. We've made brilliant progress in a Force 5-6, close reaching with 2 reefs in the main and averaging about 7 knots. We've been watching the rain clouds with interest (and even seeing them on radar) as they deliver a real extra punch of wind when they approach. The noise of the water rushing past the hull when we try to get some off-watch kip is quite startling but we both managed to get some sleep in the bouncy conditions. On deck the stars were incredible during the night and we now have bright sunshine.

 

Stormvogel left a day ahead of us, to get to the boat yards of Gran Canaria for expert opinion on their engine, but we have another British boat, Rafiki, following us. Rob and Cally have their two children, Emily and James, aboard who are loving the sailing and exploring. We are too far apart (about 40 miles) to talk on the VHF radio(which has a range of about 15 miles) but both boats have long-range SSB sets (capable of bouncing transmissions off the ionosphere around the world; we can pick up ABC from Australia); selecting the 2MHz frequency range we have 200 mile range so Rob and Graham chatted at 08.00.

 

We have just picked up the weather forecast from the sat phone so it looks as though the wind will gradually reduce during the day and we'll probably have to motor for the last 12 hours or so. We hope to get into San Sebastian de la Gomera on Saturday afternoon.

 

 

The gale passes, taking much of the beach with it!

We had another uncomfortable night on board as Maunie tugged at her mooring lines but the gale has now reduced to a still-windy Force 6. The boat was covered in salt this morning (from spray blown over the sea wall) and friends walked into the town and reported that a lot of the 4-mile golden beach had just washed away, leaving big holes and rocks.

The forecast suggests that there is a short weather window (just a couple of days) when the wind will go round to the west and reduce a little. Afer this window, there's another big low pressure system heading from the Atlantic which will bring more strong winds and rain. So, we have decided that we will have to miss on visiting the main island of Madeira (even though it's just 20 miles away) for fear of getting caught there for another week; instead we'll head south to the Canaries (about 300 miles so just under 3 days' sail. We'll look at the forecast again in the morning and leave tomorrow (Thursday) if it looks ok.

Whilst we've been here we've met lots of other boats doing the same thing as we are so we've all being comparing notes and debating when to make the break. We had a lovely drinks party on 'Rafiki' at lunchtime with crews from 5 boats today so we'll stay in touch via radio if we do set off tomorrow - we're aiming for La Gomera which looks really interesting. We'll let you know!

Exploring Porto Santo

Yesterday was a mix of moderate SW winds, sunshine and showers so we hired a 250cc quad bike and set off to explore.

Here are a few photos to give you an idea of this amazing volcanic island:

The harbour, with the marina bottom right. The entrance faces south west

(exactly the wind direction last night!)

Looking west along the beach....

.. and south east towards the lighthouse we watched for hours on the passage

Dianne leans on the safety rail of the viewpoint!

Fabulours driving roads through the barren hills apart from:

(a) Long drops and complete lack of safety barriers and

(b) the quad bike's reluctance to go round corners!

Dianne on The Beast

Our picnic spot on the cliffs of the north coast

Black volcanic rocks and golden sand at the SW tip of the island

Wild water - a taste of more to come!

We certainly picked the right day for our trip (just got rained on once). Last night it blew up to a full gale from the southwest (so we had a bit of a noisy and uncomfortable night on board) with really heavy rain. As you'll have seen from the photos, the island is pretty arid and all the drinking water comes from two desalination plants, so we're not sure what they'll do with all the rain. The forecast suggests a bit of a break from tomorrow evening until the weekend then the long-term forecast suggests more heavy weather next week. This is definitely not normal for this time of year and we must be careful not to get trapped by more gales so we may have to miss out on Madeira and head straight for the Canaries (2 days' sail from here).

So we'll set off tomorrow, possibly, or Thursday (to let the swell reduce a little). Meanwhile, we'll service our engine and sort a few other jobs.

Safely into Porto Santo, Madeira, after a bit of an epic!

Sunrise (day 2 before the gale)

Sorry, this blog entry was delayed by essential engineering work, as you'll read below, so here's a bumper edition!

The final 24 hours of our voyage Porto Santo to was quite an adventure. Once the wind returned on Wednesday morning we had some really good sailing, close reaching in a Force 4 westerly and averaging a decent 6 knots. The updated Grib files from the satellite phone suggested that the wind would swing round to the northwest in the evening (allowing us to ease sails out and sail at our fastest point of sail, a beam reach) but would also increase in strength as the southern front of a big low pressure system swept down to meet us.  Although the boat was heeled over, we managed to cook a good hot lunch and a hearty hot supper. so were well set up for the final night sail and whatever the weather brought.

At about 23.00, the wind changed to the northwest with a bang and a huge wall of rain. We saw it coming so reefed down early but, even so, the conditions (force 6 -7 and big seas) were a challenge and we rolled away the yankee completely and reached with just the staysail and two reefs in the main. After a while things settled down a bit so we were able to leave the autopilot in charge until about 04.00 when more rain squalls brought yet more wind and waves. Graham was then on helming duty with a big grin on his face for the next 5 hours in full foulies, with occasional big waves giving him a good salt water soaking (at least the water was warm!) and and then the rain giving him a fresh water rinse. The good news was that the three flashes every 15 seconds of the lighthouse at the eastern edge of Porto Santo could be seen, giving an easier reference point than when just sailing to the compass. The sailing was exhilarating  again under staysail and two-reefed main, averaging 7.5 knots and bouncing up and over the swell. It was probably a good thing that it was dark so we couldn't see the size of the waves but Graham did see a  line of white water to starboard - the crest of a breaking wave - and was helpless to avoid it, so it filled the cockpit and gave him another salt water bath. The cockpit has large drains at the back so emptied quickly and Maunie just shook herself and charged on. What a boat, she feels so secure in conditions that would have challenged bigger yachts!!

At 07.30 we rounded the south east corner of Porto Santo and sailed into the shelter of the bay, just as another huge rain squall arrived to rinse away the rest of the salt on sails, deck and us. Stormvogel was about 3 miles behind so we radioed them to say we'd wait just in case their engine wouldn't start. Sure enough, they called back to say that the engine was dead so for the second time we uncoiled our huge coil of tow rope and towed them (very slowly against a 30 knot headwind) into the harbour to face the next challenge of how to get them safely moored. Repeated VHF calls to the marina and harbourmaster yielded no responses so Dianne resorted to a general all-ships call: "Any vessels in Porto Santo harbour able to respond, this is yacht  Maunie of Ardwall. We are towing a larger vessel with engine failure and need assistance to moor her." A German yacht, Bella (who we later found out had spent 2 weeks in the same Vigo boatyard as Stormvogel having engine work done so were friends of Heidi and Peter), responded that they had alerted the marina staff who would come out and take over the tow. Sure enough a dory came out to us as we entered the harbour and said they'd take over but then their engine promptly failed! Laugh? We nearly cried! So we continued with Plan B, which was to tow Stormvogel slowly to a mooring buoy which Heidi successfully picked up, releasing our tow line at the same time. Much relieved, we hauled in the rope and headed for the marina until Peter radioed - "Help, this buoy is drifting! I am really worried." We turned back but at last the marina team had got their boat sorted and moved Stormvogel into a safe berth.

Towing Stormvogel into harbour, with the marina dory drifting with engine failure

We moored Maunie, went round to help take Stormvogel's lines, got big hugs from Peter and Heidi and a bottle of champagne was opened in very short order! Mathius and Ulrika on Bella invited us all round for a late breakfast aboard and it was wonderful to relax and share tall tales of the night's sail whilst outside the day alternated between bright sunshine and hard but warm rain and wind squalls.

During the afternoon we sorted all the paperwork with Customs and the marina, walked the 2 miles into town to find a very good supermarket that was absolutely crowded (we later realised that the ferry had arrived that morning with fresh supplies of fruit and veg) so we did a big shop and got a taxi back to the boat. We walked back into town for a meal with the Stormvogel and Bella crews and can clearly confirm that the Brisish held stereotype of Germans not having a sense of humour is entirely wrong. We laughed a lot and until the events of the past 4 days caught up and Graham suddenly began to fall asleep at the table.
So, into Friday morning and we both slept a solid 12 hours. The update from Stormvogel on the engine front wasn't good. Peter had checked the engine oil and found it to be white and thick - a sign of water in the sump. So we believe that the Vigo installation of the new motor, which included a new exhaust system, has a major flaw. Somehow In the big waves, sea water has been forced back up the exhaust pipe into the cylinders and past the piston rings into the sump. This is Not A Good Thing and will have potentially done damage to the brand new engine and explains why the starter motor couldn't turn the engine over. Graham spent most of the day working with Peter and Mathius trying to save the engine from very early death. Watching sea water shoot out of the pistons when we removed the glowplugs and turned the engine over by hand was shocking - the engine had become a 4-cylinder water pump. The immediate action was to change the engine oil and flush the sump as well as possible (using diesel rather than oil as a technique to flush it) and to drain the exhaust system of water to prevent it filling the cylinders again. In the process we believe that we found the very basic error that cause the engine to syphon sea water into itself and as darkness fell we managed to restart it.

So the thing is running again a but we assume that it will have done some damage to itself, particularly during the 40 hours of motoing after the problem first appeared since the lubricating oil must have contained sea water by then. Peter will have a battle with the Vigo yard take responsibility for their error (and maybe even replace the engine if it has done internal damage) but we hope he can now sail for Gran Canaria where there are good engineering facilities. What a nightmare, but we celebrated our success with a bbq and beer.

The beach at Porto Santo

The forecast looks as though we'll be here a couple of days at least but we are in good company of lots of other ARC boats so we don't think we'll be bored! Wifi connections require a 3/4 mile walk with the laptop to an 'internet lean-to' outside the marina office but we will update you when we have more news of our next plans.