Sailing Cantare

Selling and buying

2011-03-29T23:17:00.004+02:00

Tonight I won an auction on ebay, this AIS receiver for 77£, in Sweden they cost a lot more. Since Emelie now live in England I can buy things that used to be out of reach. I'll send it to her and she will then send it to me, perfect.

Erik and I decided that we wanted an AIS for this summer's trip, since it's likely that we'll experience quite a bit of fog. But at the same time we started to discuss how cold it will be in Scotland. Is it worth it? Going north in the summer, shouldn't we be heading south to the sun? We googled the average temperature and found out that it's about the same as in Gothenburg. Summer in Sweden can be cold. But where can we go then? Netherlands, again? Or Cornwall, to visit Emelie and Alan? I am really looking forward to at least 4 days of continuous sailing, will that be possible if we are going the other way? I want open sea with little traffic and big soft waves (not that I'm so sure that's what the North Sea will bring). Anyway, let's save that decision for later on.

/The Captain

Working on Cantare

2011-03-08T20:08:00.004+01:00

The new blog isn't ready yet so I guess I'll have to continue writing here in the meantime.

Last weekend was the first Cantare weekend in a long time. It felt a bit strange to be back in the cold barn starting all over again preparing her for an adventure. Of course, this time a lot of things are already done, which is really good since I'm studying full time now and trying to write on my book at the same time.

But the best thing this time is that I'm not doing it on my own. Sure, Sofia helped a bit before the West Indies trip, but mainly I was alone doing the work on Cantare while Sofia did the sponsorship hunt and other things that could be done from a distance. Nowadays I have a boyfriend, yes I've become one of the "ordinary" sailing couples, he also loves to sail. I'm still the captain though. Let's see if people we meet will treat me different this time. Anyway, Erik is his name and I'm sure he'll introduce himself in the near future. He is a great organizer, therefore this years work plan is very detailed, time requirement and who-is-doing-what are new features to me. This is what we have done so far:

Scraped the bottom (the old anti fouling was thick in same places and falling off)
Sanded the bottom
Lubricated the DuoGen
Took Monitor apart to change parts that are worn (also found a crack that needs to be welded)
Disengaged the oven to repair it (you could hear it in the last Atlantic movie)
Treated the watermaker with biocide to conserve it
Changed engine zinc

Hopefully Cantare will be in the water before my birthday on the 8th of May. At least that's the plan. / Captain Ingerup

Leaving San Diego for Gothenburg and Båtmässan

2011-01-30T21:36:00.007+01:00

The yacht show "Båtmässan" in Gothenburg is soon coming up! I will be there talking about our adventure on the 7th and the 12th of February! You'll find more information here and I'll will keep you posted! Now I'm on my way to the airport in San Diego, I'm starting my long flight home, leaving a fantastic work experience and exciting month in the States behind. See you on Båtmässan? Love/ First Mate Sofia

The Atlantic Movie 3

2011-01-26T00:15:00.004+01:00

I know updates are rare nowadays, but to cheer you all up in the cold winter I've decided to publish the last Atlantic movie, from the Azores to Falmouth crossing. This movie was made as a Christmas gift for my dad, you'll probably notice the absence of bikini girls. He claims himself a real Atlantic sailor since this "very" long crossing of 1200 nautical miles. You can be the judge.

This blog will soon change appearance to better suit my coming adventures and updates will then be more frequent again as the progress of making Cantare ready for Scotland begins.

/The Captain

Happy New Year - about to cross the Atlantic again

2011-01-01T08:21:00.003+01:00

This early morning I'm on my way to Copenhagen airport, about to cross the Atlantic Ocean again, this time by plane. It hit me how much faster (hopefully) my journey will be this time. But who knows, traffic on land and in the air is struck hard by the winter. I'm on my way to San Diego, USA. My studies in Stockholm went very well and I was rewarded a month internship there, exciting!!!

Happy New Year to all of you!
Love First Mate Sofia and Captain Maria says hello too, she's skiing up north.

PS!! To all of you interested in hearing more about our adventure, I will be giving two speeches at Båtmässan in Gothenburg in February! More info will follow.

Christmas again

2010-12-24T17:50:00.004+01:00

So much has happened since last year’s celebration. It’s now more than a year since we crossed the Atlantic with the ARC and yet it feels like yesterday. I still think a lot about all the good times we had together with our new friends. But it is also nice to celebrate Christmas with my relatives and eat all the traditional food. Right now it’s very cold in Sweden and we have lots of snow, it’s beautiful how the white surroundings lightens up the dark hours and make it possible to go skiing in the moonlight. I’m constantly being reminded of how incredible stunning Sweden can be and I realize that sometimes it’s really good to be home.

To all our sailor friends; we still think of you, miss you a lot and wish you all the best!

Sofia and I wish all our readers a Merry Christmas!

/The Captain

Ashore in Underpants or Offshore in Bikini Pants?

2010-11-29T13:14:00.009+01:00

Christmas is right around the corner, I can feel it. It is very cold, around -10 degrees, the snow is crackling when walking in the beautiful winter city Stockholm. For me it is very exciting experiencing winter again, first time in two years. Last year this time of the year was not spent shivering with cold looking for underpants, it was spent tanning in bikini pants onboard Cantare on our way to the Carribean. Contrasts? Indeed!

ARC 2010 started last Sunday the 21st of November. 234 yachts left Las Palmas headed for St Lucia just as we did one year ago....ONE YEAR AGO?!!? It's crazy, already one year passed since we crossed the starting line in Las Palmas and headed for the 23 days long adventure to Carribean. Time is moving by so unbelievably quick, in fact it's slightly scaring me. However, they say time flies when you're having fun and I'm definitely having fun!

Want to know more about ARC 2010? Click here

With Love/First Mate Sofia

Hard work to do

2010-11-11T22:15:00.005+01:00

Cantare is out of the water and back in my parents' barn. When she came up her hull was covered with barnacles, dad spent at least an hour with the pressure washer before she was reasonable clean, luckily I was in Gothenburg that weekend. Then came the boring task of unloading all the stuff. Some of it I store in my parents' basement some of it I brought to my new apartment and a lot of it I threw away. I found some disgusting leftovers under one of the bunks, it looked a bit like a butter package but I'm not sure and some of the rusty tins had holes in them. I think you can imagine what an unpleasant task it was to sort it out. Every time I took something away from Cantare I felt sad, it felt like I was tearing apart my home. Leaving my best friend naked and vulnerable. At the same time it amazed me that we actually lived on her for a whole year, she isn't that big, but nevertheless we managed to fill her with everything we needed and a bit more (I found a lot of things that we never used). The fact that she has been on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean is sometimes hard to grasp even for me. When Sofia falls in love with our capital I'm falling in love all over again with Cantare, my beautiful adventurer who took me safe back to Sweden. How I miss waking up to freedom and possibilities.

After a sad weekend when making Cantare ready for the winter I decided to plan another trip, not too far away in the future, otherwise I won't survive. The beautiful nature of Scotland has lured me for a long time, I think it's time to go there next summer. Cantare and Nessie might like each other and I'll see what it's like to go north instead of south, Iceland is still in my mind.

When I spoke to Emelie the other day she told me that they had decided not to sail to Sweden next summer, instead they are going with Alan's new yacht to Scotland. What a coincident, reunion in Scotland next year then. Just need to get Cantare ready for another North Sea crossing. Now I have a lot to do again. / Captain Ingerup

Mallorca – Seeing Summer and Yachts again

2010-11-01T23:38:00.010+01:00

Last week I was very fortuned having the opportunity to experience somewhat summer again. I got a week off the hectic city life and managed to convince my very best friend Marie to join me on an unspecified charter trip to Mallorca. I had never visited Mallorca and really wanted to go there, not only because people speak well about travelling there, also due to the fact that Palma, the capital, is home to large marinas. In Palma de Mallorca a number of yachts gather to prepare before crossing to the Caribbean after having spent the summer in the Med. Among other yachts Varsovie was there. Do you remember Varsovie? The 100ft Swan we were lucky to go racing with in the Heineken Regatta on St Martin. (Sending an extra thankful thought to our Alaskan stalker for getting to know Varsovie’s Skipper Patrick on a dive course…:-) )

When traveling unspecified one can pretty much end up anywhere and the hotel standard can be awful, however sometime one can be lucky, especially off season. So were Marie and I. We ended up in the north of Mallorca in Alcudia on a very nice hotel in a large comfortable apartment with a luxury relax & fitness centre and enormous pool complex where we almost were totally alone.

One day we went to Palma to visit the city and the Varsovie guys, Skipper Patrick, and his crew: Ian, Inness and Alexa. So much fun seeing them again and being reminded of the fantastic sailing year I’ve just experienced. For Marie the visit in Palma maybe wasn’t as exciting as for me, but I think Marie, to some extent, got a greater understanding of the importance and meaning of sailing in my life.

Around the same time as we landed in Stockholm again Varsovie took off towards the Caribbean. Guess who is kind of jealous?!? I am, big time! Instead of feeling the breeze in my hair while sailing out of the Med I have spent almost 14 hours at the office today …. I wont complain about my working hours though, after a week of total relaxation and sangria drinking I had to get back in business. And by the way, besides sailing I’m starting to think that doing business is my other passion in life! Over and Out/First Mate Sofia

I'm falling in love...

2010-10-09T18:14:00.005+02:00

I'm falling in love, I'm falling in love with my capital, Stockholm. So far this city appears at its very best. There is a song describing my feelings very well. It is a Swedish song called "Stockholm i mitt hjärta" a literal translation would be "Stockholm in my heart". Below you find the lyrics, have a very nice weekend! Love/First Mate Sofia

Stockholm i mitt hjärta - Lasse Berghagen

Solljuset stiger ur havet,
spelar i koppar och glas,
Stockholm i gryningen strålar
som var hon en gyllene vas,
med blommor från Östersjöns stränder,
med ängsört från ekarnas sal,
en skönhet på urbergets stränder,
Mälarens ljuva vestal.

Refräng:
Stockholm i mitt hjärta,
låt mig besjunga dig nu,
åldrad i ungdomlig grönska,
öarnas stad, det är du!
Av städer jag känner i världen
är du den stad som fått allt.
Genom Mälarens kärlek till havet
en blandning av sött och salt.

Solljuset dansar på fjärden,
det glittrar för stort och för smått,
för träkåken uppe på Söder
men även för Konungens slott.
Det porlar i fiskrika strömmar,
det valsar i Mälarens famn,
det skymmer och skänker oss drömmar
sjungandes sjöstadens namn.

Refräng:
Stockholm i mitt hjärta, etc.

Skymningen kom i en smekning
av kvällsbrisens skälvande hand.
Nu rodnar solen i fönstren
på Söder och Norr Mälarstrand.
Säj, hör du musiken och skratten
från Djurgården och Gröna Lund,
en lovsång till Stockholm i natten
från skärgårdens vikar och sund.

Refräng:
Stockholm i mitt hjärta, etc.

It's a small world

2010-09-22T20:41:00.007+02:00

I missed the first reunion in Norway, like Sofia wrote. I was actually in Finland that weekend, sailing a Bruce Roberts 39. Dad has been working on a long keel version of the same make for quite a few years and was beginning to question his own endurance. Were we to continue together, me designing and dad building, or should he sell the hull (no more is done yet) and buy an Orust-yacht. We took the ferry to Finland to find out what it's like to sail a 15 ton steel yacht. We feared that it would be slow and dull. It was raining when we stepped aboard the steady yacht Zephyr but when we left the harbour it stopped, still I was shocked when I felt the cold wind on my bare hands. After a while I couldn't feel my feet, that's how cold I was! Sailing in Scandinavia during autumn is not for me, at least not until I'm more acclimatised. Iceland will have to wait a while. Anyway, the yacht felt good, she heeled almost as much as Cantare when the wind picked up, and when sailing downwind she did good speed. She is a cruiser that's for sure, nothing for racing but that's not what we want. We were both excited and full of ideas as we started or journey back to Sweden. We will build the perfect yacht! At least in our eyes.

When it was time for the second reunion in Norway I couldn't resist. I took the buss from Malmö, where I now live and study, to Oslo where Patrick, Lina 4, would meet me. When I saw him it felt like no time had passed, was it really more than half a year ago that we waved him off when he left Grenada for the Pacific? It was, his hair was a little bit darker but except for that he was the same cheerful guy that we first met in Puerto de Mogan.

We had to hurry to the store to buy beer. When we stood in line to pay for them we started talking about the coming evening, Patrick said that he didn't know a lot of the other yachts. When I said that I thought that both Fortitudo and Havfrilla might turn up the guy in front of us turns around and asks whether we are going to the party tonight. It takes a second before I realize that it's Kyrre, one of the two guys on Havfrilla, and besides him stands Emil, Fortitudo, also with beers in his hands. What a small world!

They gave us a ride in Kyrre's car to El Mar's house. There we met the El Mar family who hoisted the whole get-together, Lina 4, Safari, Kaja, Fortia, Skamlös and Midnight Swan. Sadly Escape couldn't come due to illness. We had a lovely evening, food, beer, cigars and our own movies from the Atlantic made the hours pass by in no time. We all agreed that although it felt very strange in the beginning to be back home life was slowly beginning to feel a bit like it did before. Fortia and Skamlös are lucky, they will soon return to their yachts in the West Indies to continue around the world. The rest of us sees the future back out on the oceans, not right now, but in a "few" years.

The day after the party Patrick and I took a short walk in Oslo, we went to the castle so that I at least had done some sightseeing. When we stood there it was time to change the guards, I remembered that Escape's oldest son, Martin, used to do his military service as a guard. The last person in the group looked a bit like Martin. Could it be? Could it? Yes, it was! Again, what a small world. Patrick and I followed the guards around the castle until Martin was left to guard one of the gates. What a coincidence. It was his last day on duty. In the end I got to meet a little bit of Escape.

Memories of a fantastic weekend with the sailing family and a pink and red Norway beanie accompanied me on the bus back to Sweden. / The Captain

Seeing my Norwegian family again

2010-09-09T18:42:00.012+02:00

The weekend in Oslo made me realize even more how much I miss sailing and my Norwegian family. It was wonderful seeing them again and we all got a fact confirmed, the fact that we all feel a little disoriented after coming home. Spending a year on a sail yacht do affect people, and I would say it has entirely brought good experiences. The tears of joy were close when seeing Escape, Odin, Safari, Johanna, Lina 4, Duffen, Blue Voyager and others again. Maria could unfortunately not participate in Oslo but will represent Cantare this weekend instead when El Mar will have a reuinon party! I wish it would fit in my schedule and budget to fly out to Oslo this coming weekend too, but too bad I can't make it. I need to focus on my new life Stockholm and all new projects up here. For those of you who don't know yet, I'm in Stockholm this autumn attending the foremost strategic sales education for future leaders and entrepreneurs, U Ventures Sales Academy.

I love Stockholm! I've been very fortunated and got a part in an appartment on "Söder" in Stockholm, the place to be! The education is tough, but very inspiring, after finsihing it I will hopefully be more prepared for the business career I'm aming for. I'm learning how to overcome obstacles and reach success in business. I still have my master in Gothenburg left though, and will finish it the coming spring. However, I think it is going to be hard leaving Stockholm for Gothenburg to finish school. Gothenburg is indeed very beautiful and I like the city, but Stockholm has another beauty, a beauty I appreciate very much. Stockholm is located on 14 islands and the direct water contact here is awesome. One can basically take a swim in the middle of the city and go sailing just round the corner. Of course, Gothenburg is a coastal city too, but more like a seaport and you have to travel a little while to reach pure nice swim and sail water. I wont become absorbed in comparing the two cities, my point is: so far I like Stockholm very much and looking forward to spending my autumn here!

Time to rush home from office, my sister Katarina is coming up from Skåne tonight to visit me!

Have a very nice second September weekend!

Love/ FirstMate Sofia

Stockholms flytande båtmässa - the floating Boat Show

2010-09-06T22:56:00.003+02:00

Spent part of yesterday afternoon dreaming, dreaming I was back on the ocean again, feeling the the breeze filling the sails and taking me out on new adventures again... I visited the floating boat show in Stockholm, my current city. A number of boat companies exhibited their present boats on Djurgården, Stockholm, http://www.flytandebatmassan.se. /First Mate Sofia

Flying to Oslo - a true sailor's reuion

2010-08-27T20:42:00.003+02:00

I'm at Arlanda airport in gate 9 waiting for the delayed flight to Oslo. The flight is scheduled to 21.00 but delayed until 21.15, as long as I get there tomorrow I'm satisfyed. Tomorrow the family onboard the X-yacht Odin will have q reuinon party at their house in Oslo. I'm so excited, can't wait to see all sailors again, I miss my sailing family terribly! Now I think it is time to board...:-) Have q very nice weekend! Love First Mate Sofia

The Atlantic Movie 2

2010-08-26T15:03:00.003+02:00

Finally it's here, the second movie! Those of you who came to Höganäs when we returned have already seen it, but for the rest of you it's new. It isn't as good as the first one, because I did this one during our short sail from Helsingör to Höganäs. I had hoped to be able to make a better version later on, but time flies so I've decided to publish it as it is. Enjoy! / Captain Maria

The satellite phone now lives on S/Y Wind

2010-08-24T18:45:00.004+02:00

Today I've sold our satellite phone to the crew on S/Y Wind. Six friends from Gothenburg are doing the same trip as we did on a 47 foot yacht. They have a blog in Swedish which you find here: www.latalatituder.se As a good luck gift I've given them our fishing hook, let's see if they can beet our 1.05 meter long Dorado. Fair winds to S/Y Wind who leaves next Wednesday!
/The Captain (the Atlantic movie 2 will soon be uploaded)

Have a nice weekend!

2010-08-13T17:50:00.002+02:00

First Mate who is missing the sailing life extremely much would just like to wish you all a very nice weekend! Since we arrived home in Sweden my life has been very busy, my life has been far, far away from the sailing manjaña manjaña life I have lived this very last year. However, even though I miss the sailing life very much I wont complain, I do love the busy life at home too! Promise more updates when I have the opportunity! Over and Out! /First Mate Sofia

PS, If you would like to look at a picture of the three very happy sailors who won a prize in The Atlantic Rally for Cruisers for "very good accounts of life at sea", click here.

Feminist anchor

2010-08-10T16:35:00.004+02:00

My planed feminist anchor tattoo never happened. To some peoples delight I decided against it in the end. When the tattoo drawer in Falmouth made a worse drawing than my 3-minutes sketch, and he took at least fifteen minutes to do it, my resolution disappeared. I'll save it until I've rounded Cape Horn or sailed around the world and for now I'm satisfied with my own homemade pendants, they turned out quite nice. / The Captain

Cantare in the local newspaper HD

2010-07-31T11:24:00.003+02:00

This morning we could dream ourselves back to the sailing adventure with an article in the local newspaper HD, "Har vi seglat med den här till Västindien?"

You fing the article here: http://hd.se/angelholm/2010/07/31/langseglare-tillfalligt-i-hamn

Enjoy! /First Mate Sofia

Equipment for sale

2010-07-17T10:59:00.001+02:00

Some of the things that we bought especially for this trip is now on sale. If you’re interested send me an email, mariaingerup@hotmail.com, and I will tell you more about the them.

* Satellite phone Motorola 9555 with external antenna
* DuoGen-2 (water/wind generator) with service kit
* Watermaker Pur PowerSurviver 40E (5 liters/5 amps/hour)
* Zodiac 4 persons liferaft, coastal (found it floating outside England, no serial number)

* Navionics charts on SD-card
1 x Caribbean + Bermuda
1 x Europe + Cape Verde, Canaries, Azores

Pilot books
* Shell Channel guide
* Cuba
* Cruising Almanac 2009-2010 tidetables 2010

* Cruisers guide to fishing

* Paper charts northeast Cuba reaches to Varadero

Real life

2010-07-17T10:51:00.004+02:00

Why they call the land life real life I have yet to figure out. After almost a week in Sweden I still miss my life on Cantare. The first night in an ordinary bed was difficult, I couldn’t fall asleep, there were no water sounds, no movements and the air was dry and filled with pollen, which I’m allergic to. After one restless night I gave up and returned to Cantare, together with Sandra, Emelie and Alan (from Starfire) I sailed to our favourite harbour in Denmark, Hornbaeck. When the barbeque was loaded and the food was getting ready we could see the first lightning, the clouds were dark and threatening so we hurried back to Cantare. All of us were tired, when we’d finished the wine we went to bed. What a pleasure to fall asleep in Cantare’s fore cabin to the sound of raindrops on deck. When I woke up the next morning the others were barely stirring and it was already 11 am. Alan said it was his best night since he came to Sweden, I agreed. Although I tried to pretend that we were still on our big adventure I knew that we had to return to Sweden again. Back home real life according to my dad started two days ago, the alarm went off at 6 am and marked the beginning of my first work day. 8 hours in my dad’s workshop, welding, drilling and sawing, my feet hurt a lot when I was free to take a shower in the afternoon, I’m not used to standing up that much. The worst part though, everyone that came to visit laughed when they saw me and told me it was time to pay the price. Another thing that has fully hit me is how organized life is ashore, people plan ahead, not only for the coming week but months from now and they want responses to whether I’ll attend a party or not. The usual phrase, we’ll see how the weather is and if the wind is with us isn’t a good answer, they don’t seem to understand the concept of living for the moment. How I long for my real life, life on Cantare, freedom and adventure, when will I be able to get it back?

There is no place like home, or is there?

2010-07-16T16:10:00.003+02:00

A last update in Swedish about our homecoming is now to be found on the insurance company Europeiska's webpage, you find it here: http://www.europeiska.se/sv/blogg/?p=2102
Enjoy and have a really nice weekend! /First Mate Sofia

Thank You!

2010-07-12T23:06:00.005+02:00

Thank you so very much for the beautiful welcome we got in Höganäs when we arrived home! It was a wonderful day which we will remember forever. More updates and pictures will follow when we get the time and have woken up to the reality again... Until then, thanks for a wonderful year!/First Mate Sofia & Captain Maria

The 10th of July

2010-07-10T16:54:00.000+02:00

Shit, less than three days until we are coming home, crazy! As I think I have said a thousand of times, sailing and planning don't equal, but we will try to arrive in Höganäs harbor on time the 10th of July. However, to have a bit of margin we have set the time to sometime between 15.00 and 16.00 local time! I repeat, some time between 15.00 and 16.00 local time we will arrive in Höganäs! If you would like to come down to the harbor and wave when we are arrving please be there at 15.00! Thereafter Maria and I are looking forward to loads of hugs and kisses and a party in true sailor's style. Maria has just refilled our rum storage on Helgoland and throughout the afternoon and evening Carribean rum drinks will be served! We are hoping on glorious summer weather but the yacht club is booked in case of rain. Towards the evening we are planning to eat something together and to those of you who have the opportunity to stay the whole night and party with us (which we hope are all of you :)), please bring your own picnic food (and if you want something else than rum to drink, bring that as well)!

Looking forward to seeing you again!!!

Love/First Mate Sofia & Captain Maria

Polishing Cantare and Ourselves

2010-07-08T12:05:00.005+02:00

Maria and I are now preparing ourselves and Cantare to be ready to come home on Saturday. Among other things, stainless steel polishing is on the meny, Cantare is going to shine in the sun! Until we meet on Saturday there is an update in Swedish about our last adventures on the insurance company Europeiska's blog, you find it here:

http://www.europeiska.se/sv/blogg

For those of you who missed the article in NST/HD yesterday, a new chance is given here:

http://hd.se/angelholm/2010/07/07/cantare-tjejerna-tillbaka-efter-ar

Back to work! Over and Out!! /First Mate Sofia

Now, bring me that horizon

2010-07-07T11:35:00.001+02:00

After a few days with the lovely company of our Norwegean friends Lina 4 and Cintra, we were going in different directions after Aerösköping. It had been days with sun-drenched sailing, world cup games watched in harbour pubs and late dinners in Lina 4 with the never-ending supplies of sparkling wine that Arne kept popping. Lina 4 invited us out for dinner in picturesque Aerösköping on our last night together, with amazing food and an ending just as nice as the previous days had been. I have discovered that one of the upsides of sailing is that people of all ages and backgrounds meet.
The day after, we left for Köpenhamn, roads end for us on Cantare. As always, we bought lots of food for the last days onboard, including freshly smoked butterfish, shrimps and mussels in the harbour. The last leg was amazing. Sunshine over a calm sea, the quietness only disturbed by the many dolphins around us. Unfortunately, we immediately ran out of gas, so the treats we had bought were left uncooked. But, with a captain aware of the importance of sweets and snacks to keep her crew happy, we managed. I had a last swim from the boat just before arrival (we didn’t count on showers before going out in Köpenhamn, so it was also strategic), but the others didn’t believe me when I told them how warm the water was. We have had amazing weeks of summer onboard, and we are both eager to sail some more. Maria and I are already planning the next sailing trip, possibly with our own families by then. Who knows, long distance sailing just seems like something me and Erik haven’t seen the last of.
Köpenhamn greeted us good. Mooring in beautiful Nyhavn, we celebrated an amazing trip with snacks and beers before leaving Cantare for some city life. It was jazz festival in town, and an endless supply of restaurants and bars for sailors to enjoy. So, here our adventure comes to an end, and we will see Cantare in Höganäs on Saturday. And, of course, keep planning for some more sailing.

Love, Sailor Sandy

Bye bye Copenhagen

2010-07-07T02:38:00.003+02:00

Time to leave Copenhagen, too bad, it is a very nice city! Have had some great days here together with good friends I haven't seen for a long while. Thanks Eva and Jonas for hosting me while staying here! Cantare arrived yesterday and tomorrow Maria and I are off for some very last adventures before coming home on Saturday. The countdown has started! Until we see each other on Saturday, enjoy some of the last pictures you find here: http://picasaweb.google.com/SailingCantare/NorthSeaNorwayDenmarkALotOfFun

Nighty Night! /First Mate Sofia

Norway - Thank You!

2010-07-03T11:00:00.010+02:00

-Norway, thank you! Thank you for giving me so many wonderful friends and fun experiences during this year. The Sailing Cantare adventure would not have been the same without you! The Norwegian fairytale started already in Dover almost a year ago when we met the three Norwegian yachts, Johanna, Time Out and Escape. And as you all know that was just the beginning of what would be a year full of new friendships and fantastic memories. I am very pleased to have had the opportunity to sail with first Odin and then Safari to arrive in Norway and finally experience little of our beautiful neighbor country. For me Norway used to be skiing in Hemsedal where you bring your own food in order to afford the after ski, I didn’t know much else. Norway is indeed very expensive, kind of frustrating for a close to ruined sailor whose current is SEK, however I have now experienced a country with a lot more than expensive beers and good skiing.

I arrived in Oslo last Monday and have then met friends from Johanna, Time Out, Fortia and Skamlös. The guys on Johanna looked sort of the same, a little less tanned though, but it was still so strange seeing them in a non sailing environment and instead meeting them in their daily life. They told me to really enjoy the last week of the adventure, after a couple of weeks at home you will be back in the normal routine-like life with a lot of must do things... I took their advice to my heart and had some wonderful days in Oslo. Sort of living the true Sex and the City life with shopping (budget shopping though, no designer shopping as in the series), nice dinners and partying. Geir from s/y Johanna is running a restaurant called Lille Herbern on Bygdøy in Oslo. Terrific food in fantastic atmosphere! Lille Herbern is situated on a little islet outside Bygdøy with a nice view of the Oslofjord. They have a little boat transporting the guest to the restaurant from Bygdöy to Lille Herbern, very cosy! So if you happen to be in Oslo, the sun is shining and you are looking for a place to dine, take the ferry from Aker Brygge to Bygdøy! Have had a great time in Oslo, thanks Geir and Co for hosting me!

I love the life of contrasts so after some days of city life I put on some working clothes and ended up harvesting hay at my aunts farm. My mother’s oldest sister, Agneta, is not only my aunt and godmother also one of Cantare’s sponsors! She is pure girl power running a huge farm on her own! Since she is living next to the Norwegian boarder I just couldn’t pass her and her family on my way to Copenhagen without a short visit. Therefore yesterday was spent hay harvesting and barbequing on the countryside. It was a true flying visit, little too short but seeing her, my cousin Tina and other relatives was amazing!

Now I am on my way to Copenhagen visiting some good friends before finally meeting Maria and Cantare again! Looks like Cantare will arrive in Copenhagen on Monday. Really looking forward to seeing my Skipper again, we have a lot of gossiping to do…:-)

Have a nice weekend!

Love First Mate Sofia

Turning around

2010-07-02T16:57:00.004+02:00

The Kielkanal (Nordostseekanal) is behind us, we are in Holtenau now. Together with Lina 4 we've had a couple of lovely days. Arne (the skipper on Lina 4) and I are seriously considering going the other way. We play music from the Caribbean and dream about warmer water, do we really want to return to cold Scandinavia? I'm not so sure. There is not much more than a week left of this adventure. Sandra and I have already started to plan a new trip, how about Cape Horn or maybe an Arctic circuit, the plans are big as always. Here in Holtenau we have met a Norwegian couple who have been on a circumnavigation for seven years, inspiration is close by. The others are watching football while I use the free WIFI. I think we have another perfect evening ahead of us, and it's a very warm one so I guess that if we drink enough beers Arne and I can pretend that we are back in the Caribbean. See you on the 10th or maybe not...

New pictures can be found here: http://picasaweb.google.com/SailingCantare/EnglishChannelNorthSeaAndKielcanal#

/ The Captain

If I was his girlfriend.

2010-07-01T19:31:00.000+02:00

I was supposed to publish this yesterday, but WIFI in Germany seems to be very hard to get. Some places do have it but then they don't know the password or don't understand English well enough to understand what I need. Today we have motored on the canal and are now in Rendsburg, moored next to Norwegian Lina 4, we have invited them for tapas and champagne in Cantare tonight.

Helgoland is a German tax free island and inevitably attracts a big tourist crowd. Most of them seem to be retired couples who stroll around on the few streets looking for bargains in the many shops. The village isn't very beautiful, it looks soulless and boring, yet it felt good to be ashore again. Since the trip from Brighton to Helgoland took four days we decided to stay in harbour a whole day. Yesterday we spend a lazy morning in bed before we took the small ferry to the neighbouring island which is a nature reserve. There we could swim with "seehunden", the seals where playing and sunbathing all over the island's beaches. They were even inside the for human reserved swimming area, maybe they couldn't read signs. We had a lovely afternoon on the beach, read, slept and walked a bit. Sandra and Erik actually took a short swim, but I only dipped my toes because it was freezing, how I miss the warm Caribbean water. When we returned to the main island we went shopping, the fore cabin is now full of bottles, some of them for the homecoming party.

We had dinner in the cockpit when our closest neighbour on the outside of us wanted to leave. He had two other yachts on his outside which now were to moor on us. A rope was sent over from the German yacht, when we weren't quick enough to attach it he yelled at us from a distance of 5 meters. We looked at each other and frowned, no need to shout. When it was time for the move I went on deck to help the German yacht tie up alongside Cantare. When the bow and stern ropes were secured I asked him to move a fender to the middle where our yachts were close. He then said to me:

"If you were my girlfriend you would be in big trouble, wearing no shoes, that's unacceptable. Your vacation could end quickly."

Like I would be his girlfriend, he was older than my dad, even had his grandson with him. He didn't say hello or thanked me for helping out with the ropes, all he did was criticising me for not wearing shoes on my own yacht while I was having dinner in the harbour. I don't wear shoes while sailing either but that's non of his business, I prefer to feel the deck under my feet. I told him I wasn't on vacation, that I'd been away for a year and that on my yacht we didn't wear shoes. He shook his head and muttered about crazy Vikings. Then I said that we would be leaving at 8 am next morning, he said in a grumpy voice that it was very early and went down to check his tidetables. Returned and agreed that it was a good time to leave for Brunsbüttel. Again, if I wanted his opinion I would have asked. I guess it's time to get used to the know-it-all-vacation-sailing men, who think they ought to teach the little girl a thing or two about sailing. Or should I start wearing a T-shirt with the text: I've sailed more than 10 000 nm, shut up!

Today we have motored to Brunsbüttel on river Elbe. The timing was perfect, thanks to another much nicer German neighbour we had the tide with us during the entire trip, sometimes we did more than 8 knots. Now we have passed the lock that leads into the Nordostseekanal and are moored for the night. Time for a beer ashore before it's dinner in the cockpit. / The Captain

In Oslo

2010-06-30T16:47:00.003+02:00

First Mate is now in Oslo enjoying the beutiful summer city and having a great time catching up with old sailing friends. Norway will always have a special place in our hearts. Maria and I have gotten to know so very many Norwegian friends and boats during the trip, they are all so much fun and we will miss "the sailing family" very much! Cantare is on her way to the Kiel canal and then Copenhagen where I will come home to Maria and Cantare again. Love/ First Mate Sofia

Bloody foreigners.

2010-06-28T15:09:00.001+02:00

Helgoland 100623

After arriving in Brighton we decided to have a big breakfast to celebrate our arrival and prepare ourselves for a day out and about. I went to the gigantic supermarket located just of the marina, picked up my groceries and went to the cashier where I stood in line behind a Swedish couple. As I am travelling incognito I did not bother them with the somewhat boring fact that we were from the same country, but rather I enjoyed their difficulties in separating a pence from a pound, which I might say was not as easy as one might think. When they finally got it all right, had payed and left, the lady behind the desk leaned over and said in trust: "Am I allowed to say it?", "Yes, of course" I replied, "Bloody foreigners" she said with a smirk, I agreed and nodded my head. I am not sure if it was my very British tan, lobster style, or my British breakfast habits, consisting of sausages and bacon that made her believe that I was one of them.

Having finished our brunch in the sunshine aboard Cantare we went to watch the England vs. Slovenia game and down a few pints, luckily England won without playing very well. The late afternoon I spend cooking a nice spaghetti Bolognese while the ladies were of buying the supplies we needed to celebrate the midsummer in the proper way on our way to Helgoland. We all fell asleep early that night watching an episode of Dr House.

The second and last day of our stay in Brighton we spend at the Palace pier and in the city, shopping. We all managed to get ourselves a few bargains and returned to Cantare filled with the joy that only successful shopping brings, we filled her up with diesel and left the British shores behind.

Helgoland, here we come, approximately 380 nautical miles to go or four days of sailing. Early Friday morning we were coming up to the passage of Dover - Calais, here I had my first encounter with serious fog, I must acknowledge that being in a sailing yacht in a relatively heavy trafficked area with no visibility, just hearing the horns of substantially larger vessels is somewhat frightening to an inexperienced sailor like myself. I woke the captain up and she got up, horn in hand ready to signal. When the fog finally eased up we noticed that we had fish on the hook, we reeled it in and to our surprise we had not caught one but three mackerels, midsummer's lunch was saved. Fried mackerels with potatoes, finely chopped spring onions and lemon butter consumed in the sunshine was just as good as it sounds and the culinary peak of this trip so far.

We now live our lives in a very nice three hours on and six hours off routine that gives us plenty of time to enjoy the beautiful sunshine, and as I said before, I have gotten an extraordinary tan, some might say that when your face starts to come of , you have burned yourself. I say it is the normal way of getting a tan, it never comes easy and one has to earn one's tan. Besides working on my tan I have relistened to some of my favourite pod casts, read one sailing biography of a Swedish couple exploring the world in a 62 feet Hallberg Rassy and another about 3 young adventurous people that sail the world in a Vega, two totally different experiences but each with interesting episodes.

Now it is time for me to start my watch, Stay Black!

Boat Bunny 2 a.k.a The Bosun

A Perfect Midsummer Weekend

2010-06-28T01:52:00.012+02:00

Summer in the archipelago with the sun shining from a clear blue sky, what more can you ask for? It has been a very nice weekend in Norway together with Cecilie, Lars and their friends and family.

Last Thursday was spent in Skagen, Safari’s last destination before coming home. Cecilie and I sort of ran amok in a second hand shop where we found cool vintage clothes to reasonable prices. It is shocking seeing the prices in Denmark and here in Norway though. The now prevailing price level in our neighbor countries is deterrent and it especially struck me in Skagen when having lunch. We thought we found a very affordable restaurant to dine who offered a fresh lunch buffet for 69 DKK. The food was delicious but when we got the bill we learned where they earn their money, on beer. One beer was 74 DKK! Ridiculous, I mean a beer that cost more than the food itself and to point out the crazy prices even further, Cecilie’s orange juice was 36DKK! After a relaxing but expensive day in Skagen we sailed during the night towards Norway. Finally we got some good winds for pure sailing! Southwesterly winds up to 20-25 knots and with the heavy weather headsail and two reefs in the main we did about 8-9 knots, wonderful sailing! We sailed along the Swedish west coast and I could, from time to time spot Sweden in the horizon. A good friend of mine has a summer house on the little paradise island Nordkoster and when we passed some miles outside I called her and told her I was waving to her. Even though I couldn’t see her waving back to me it was wonderful talking to her and it recalled nice memories from time we have spent together on Nordkoster. Sailing in Swedish water, even if very shortly, felt really good, but also little sad since it reminded me of the fact that it remains less than two weeks of this adventure.

As I have mentioned briefly before I was very touched by the warm welcome we got when Safari arrived home last Friday. Cecilie’s mother is Swedish and she had made beautiful Midsummer wreaths which we saved for yesterday when it was time for Midsummer party and the celebration of one of their best friends who just turned 40. It was a thoroughly successful party which you can tell today, when we haven’t done much more than relaxing onboard listening to good music and watching movies. It was very wholesome though, can’t remember last time I chilled like this. It is since long time bed time, tomorrow we will sail back to Fredrikstad after the party here in the archipelago and I will wave goodbye to Cecilie and Lars. We have had a wonderful time together and I will miss them very much! Thanks for all the good times guys! However, Fredrikstad is not too far away from Sweden and I think there is a Caribbean reunion coming up pretty soon! Tomorrow I will go to Oslo and catch up with some old dear friends from among others s/y Johanna and s/y Fortia! So much looking forward seeing them again! Nighty Night! /First Mate Sofia

On our way to Helgoland

2010-06-27T23:32:00.000+02:00

Position: N 53° 53' E 006° 10' UTC 2120

Nautical miles left: 64

Total nautical miles: 384

Yanmar is working, we've had no wind or light wind against us. Life aboard is almost dry and very pleasant. Good meals and interesting company make the days and nights pass by. Most of the time it is sunny, but cold, sometimes we get surprised by fast approaching fog that after a while vanishes again. We caught four mackerels on Midsummer, but now all our good lures are gone. If nothing unexpected happens we will reach Helgoland tomorrow around lunch. A longer tale of our life since Brighton will be posted by Boat Bunny 2 tomorrow. / The Captain

Tears of Joy in Fredrikstad

2010-06-26T15:51:00.002+02:00

It has been some hectic days onboard Safari, especially for Lars and Cecilie who now have arrived home in Fredrikstad. And I have gotten a little preview of how is like to come home and see family and friends again. Even I have cried some tears of joy when we arrived here in Fredrikstad and got a wonderful welcoming of Cecilie’s and Lars’s family and friends. Seeing Cecilie embracing her father when he came onboard from one of the escorting boats when we sailed up the Glomma sound towards Fredrikstad was so emotional and made me cry! Even tough I will miss this life so much I am so much looking forward seeing home again....only two weeks left now!

LoveFirstMate Sofia

Cantare on the North sea

2010-06-24T18:04:00.005+02:00

After a lovely day in Brighton we are off again, this time we'll head for the North sea. I hope we get some wind and don't have to motorise all the way to Helgoland, our next destination. Midsummer will be on the water, hopefully we catch some mackerels for the celebration, at least we have lots of strawberries aboard Cantare./ The Captain

Skagen, Denmark

2010-06-24T10:48:00.000+02:00

57 43.1 N 010 35.30 E, Position 0800 UTC, Skagen Denmark

Haha, even though I been talking about how we just passed east of the Meridian of Greenwich I just noticed I forgot to change the latitude to east in the last position updates, haha, I guess I am too used to be on the west side... Anyhow, just arrived to Skagen, Denmark after 3 days and nights on the North Sea. Now we heading up to town for some real Danish beer and later a much longed for shower. We will continue towards Norway and Fredrikstad later tonight and sail the 85nm during the night and with good margin arrive in Fredrikstad tomorrow afternoon, the home of Safari!

PS. The Norwegian sailors are EVERYWHERE! The little marina of Skagen is covered by Norwegian sail yachts, I can count at least 15, and so far I have only seen 2 Swedish yachts... :-(

Have a very nice weekend and Midsummer Eve! This year I will celebrate Midsummer on Saturday in the Norwegian archipelago, som much looking forward to it even though I will miss my traditional Midsummer party in Båstad Sweden (a special greeting to the host and hostess, Sebastian and Louise, puss!)!

Lots of Love!/First Mate Sofia

Pictures from lovely England

2010-06-23T16:04:00.001+02:00

New pictures from our time in England are uploaded and can be found here: http://picasaweb.google.com/SailingCantare/FalmouthFoweyBrighton#

/ The Captain

Ohoy

2010-06-23T15:45:00.002+02:00

Got off my watch, alongside the beautiful coastline of Isle of Wight, just when dinner was ready; the mackerel Maria had caught this morning, I had gutted and Erik had fried in butter and lemon. We’ve had no wind yet, but hot summer weather which has made me want to swim, but the others just shake their heads at me.
Now my face is sunburned (some would say red), I am more relaxed than I’ve been for a while and it’s great to be back on Cantare. We have known each other since I was around 17, Cantare and I, and sailed together for years now, little adventures here and there. On Cantare I have discovered an interest in sailing that our High School couldn’t create, met new friends, she has cured heartbreak and watched new relationships form, short and long, and now I have introduced her to Erik. They like each other.
Seeing Maria after she completed our long-time dream journey was exciting, I was proud and eager and curious, champagne in hand waiting in Falmouth, and when we met after one and a half years again it was like no time had passed. I guess that’s what happens with really good friends. Or boats. Cantare was the same, too, smelled a little worse, looked a little worn, but we fell into old patterns instantly. Except, perhaps, the fact that I haven’t been seasick at all (yet). Instead, it’s all been lazy days in the sun, reading and writing, cooking and steering, meeting Marias sailing friends and simply enjoying life as crew. Night watches have been calm and quiet, just me and the sea, something I have always appreciated with sailing. Lessing and Austen have kept me company under the stars, and as soon as my watch has ended and I have crawled to bed, cold and tired, Maria has called me back from sleep wanting me to take a fish off the hook, or help out with something. I obey, grumpy but grateful to be part of the last part of this journey. Today, Brighton awaits. Beers, bars and football. I could do this for a long time.
Love, Sailor Sandy

Sunrise in the North Sea

2010-06-23T11:22:00.000+02:00

Position 57 33 N 005 49 W 09.20 UTC

Sunrise at sea is one of those things I'll miss the most after having returned home the 10th, this morning we experienced one of the best ever! The sunrise coincided very suitable with the watch change, since it has been very foggy and it is way more fun being two on watch we have occasionally had double handed watches and therefore everybody was up on deck. During the night the wind had died, leaving the sea to look like a mirror and the rising sun was beautifully shining on the calm sea. It was a great moment, we were all quiet, reflecting over life and realizing how good life is. In the sunrise I finally saw an oil field in the horizon, about 20nm away, but I could still clearly see the huge complex rise from the sea. Unfortunately I couldn't see any Ben Affleck though. I started thinking, is that the cash cow creating the strong Norwegian economy? Or shall I put it this way: do the oil fields make it possible for way more Norwegian than Swedish sailors to pull up the anchor and take off? No, I don't think the many oil fields is the correct answer, but they are good cash cows for sure and a point worth noticing is that this summer 50 Norwegian yachts take off for a translantic adventure and if I have remembered it right, 27 of them are joining the ARC, Atlantic rally for Cruisers!

The sun that rose this early morning is still shining and I hope it will continue all day long! The tan is nowadays scarily fading away and at nights (and some days) it is freezing cold! The last couple of days it has been around 9-12 degrees C, brrrrrrrr! We have now around 160nm to Skagen and if the coming weather forecast haven't changed the outlook for Friday we will visit Denmark tomorrow, not to arrive too early to Safari's coming home party on Friday in Fredrikstad.

Out! /First Mate Sofia onboard Safari in the North Sea.

Among Ghosts, Oil Fields and maybe Ben Affleck?

2010-06-22T11:36:00.000+02:00

Position 57 33 N 000 48 W 09.30 UTC

When I woke up at 02.45 UTC before my night watch the fog had almost disappeared, puh, it was sort of a relief. Fog is one of the great dangers a sailor has to deal with. On the North Sea there are numbers of fishing boats without radar or AIS, they are basically ghosts appearing when you least expect it. Like yesterday when our visibility at one point was no more than 50m and Cecilie and I thought our eyes were about to pop out because of the constant staring into the fog, a ghost suddenly appeared. On starboard hand side I saw something white approaching in the fog: BOAT BOAT!!! The first seconds it was hard seeing whether we were on collision course or not but the next second we judged it would almost certainly pass behind us and therefore gained speed to be on the safe side, puh! It wasn't a small fishing boat, it was a large one and a collision would have been devastating...

Not only do we have to lock out for ghost while crossing the North Sea, also oil fields. I can't count the number of oil fields I see on the paper chart here next to me. I haven't seen them yet for real though since it has been too much fog on my watches. If we will get close enough Cecilie and I are considering a quick stopover at one of them. You see oil fields make us think about the movie Armageddon, in which a pretty young but very attractive Ben Affleck is acting, maybe we can find some other hot oil men at the oil fields?!?! We haven't really mentioned our plan to skipper Lars yet, we don't know whether he neither deckhand Glen will find the idea as tempting as we do... Anyhow, we are doing good speed and if the the coming weather forecast is as satisfying as we are hoping, it looks like we will have time for another stopover, the one in Skagen.

PS 1: Have you noticed the latitude in above position? This morning around 06.00 UTC we passed the Meridian of Greenwich, we are no longer west of Greenwich, we are east and very soon in familiar waters.

PS 2: If you want to read more about the adventures with Safari they have an excellent blog: www.sailing-safari.com

Love/First Mate Sofia

A North Sea covered in Fog

2010-06-21T21:42:00.000+02:00

Position 57 50 N 002 03 W 19.30 UTC

We left Inverness this morning after a tasty breakfast, went through the last two locks of the Caledonian Canal and took off towards the North Sea. So far so good, we are however forced to motor since we have a steady headwind, but the wind is suppose to turn to the south and later southwest. The smell down in the saloon is wonderful at the moment, Lars is cooking and four hungry sailors are looking forward to have dinner any minute now. The only thing bothering us is the fog. We have occasionally very bad visability, the radar and AIS are very helpful, but still, the fog is not very fun and we keep a constant sharp look out! Love/First Mate Sofia

Goodbye Scotland - Hello North Sea

2010-06-21T04:31:00.002+02:00

We have had a couple of great relaxing days on the Caledonian Canal and my opinion of Scotland still remains, I have a minor crash on the country and truly recommend a visit here! Cecilie, Lars and Glen can only agree with me, we have all come to like this country very much! Time flies when having fun though, we are about to say goodbye to Scotland, tomorrow we are off to the North Sea... Yeah, the North Sea it is, I don’t know whether you remember how the North Sea was like last time Maria and I was out there, it was rough, real rough. And I don’t want to experience it again, however, I am still insured by the insurance company, and yes, you all know the name, Europeiska! I hold the North Sea in great respect but I am not afraid, the weather forecast looks good, a high is about to intensify and light breezes are predicted. I just hope the wind wont be to light, I hate motoring a sail yacht and I would love to get some nice downwind with Safari and her gennaker. This is Safari’s “last” crossing before coming home to Fredrikstad Norway. On Friday afternoon, Midsummer Eve, we intend to arrive in Fredrikstad, which will be sort of my rehearsal before our own homecoming party the 10th of July, just like Maria’s rehearsal in Fowey. It is about 505 nautical Miles to Fredrikstad from here, Inverness, so leaving tomorrow gives us plenty of time to reach home, but one never knows what can happen on the North Sea and a good margin is necessary! Hopefully we will have time for a little stopover in Skagen, Denmark, about 85 Miles from the home of Safari.

As I use to say, a picture is worth a thousands word and since internet is finally starting to show off, I will gladly share some pictures from our Scottish adventure! You find the new pictures, Scotland - an European Pearl, here: http://picasaweb.google.com/SailingCantare/ScotlandAnEuropeanPearl

Ps. Regarding our Coming Home Party the 10th, we are planning on arriving in Höganäs sometime around 15.00 – 16.00 local time, but as you all know planning and sailing don’t equal, however, if you would like to see us approaching we recommend you to show up around 15.00!

Good Night/ First Mate Sofia

Greeted like heroes

2010-06-20T22:42:00.000+02:00

Yesterday I woke up when Emelie opened the hatches and asked if we were awake. I had returned to my bed two hours earlier after having spend a wonderful night on Silver Bear, therefore I wasn't very talkative at 8 am. Emelie seemed to understand that immediately and told us she would see us later, in Fowey, where she would be waiting. She had landed one hour earlier to be here in England when Alan made his final leg from Falmouth to Fowey. I tried to focus on what lay ahead, getting up, taking a shower and prepare Cantare. 10 am we all left Falmouth, by then I had managed to shower and have breakfast but it was still a mess inside the yacht. Sandra and Erik tidied her up while I took us out of the harbour. Yanmar was working hard since we had the wind against us in the beginning. When we came around the corner of the river entrance we set sails and turned off the engine. Sandra and Erik were smiling, it was a very nice day with blue sky and sun, yet it was a bit cold for my Caribbean accustomed body. After a while Alan called us over the VHF and asked what speed we were doing. He wasn't happy with our progress towards Fowey, we had to start the engine to get there in time. Silver Bear wandered off on there own for a while. Alan tried to call them on the VHF, but got no answer, later we learned that Ray had decided he was going to be off watch most of the sailing and was sleeping down below. But Cantare and Starfire sailed in convoy during four hours and were joined by Silver Bear in the end, before we met the welcome committee. Emelie and Bob, Alan's dad, and a few others sailed out to meet us. We took down the main and moored along a pontoon in the city centre. Champagne was handed out as we jumped ashore. Alan and Emelie kissed and hugged. It felt like a rehearsal for our own homecoming party and we received congratulations from the people on the pontoon. We posed for photos together with Starfire and Silver Bear and enjoyed the sunny afternoon on Starfire cruising the river before the big party and dinner were held at the yacht club. It was a great day! Today I feel a bit sad though, Silver Bear left this morning before we were up and Starfire is already laid up ashore. From now on Cantare is on her own. Tomorrow we are off again, destination Brighton./ The Captain

Celebrated return to Fowey

2010-06-20T20:22:00.005+02:00

Arriving in Falmouth

2010-06-18T22:35:00.007+02:00

Yesterday Cantare arrived in Falmouth. Starfire, Silverbear and my new crew were there to welcome us. After a very nice shower and a big meal ashore dad decided to stay at a hotel (I think he was tired of wet bunks) and took a plane to Sweden today.

I have uploaded pictures from the Azores and the last Atlantic crossing. You find them here: http://picasaweb.google.com/SailingCantare/TheAzoresAndTheAtlanticCrossing#

Tomorrow it's time for Starfire's last leg to Fowey, Cantare and Silverbear will sail there together with them. Time to test my new crew. They have helped me buy food today, and there's a lot of it. If they sail like they shop we'll have a wonderful time, I'm actually quite sure that we will. Time to start the last adventure! / The Captain

Climbing the Ben Nevis

2010-06-17T00:58:00.007+02:00

That Ben Nevis almost killed us yesterday, but it was so worth it, the view stunning and the nature wonderful! Our sleeping muscles needed to be awaken, or maybe not that abruptly though, today my body feels like I have been knocked down or something. However, giving up when something is hard is simply not my style, neither is Cecilie’s. We pushed each other up the top and tried or best to keep up with skipper Lars who surprisingly didn’t seem to be affected by the mountain climbing. Why on earth is he in better condition than us!?! Cecilie and I came to the conclusion that he is taller, have longer legs that take him about 10 cm longer each step he takes and he has also more muscles than us. Longer legs or not, we have come to the conclusion that after returning home it is time to awaken those muscles for real, detox our bodies and look better than ever, haha, or at least get fit again! However, skipper Lars has been complaining about sore muscles today so he is still human! Despite escalating pulse and sore muscles today it was an amazing day, it is hard to describe the astonishing view and it is hard to show reality through pictures.

Ben Nevis is 1343 m high and UK’s highest mountain. When getting closer to the top we saw snow and glaciers and started freezing. The temperature was close to zero and the brought clothes we thought we would never have use for when sweating on the way to the top was very useful higher up in the snow. The longing for skiing was huge and I am really looking forward to real winter again with snow and skiing! After having enjoyed the top for a while and also gotten some very beautiful pictures when the fog fortunately decided to disappear it was time to start climbing down again with shaking legs. After 8 hours of climbing we decided we deserved a pizza and was recommended a take away pizza place with Fort William’s best pizzas. The restaurant didn’t only have the best pizzas, also the sweetest owner, another proof of the wonderful kindness of the Scottish people. We missed the last bus back to the boat when ordering pizza and instead of taking a cab the pizza man insisted on driving us. He is not a Scot originally, but came 40 years ago and stayed, mostly due to the friendly people!

Tomorrow we will continue up the Caledonian Canal towards new adventures! The plan is to be back in Norway and Fredrikstad, the home of Safari on the 25th, at the moment it looks like it will be possible to leave Scotland on Monday. This weekend a low will cause rough weather on the North Sea and no more lows on the North Sea please, I think I had enough of that last time I was there…

Love/First Mate

Day 11 - Waterworld

2010-06-16T15:30:00.000+02:00

Position: N 49° 06' W 008° 12' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 147

Yesterday we downloaded a grib-file and discovered that the wind would be more or less against us the coming 24 hours. We decided to tack immediately, then we would do a tack again before the night watches started and in that way avoid having to sleep in the wet bunk. What we hadn't foreseen was how the water now started to soak our dry bunk, horrible! We discussed sleeping with a big plastic bag underneath us, but hoped that it wouldn't get that bad before we did the second tack. Sailing on the other side made us a bit confused, it was hard moving around since all the good resting points now had vanished. The toilet door that used to be a nice plane surface to lean against while dressing was now up in the air, on the other side is the moving stow which has a lot of sharp points that should be avoided. Suddenly there was more water on the floor, the water that had hid under the table and dinghy was now in our prime moving space and some of my cloth that was hanged up on a rope fell down into it. The only thing that was made easier was to do the dishes, but it didn't make up for the negative sides. When I stepped outside ready for my watch I was feeling wet, my clothes were party soaked, my socks damp and my spirit low. Dad had sailed 1 single nautical miles towards Falmouth during his 4 hours and it didn't look like I would do a lot more, in the end I actually did -1 towards our destination. The strange thing though was that the sailing was really pleasant. Over ground we were doing more than 5 knots and the sun was shining. I put on my damp gloves and decided that it didn't matter that they weren't dry, they would warm me anyway. I felt happy again, life is good, I am sailing.

During the night the wind veered, this time in our favour. We could sail directly. I started to imagine how it would be to get into the shower in Falmouth, how the warm water would wash away all my accumulated coldness. Lovely thought. Sadly the wind started to veer again this morning, exactly the same way as it had the day before. I got a bit frustrated and when dad went to bed I started the engine. Yanmar together with the sails make us go the right way, it is very noisy but I drown it with Rammstein. I hope we can make it to Falmouth before the pub closes tomorrow night, otherwise I have two friends stranded in England. / The Captain

Day 10 - Going to France?

2010-06-15T15:01:00.000+02:00

Position: N 48° 22' W 009° 27' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 210

Since day one we've had the wind in from the same side, our portside. Today the wind has veered and are forcing us to sail to Brest in France. A moment ago there was a fishing boat on collision course, Maria called it up on the VHF. They were talking French, a language we don't speak, which made it difficult to decide whether to pass behind or in front of them, the only things they could say in English were fishing and we don't speak English. After this encounter with the frog people we have decided that Brest is not an option. But there is another problem, if we tack we'll have to sleep on the port side bunk which is soaking wet. In a short while we will download a grib-file with weather information and decide what action to take. Candy and cookies are running low, we need to get ashore soon. / Deckhand Anders

Scotland, beautiful indeed!

2010-06-15T01:35:00.005+02:00

Position 56º 51’ N 005º 05W Caledonian Canal, Scotland

Stunning scenery, bag pipes, friendly people, pubs, whiskey, local dance, canals, kilts, Ben Nevis, castles, forts, midges*, Braveheart… it is all about Scotland!

Today’s been the most beautiful days in a very long time, last time it was this sunny was some day on the Atlantic on our way back from Cuba. I have come to like Scotland very much, it is hard not to fall in love in this country when the sun is shining on a wonderful landscape and when the people are among the friendliest and helpful you have ever met.

Yesterday we left Crinan Canal and continued sailing up north through the Scottish archipelago. The rain silent drizzled the first miles but it didn’t bother us, we were too engulfed by the fantastic landscape. We passed safely east off the frightening Gulf of Corryvreckan a sound with scary currents and turbulence caused by drastic differences in depths. To quote Reeds, the yachtsman’s bible: “Gulf of Corryvreckan is best avoided and should never be attempted by small craft except at slack water and in calm condition.” But we sure did get our share of Corryvreckan even when we passed east of it, the sea was turbulent, whirlpools pushing Safari in different directions. However, we quickly passed and the sun soon came through. One should never underestimate the power of currents though, when we got closer to Fort Williams and the Caledonian Canal we occasionally had 5 knots co-current, doing 11,4 knots and a boat doing slalom in the fairway.

After having arrived in the little village Corpach just outside Fort Williams where the Caledonian canal begins we soon discovered that the local pub had a live band playing that evening. Finally some bag pipes! The band was awesome and Cecilie and I couldn’t resist join the locals dancing. We also got to try the bag pipe, hm, we didn’t manage to get some sounds out of it though, I think we need to practice!

Today we have started locking our way up the Caledonian canal, have done 8 locks today. Tomorrow we will try to climb all the way up to UK’s highest mountain, Ben Nevis, 1343m! Over and Out/First Mate Sofia

Day 9 - Crashing into walls

2010-06-14T16:19:00.000+02:00

Position: N 47° 41' W 012° 02' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 322

For the last 24 hours we've had winds of about 30 knots, the waves have become bigger of course. Like dad wrote they are mountains with waves on top. Cantare likes a lot of wind, most of the time we don't reef before 25 knots of wind. But now we have one reef in the main and have furled the head to the first reef point. We are doing more than 5 knots although we are very close hauled. The wind is from the north, most of the time we manage to go directly towards Falmouth on a 67 degrees course. It is amazing how good Cantare moves, not loosing too much speed when the waves come rushing towards us. But, sometimes and recently more frequently, she comes to a halt, a sudden crash, we wonder whether we've hit something before we realize that it is nothing as serious, only one of those extreme waves. The extreme waves are almost twice the height of the normal and usually they brake into Cantare's side, it feels like hitting a wall when the hull shudders and I imagine a big hole on the bow that will sink the yacht in no time. But I usually come to my senses at the same time as the top of the wave lands in the cockpit, if I'm too slow to bend down behind the spray hood it lands on me, cold water trickling down the neck and making me scream. When it's sunny outside I enjoy sitting with my face tilted a bit upwards, but that's a bad idea, especially on my morning watch when I have to sit behind the wheel not to be shadowed by the spray hood, nowadays it's a question of minutes before I get a free ocean spa cleaning of my face. Saltwater is healthy isn't it? A few minutes ago dad was sitting on one of the safe spots when we hit a big wave, there was so much water in the air a short while later that it even got to him there in the corner, his hair was soaked and flat on his head and his glasses where covered with water. We both laughed, what else is there to do. The waves keep excelling each other, when dad stood up to look for ships we hit another one, he could see a lot of water flying up over the yacht and almost reaching the spreaders. It's a wild ride, but a fun one, especially for the person sitting inside. / The Captain (who watch dad get wetter and wetter)

Day 8 - Becoming a seaman

2010-06-13T15:40:00.000+02:00

Position: N 46° 38' W 014° 36' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 443

Today we have been sailing for one week. Cantare has been heeling with about 30 degrees to the starboard side and rocking more or less constantly. We have adapted routines for life onboard. I have been reading and listening to more books in one week than I have done during the last 15 years. While listening to books I can stand looking at the sea for a long time and I'm amazed how different the waves are from the ones in my home waters. They are like small mountains with waves on top of them. In the beginning of this trip I was afraid of getting seasick and the first two days I was a bit uncertain about how to behave and what to eat. I realized that I couldn't be looking at the horizon for seven to ten days. I must admit that the first two days I felt a bit queasy but from day three I got my sea legs and now I'm feeling perfectly well. I haven't been facing more than about 40 knots of wind for short periods so I'm not hundred percent sure about how I would cope with a storm. About my relationship with the captain I have realised that she has got much more experience on ocean sailing and trimming Cantare so I just have to obey orders. There is just one subject that I constantly disagree about, that's when she's giving me my rations of cookies or sweets. My point of view is that we have to eat the best things first and in a rather high speed due to the fact that we might have to abandon Cantare in case of an emergency.

So far we have been lucky with the wind speed and direction, the captain says that we will be in harbour on Thursday the 17^th. We have come to the conclusion that we both need to take a shower, someone is smelly onboard. We're not sure whether it's us or the free passengers I have mentioned before. After that I look forward to a big steak and some beers.

Contact Details Sailing Safari / Well done Anders & Maria

2010-06-13T03:44:00.006+02:00

Onboard Safari there is also a satellite phone, so if you want to get in touch with me, or just send a little greeting don't hesitate to send a text message! It works the same as when texting our phone on Cantare, you just change the number! Safari's number: +881631619141

Forgot how to send text messages? Here is a little reminder: Click here to go to the Iridium Messaging page. The first numbers of the telephone number are already being filled in. All you need to do is to fill in the rest, that is, 31619141. Skip writing anything in the "reply email" box and just go ahead and write your message to us and then click the button "send message" and we will recieve a message from you within a couple of minutes!

I will post updates of my journey with Safari as often as possible, but as usual, finding internet can be hard. However, safari is also a keen on blogging and they have a very nice webpage, visit http://www.sailing-safari.com/ where you can read more about our adventure!

/First Mate Sofia -who is very proud of the owner Anders who is doing a great deckhand job onboard Cantare, and now also blogging while doing the dishes! And proud of Maria too who is skippering her dad and owner! I think she not only teasing with desert, also using a lot of candies to make him follow her orders:-)

Beautiful Scotland

2010-06-13T02:50:00.004+02:00

Position 56º 06’ N 005º 33W Crinan Canal, Scotland

It is time for new adventures! After some rainy and cold but very nice days in Dublin Safari and MaggyV took off to find new adventures in Scotland the day before yesterday and First Mate Sofia is joining! Odin is now complete again after the arrival of Hella and Anna-Luna and they will gradually make their way back home to Norway. Safari and MaggyV are planning a quicker route and wish to reach Norway little faster which suits me perfect in order to be able to come home to Cantare again in time before our arrival in Sweden. Just noticed that it is less than a month left of our adventure, time flies at the moment, it is really scary! I had a wonderful time with Odin and would love to continue sailing with them, however, it is so much fun to join two of my new best friends, Lars (33) and Cecilie (27) on Safari and not to forget their crew at the moment, Glen (55). Maria and I met Safari in Puerto Mogan, Gran Canaries and we have ever since had a great time when seeing each other in the Caribbean! I will now sail with Safari to Norway and then Maria and I are planning to catch up in Copenhagen. I would like to thank skipper Lars and his son Nicolay on Odin for a wonderful time while sailing to Dublin, I had a great time and Odin sails beautifully! Hope to see you very soon again!

We left Dublin at lunchtime last Thursday and had around 200 Miles a head of us to Crinan Canal in Scotland. Occasionally we had 20-25 knots of wind against us and it was little rough coming out in Irish Sea and later North Channel. Despite having strong headwind and disturbing waves Safari’s Volvo engine (55hp) kept good speed (7 knots) and we quickly moved north together with MaggyV. We tried to plan the tides the best way to gain as much co current as possible and our calculations were right, yeah! During the night we passed Belfast on our port side and on starboard side England approached. The traffic to Belfast was rather busy and unpredictable fishing boats seemed to be everywhere. “Red or green over white, fisher tonight” – a little rhyme that was practiced during the night while keeping a good look out. Coming from the Atlantic Ocean where you hardly see any other boats you need to adjust a little when entering the traffic zones again. We crossed the North Channel and put a waypoint in Firth of Clyde and sailed north with the island Arran on our starboard side. Since Safari’s ordered electronic charts hadn’t turned up we navigated in true old fashion style with detailed paper charts! So much fun when you haven’t done it for a while! Onboard Safari Lars and Cecilie have different tasks. Before setting out on this sail adventure had hardly sailed before and they bought Safari 8 months before taking off and in order to be able to sail away so quickly the two novices decided to focus on different things. Skipper Lars for example learned the boat and its functions carefully while Cecilie studied navigation and other more theoretical subjects like communication. I am so impressed by how they have managed to fulfill a sailing and travel dream and how good sailors they have turned out being, Lars and Cecilie is a passionate dream team (I am really looking forward to the wedding invitation)!

After 30 hours we reached Adrishaig and the entrance to Crinan Canal. The local pubs in the little village of Adrishaig were soon visited by the Norwegian (and Swedish) Vikings and the evening turned into late night with Scottish songs and Whiskey. It was a bunch of tired hangover sailors that at lunch time entered Crinan Canal, one of Scotland’s most picturesque waterways. The tiredness however soon drifted away while motoring in the indeed fantastically striking canal. The canal is 10 nautical Miles and consists of 15 locks and 7 bridges and most of them you operate yourself. Locking is really fun and got me thinking about the wonderful chill canal ride Maria and I had in the Netherland’s canals. Cruising down a canal is very relaxing and especially nice in this beautiful Scottish landscape. We arrived at the last lock this late afternoon and tomorrow we will continue up north through the Scottish archipelago towards Fort William and the Caledonian Canal. Loch Ness is part the Caledonian Canal, I have been there once before but that time I didn’t meet Nessie, the lake monster, Maybe I will be luckier this time?

Over and Out from a Scottish paradise (with out palm trees though) /First Mate Sofia

Day 7 - Memories

2010-06-12T15:36:00.000+02:00

Position: N 45° 35' W 016° 36' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 547

In about five days Cantare and I will have completed an Atlantic circuit. Falmouth is the first place that we return to and it is also the place where I feel that our long-distance sailing experience started. There we got to know the Norwegian yachts Escape, Johanna and TimeOut, the Danish boat Ing and the Swedish yacht Inga. We became a part of the big sailing family and exchanged power-walking and running for beer drinking and new friendships. I remember the excitement that we all felt right before it was time to leave for the Biscay, we were running around on the pontoons hugging each other and wishing the others fair winds. We gathered in front of Escape and took a few pictures of the group, we were dressed in waterproofs and ready to go. Together with the Norwegians we left in the sunset, small shadows with glowing lanterns on the rough sea, friends in the dark. Cantare returns without the others. But they are in my mind.

Escape was somewhere on the Atlantic on the way to Horta when we left seven days ago, hopefully they have reach land now, from there they will take the Caledonian canal to Norway. Johanna and TimeOut planned to sail around the world, but right now the yachts are left in the Caribbean waiting for the return of the guys who have gone home to Norway. Ing is somewhere on the other side, they took the Panama canal and do what I dream of, continue around the world. Where is Inga? I don't know. They should be on their way home to Gothenburg as well, but no one I've met has heard anything. I'll have to search for their email address.

I look forward to being back in Falmouth, I know that the showers are fantastic, the beer is good and the stores are well stocked. There is also another reason that I long to Falmouth. One of my best friends Sandra and her boyfriend Erik (boat bunny 2) will be arriving around the same time as us. They will sail together with me until we reach Denmark. I haven't seen Sandra for more than a year since she left for Australia half a year before my departure and didn't return to Sweden until I was gone. She is also the girl that I started to plan a trip like this with many years ago. To be able to sail together with her means a lot to me and I see this last part as a new adventure. It is now less than a month before we are to sail into Höganäs harbour, a frightening and exciting thought. But, a lot can happen and the fact that Sandra will join me makes me appreciate these last weeks even more. /The Captain

Day 6 - Free passengers

2010-06-11T15:32:00.000+02:00

Position: N 44° 30' W 018° 54' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 665

After some pressure from a few blog readers I have been forced to write a post, and by the way I don't get any desert from the Captain until it's done. Normally I can't fill a postcard so this is a big challenge. I am dictating this to a ghost writer while I'm doing the dishes and doing the dishes is a very huge problem. You have to balance on one leg, use the other one to pump water at the same time the yacht is behaving like a rodeo bull. I have been thinking about using duct tape to stay put in the galley. Talking about the dishes, here onboard we have got two free passengers. One of them is producing more dishes for me, mostly during the night when I'm asleep. I suspect that it could be the same person as the ghost writer. The other free passenger is eating cookies and candy in an abnormal rate, this occurs both during daytime and night. But I can't figure out who it can be. Sometime during the coming night we will pass the point of no return, meaning that we are halfway to our destination, and if we want more candy it's a better decision to go forward than to turn around. Now I am exhausted of all this dictating and hope this is long enough to receive my promised desert. / Deckhand Anders

Day 5 - Envious?

2010-06-10T15:20:00.000+02:00

Position: N 43° 42' W 021° 14' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 774

I don't have a lot to write today. Dad is actually behaving very well, he has even managed to turn the plotter into night mode without losing all the route data. The only annoying thing with him today is that he's reading a book about a Swedish couple who sail a Halberg-Rassy 62 around the world and he keeps telling me about everything they have on the yacht. The last comment he made was that they have three bathrooms and think that is the perfect amount, one each and one extra for wet clothes. But that's alright today since the sun is shining and we don't have any wet clothes hanging all over the saloon for the moment. Although most of the yacht is rather damp again we have managed to keep the lee bunk dry, one of us is usually sleeping in it, warming it with our body heat. I have also taught dad the trick with wet socks, just keep them on when going to sleep and if you're lucky they are dry when you wake up. I'm not at all envious of the Swedish couple who made all meals before their crossings and froze them in their freezer, I like to balance around in Cantare with knifes and hot water. Life onboard Cantare is great! / The Captain

Pictures from Dublin and the Atlantic Ocean

2010-06-10T09:52:00.001+02:00

New Pictures from Dublin and the Atlantic Ocean are uploaded! Click here to view: http://picasaweb.google.com/SailingCantare/TheAzoresToDublin

Enjoy! Love First Mate

Day 4 - Four worlds

2010-06-09T15:29:00.000+02:00

Position: N 43° 02' W 023° 27' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 876

Life is settling down, routines have formed. Every four hour one of us gets dressed and ready for the cockpit while the other one looks forward to take off the clothes and go to bed. The one awake, ready to leave the duties outside, is happy and teasing the other one about how cold and wet it is outside. The person just awoken surly reminds the first one that sweet is short, four hour passes quickly when you're asleep. Like this we go on, every four hour the roles changes. Anyway, during one of the watch changes tonight dad said that he is living in four world. My mind was still a bit slow since I'd just gotten out of the bunk so it took a while for me to understand what he meant. He means the world in the cockpit, a grey, wet and rather cold place, with waves rushing by and the look out duties, that's number 1. Number 2, the world in the book he is listening to on my iPod during the night watches, for the moment Stieg Larsson's. Number 3, the world in the warm and dry bunk on the lee side of the saloon were he dreams about I don't know what and number 4 the world in the book he reads during daytime. It's actually the same for me, I also live in four worlds, so far I've read two real books and listened to one on the iPod, that makes time go by quickly. Right now the outside world isn't that interesting most of the time. Only when the dolphins show up is it worth standing up and getting spray in my face. This morning some strange dolphins came by, at least I think they were dolphins but I'm not sure. First I spotted what looked like a small black whale in front of the yacht. I called out to dad who was in the bunk, he's been dreaming about whales for a while now. When he got up we could see a lot of them swimming behind Cantare. They seemed to be too small to be whales, and they moved more like dolphins, yet they were bigger than the dolphins I've seen before and had a different head shape. They were completely black on the top, greyish underneath and with big bulbous heads that looked a bit like the sperm whale's head. If any one has a clue please text us on the satellite phone, I can't find my book about Atlantic species.

The sailing is alright, but the wind has veered to the north and decreased, we struggle a bit to go directly towards Falmouth but at least we average above 4 knots towards goal. / The Captain

Pub Crawl in Dublin

2010-06-08T21:52:00.005+02:00

Yesterday evening after having settled in the marina we all went out to for some traditional Irish food and drinks to celebrate our arrival in Dublin. The rain was pouring down, sort of typical for this latitudes and dress code nowadays is wellingtons and sail jacket. All of us have been thinking about turning and set sail towards the warm Carribean again… We had a very nice evening together and the live music was great! But I must say that I’m neither a Guinness fan, nor very keen on the Irish Coffe, I prefer the lighter beers.

Today we finally find a laundry, I haven’t washed since Cuba and is starting to run out of clean clothes. Lars, Nico, Cecilie and I looked like true bag ladies when carrying our dirty belongings half round Dublin before finding the laundry. Besides laundry I have started to get to know Dublin today. Very hard to understand the Dubliners, their English is very unique and I found myself constantly asking please, say again. Haven’t met that very many true Dubliners yet though, it is a very multicultural city and to quote a taxi driver when I asked him how many inhabitants Dublin have: Around 1 million but 2 million if you count the illegal workforce. Tomorrow the Dublin sightseeing will continue!

Before I’m off to bed just a little eye opener, today a guy who single-handed had sailed non stop from Australia arrived in our marina…took him 101 days or was it 105…anyway our 30 days from Cuba to the Azores now feels little lame =) I didn’t meet him though, he left again before I got home, don’t now where, probably off to sea.

Nighty night! /First Mate Sofia

Day 3 - Sailing with elderly people

2010-06-08T16:21:00.000+02:00

Position: N 42° 04' W 025° 26' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 981

Yesterday evening the dolphins were jumping around Cantare. Not like they normally do, they were jumping a lot higher, their whole bodies were out of the water, they turned sideways in the air and made a huge splash when they hit the water. It was amazing to watch them! The sun was gone behind the clouds and it was starting to get cold when I left the cockpit to get some sleep. Cantare was on beam reach and was doing good speed. I switched the plotter into night mode and instructed dad not to touch it. The nights before he had fumbled with the plotter and accidentally turned the route off, twice. It was hard to fall asleep, maybe I had slept to much during the day. Before it got dark we had taken the first reef in the main, the wind kept on increasing and after a while I could hear how dad reefed the head sail. I dozed off for an hour before I became aware of the shaking movement in the hull, the head sail was flapping. I sat up in the bunk and asked dad what he was doing. He was behind the wheel, waves were towering behind him, some of them very close to the railings. He said that one of the vindwane's blocks had got lose and he had to hand steer. Alright, but why was the head sail flapping? Because he couldn't see the compass and had a hard time keeping the right angle to the wind. I took on my clothes and lifejacket and went out to tie the block back to its right place. After this was done I had to get behind the wheel to reattach the windvane lines and engage Monitor again. Dad had his glasses on, which were covered with saltwater spray so he couldn't see well enough to do it himself, and he also doesn't really know how engage Monitor. During our work with Monitor the wind had increased even more, steady on 28 knots with some gusts up to 40 knots. We decided to take the second reef in the main and furl the headsail even more. When this was done Cantare was moving nice and steady again, doing good speed in the strong wind. After this I went back to my bunk, with only one hour to go before I was due to be back in the cockpit for my night watch. I thought about how difficult it must be not to see well, especially when it's dark. People get amazed when they hear how young we are, but I'm a lot more impressed by all those retired people sailing around the world. After having watched my dad stumble in the cockpit during night I realize what an advantage it is to be young while doing this, I'm a lot more flexible and move around easier. Maybe I'm a bit unfair now to my dad, he hasn't been sailing a lot with Cantare lately, the last couple of years I've done all the sailing with her, and lot's of the stuff on the yacht is new to him, like the wind vane and the single line reef system. Still, I start to understand why furling mains are becoming the standard and why older people like the luxury of bigger yachts, at least bigger than Cantare.

We still have rather strong winds today, around 24 knots with occasionally gusts. Waves crash into the cockpit and we try to hide behind the spray hood as much as possible. The floor inside the yacht is getting wet again, we are bilging out water regularly and move around in our rubber boats or without touching the floor. But we are moving in the right way and have lots of warm food to eat, and some cookies and candy for desert. / The Captain

Odin, Safari and MaggyV have arrived in Dublin!!

2010-06-07T15:37:00.010+02:00

The pubs had just closed when we arrived in Dublin yesterday evening around 2200 UTC, but no worries we held our own arrival party in the cockpit of Safari's. All three boats arrived together, Odin, Maggy V and Safari, it has been wonderful having company on the sea. As I use to say, pictures are worth more than a thousand words so I post some pics from our crossing now and as soon as we have washed the boat and settled here in Dublin more updates will follow. Tonight all boats will go out for an arrival dinner and hopefully we get to try the guinness! Cheers! /First Mate Sofia

Day 2 - Last Atlantic Crossing

2010-06-07T14:12:00.000+02:00

Position: N 40° 18' W 027° 08' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 1107

Total nautical miles: 1230

Yesterday Catrine took a cab to the airport at 9 am, dad and I waved goodbye and went over to Peter's to leave a message for Escape. Then it was time for the last preparations, we filled the water tank and secured everything. Martin and Miriam (Ranja) came over, we talked for a while and hugged each other, I will not see them again since they are going into the Mediterranean. It felt a bit sad to leave Horta, since most of the yachts go different ways from there. But, I have decided to go to Falmouth, as will Starfire and Silverbear. Although they got restless and left Saturday evening, we are not that far behind. From Falmouth we go together to Fowey on the 19^th, when there will be a big homecoming party for Starfire, Emelie will fly in of course. I really look forward to go to Fowey together with Starfire to celebrate Alan's Atlantic circuit. Alan will then fly to Sweden and be in Höganäs when Cantare returns with all four girls onboard again. I nice ending to the start of a good friendship.

When I first mentioned to my dad that it would be nice if he joined me and Sofia on this last Atlantic crossing I told him it was about 1000 nm. I knew that it is a bit longer but it was better not to tell him. He brought with him a new plotter with three years warranty, it is the same make as the old one but a newer version. It seems to be much better. I made a route from Horta to Falmouth and the distance we have to sail is 1230 nm. Dad took it alright, the other sailors had already hinted that it was a bit longer than 1000 nm.

We left Horta in sunshine and had a very easy going first day at sea. I made the food, dad liked it even though there was not as much meat in it as he usually prefers. In the end he seemed a bit surprised that vegetables could taste that good. I thought about how he would have liked our tin diet, fresh food is a luxury that should not be taken for granted.

It is a bit different to be double handed again. Most of the time is spend either on watch or sleeping. Tonight I was awoken after only 3,5 hours of sleep to get back out in the cockpit for another 4 hours of watch. The 8 hours of continues sleep on the last crossing is just a sweet memory. But I will get used to it, and with only two persons aboard Cantare feels huge. Catrine left some of her warm clothes so now it is easier to keep warm and the new duvets make the few hours of sleep a greater pleasure. Dad haven't been seasick so far and is very pleased with himself. He has been sleeping inside tonight which is a progress since his visit in the Caribbean.

We are doing good speed, over 5 knots, right now we are going a bit more north than the direct route because we will soon get wind from the north and we don't want to be pushed too far east. I don't want to end up in the Bay of Biscay if we get strong winds. / The Captain

Time to say goodbye

2010-06-06T11:45:00.003+02:00

I can’t believe how fast 3 whole months can pass by! My vacation and sailing adventure is coming to an end tomorrow when I’m flying back to Sweden but it feels like I’ve only just started it. In the beginning of my trip I weren’t that keen on talking about boat stuff and didn’t have so much sailing experience of my own to brag about… but now… now I call myself a hardcore sailor! 30 days on the Atlantic and the last weak eating only cold canned food… well that’s a story I like to tell. And it’s nice to have seen so many places as well. Sailing is a great way of travelling!

During this last weak here in the Azores we have had a really nice time. We hired a car together with Alan and Tom, drove around and saw some of the splendid nature of the island. We have been eating and drinking at Peter's Sport Café. Welcomed Silverbeer and Ranja and had a nice little party with them. Had Miriam and Martin over for a cosy dinner in Cantare. Been over at Ranja for another tasty dinner. Painted on the dock. Written our names on a Swedish flag which we hanged in Peter's. Cleaned and fixed some things on Cantare. And a lot more that I can’t remember now but that has made the time fly by.

Dad arrived yesterday evening and we welcomed him with hugs and a bottle of Vino Verde. We took him to Peter’s which he had been longing to visit and had dinner there together with Starfire (Alan & Tom), Ranja (Miriam & Martin) and Silverbeer (Ray, Tony, Duncan & Ash). After the dinner we all went to another place and continued the night with some more drinking. It became a late night and me and dad went to bed at about 4 am I think. Maria continued on for I don’t know how long.

Well tonight we took it a little bit easier. We had dinner at our favourite restaurant together with Miriam and Martin. It was that place were you get a warm stone in front of you and some raw meat and fish to put on it. The first time we went there me and Maria had really big problems with eating it all (after the Atlantic crossing we had reduced the size of our stomachs) but this time it all went down just fine. With a desert!

/Catrine

Odin's position 5/6

2010-06-05T18:01:00.001+02:00

50.04N 08.43W - ETA Sunday evening

Is ETA good enough for a Guinness?

2010-06-05T07:13:00.000+02:00

Is ETA good enough for a Guinness? Haha, that is the question. Skipper Lars
is hoping we will arrive in Dublin before the pubs are closing tomorrow
night, and hopefully we will. Our position was N 49 32 W 009 20 at 0700 UTC
this morning. Sadly the high has forced us motoring, but we are still doing
around 7-7,5 knots. Don't know whether I like Guinness or not though, or how
to spell it properly. However, in case I will not fancy Guinness there is
always an Irish Coffee… /First Mate Sofia

Odin and the Whale

2010-06-04T04:41:00.000+02:00

Odin tends to attract whales! On their way to the Azores from St Martin they
bumped into one, luckily there were no injuries on any part though! Onboard
Odin I have now seen my closest whale ever! I was standing at the helm,
talking on the VHF with Cecilie on Safari when my heart started pumping
frenetically and I almost lost the VHF while trying to scream whale… On
starboard side some meters from the boat something huge submarine boat look
a like appeared on the surface. The whale stayed about 10 seconds before
slowly diving again. It was spectacular seeing its gigantic fin pointing
straight up before disappearing into the deep blue. The whales are enormous
animals! The adrenaline kick lasted for a while and I tried my best not to
think of what consequences a whale crash would bring. At least I'm lucky to
be covered by the insurance company Europeiska, as if the whales would care
about insurances, but I do!

Do I need to say that Odin, X-yacht, is great upwind? It is amazing how
close to the wind she can sail. Beating with her is impressive, especially
when you see your competitors disappear behind you. However, the yachts in
our little mini-regatta towards Dublin are still fairly close, more fun this
way, having company on the ocean. But in order to allow MaggyV (Beneteau 45)
and Safari (Bavaria 42) to follow we tend to reef conservatively and to
decrease the often upcoming gap between us we sometime furl the genoa at
dinner time to let them catch up on us and let us have a comfortable dinner.
But what so far has hit me the most is Odin's ability to sail in almost no
wind. Even if it is only blowing a couple of m/s, the sails are still being
filled and she manages to sail while the other yachts need to support the
sails with help from their engines.

We are having a wonderful time onboard Odin, not only is she a terrific
sailor, as I think I've mentioned before, her skipper Lars is an
extraordinary chef. It is very hard to keep up with his tasty cooking.
Nicolay and I tried our best the other day with some baking and Kjetil is
very keen on doing the dishes. Time flies when having fun! Even if Sex and
the City has not yet been introduced, yesterday we watched the movie Dirty
Dancing. Ten year old Nicolay found the dancing and kissing parts little bit
too much though! He prefers fighting movies a la Narnia instead of romance,
but do sometimes agree to a goodnight hug : -)

There are lots more to tell about my adventures with Odin, and updates will
follow when we reach Dublin and proper internet. ETA is at the moment
sometime late Sunday/early Monday.

Have a nice weekend! /First Mate (who will do her best to celebrate Sweden's
National Day on Sunday among all the Norwegians…)

Atlantic pictures

2010-06-02T19:27:00.002+02:00

Most of the pictures from this last crossing were of dolphins, I have picked the best for you and blended them with some pictures from our life on Cantare. You find them here: http://picasaweb.google.com/SailingCantare/AtlanticCrossing2#

There is also a new post in Swedish on the insurance company Europeiska's homepage, you find dit here: http://www.europeiska.se/sv/blogg/?p=1807

/The Captain

Odin's position 2/6

2010-06-02T18:42:00.000+02:00

43.14N 15.44W

Odin's position 1/6

2010-06-01T23:57:00.001+02:00

41.25N 17.58W - Odin has been using the engine last 24 hours

My wife and I

2010-06-01T03:05:00.000+02:00

In order to avoid an unnecessary divorce, my wife and I have decided to take
some time apart. Living together for almost 11 months now on a 9,33m x2,78m
area with no where else to go except to maybe go for a swim has caused some
minor boat marriage problems. But please don't worry, even though we will go
back together in a couple of weeks we are perfectly straight, and available!
I hope you have heard the expression "one guy in each new harbor"… and by
that I will stop joking and be a little bit serious. :-) Maria and I are
two very strong individuals. There is reason why it was the two of us that
actually got our asses off university/work and took off on this amazing
adventure. We are ambitious and want things in life and work hard to get
where we want. As I always tend to say, I aim for the stars and hopefully I
will land somewhere among the clouds. Even if a lot of you don't know us in
person you might have noticed through our blogging that we are two unique
persons with very different personalities. We want different things in life
and we have different ways of achieving what we want. Two strong wills with
different ways of seeing things do not equal for ever on a tiny 31 footer.
(Neither on a 100-footer I think).

Even if the idea of leaving Cantare for a little while was figured after an
angry argumentation where the skipper's blood sugar level was down on the
sea bottom and we were 2 days from Horta, we later talked it through and
decided this would be the best way to recharge the batteries and get some
personal space. To put it in boat terms, we were about to go under 12volt,
in desperately need to recharge and reach 13,9V again! Go see a shrink? A
psychotherapist specialized in boat marriage? No, not really an option, but
to be able to remember this Sailing Cantare year as the best year ever
getting away from each other was crucial. Are we giving up? Absolutely
not!!!! I will go back home to Cantare, we will finish in Høganæs together
and Maria and I are, as I said, still married. We invited Maria's father,
who's been eager to sail his Cantare again, to come sail with us long time
ago. So you can skip all potential thoughts about me leaving the Captain on
her own to England, no way! Deckhand Anders will arrive on Fri to Horta, but
if there would happen to be any problems on the way, I will fly from Dublin
back to the Azores to do another delivery, to sail with Maria to the Azores.

After 30 days at sea, coming ashore was wonderful but it also turned out to
be the most intense 52 hours in a very long time, haha, almost like being
back in my old life, constantly on the cell phone running back and fore to
sort things out. As you have already heard we arrived on the Thursday 1400
UTC. Then it turned out to be a very fun but hard night…waking up the next
morning (lunch hour) I was told the Norwegian boats had to leave as early as
possible the coming day due to the weather forecast, around 0600 UTC.
Ahhhhh, shit, at least I had finished something on my list of what to do on
the Azores: a 200% night at Peter's Café Sport. But then there were some
other things on the list, like washing my sweaty, dirty clothes, go though
and reply to my hundreds of unread mails (sorry guys, I will try to take
care of it in Dublin), pack, say good bye to my lovely Cantare girls,
shower, have time for a little catch up with friends who just arrived, a
last gin & tonic at Peter's and send flowers to mum for mother's day. I
managed everything except the laundry and some emails! The sleep was sort of
reduced though, 5 hours in 60 hours, but sleep you can either do on your
free watch or in your grave.

So, for those of you who haven't figured yet, I am not in the Azores
anymore. Last Sat 06.00 UTC I left with the Norwegian yacht Odin. It is a
45,2 foot X-yacht from 1988 and just to give you a little tease, she sails
great and my bunk is bigger than our fore peak on Cantare... Odin also did
the ARC and we first met them in Porto Santo and it is also the yacht I
helped babysitting one night in Antigua. Odin consisting of Lars, Hella and
their two kids; Nicolay turning 11 and Anna-Luna turning 6, is also doing a
one year cruise and is now on it's way home. Hella and Anna-Luna are at the
moment in Norway and onboard heading for Dublin are Lars, Nicolay, myself
and a new crew named Kjetil. Odin and Cantare sort of saved each other,
Skipper Lars had desperately tried to get more people to join him but not
succeed, only two adults sailing Odin is a bit too little, so when I sent
out my mail asking if some of the Norwegian boats would want me I
immediately got several replies. So here we are together with Safari and
MaggyV on our way to Dublin. However, at the moment it looks like we are
heading back in to the Bay of Biscay again since we have to go east for a
while to avoid a big low west of us. It is a wonderful experience sailing
other yachts and especially larger, faster ones in which I can stand up tall
cooking dinner and not loose my balance behind the huge helm. I was so
fascinated my first night watch the other night about how Odin did 8-9 knots
with 3 reef in the main and 4 reef in the genoa in 14m/s. Amazing! It is
also fun sail together with other yachts, a sort of mini regatta where we
trig each other to gain speed and have fun quiz on the VHF. Skipper Lars
likes racing, so do I and I am definitely on the right yacht, a X-yacht! We
will do our best to win the mini regatta to Dublin. I will tell you more
about my experiences on this little side adventure of mine asap. I will blog
as often as I can and until we reach Dublin, Maria will post my position on
www.cantare.se. See it this way dear readers, now you will get two
adventures in one to follow!

Love from First Mate Sofia, now temporarily onboard Odin.

Odin's position 31/5

2010-05-31T18:29:00.001+02:00

40 18N 20 53W

Departure of Odin

2010-05-29T11:55:00.005+02:00

Most of the Norwegian yachts have been here for a while, since there was a weather window today they decided to leave as early as possible. Otherwise they would have had to stay until Tuesday at least. This meant that Sofia had just a little more than 48 hours to get ready for sailing again. She managed one shower but laundry will have to wait until they get to Dublin. Yesterday she packed and moved her things over to Odin and when that was done, Catrine and I went over to Odin to check out her new home and make sure it is a good and secure one. We were very pleased with what we saw and know that Lars, the skipper, is experienced. Sofia has even got her own cabin, with a double bed and a closet big enough to hold almost all of the clothes on Cantare, we were just a tiny bit jealous. In the evening the girls and Alan from Starfire went to a restaurant to eat a last meal together. It was very good, each of us got a warm stone and a plate with raw meat and sea food. You put the raw stuff on the stone and wait for it to get ready, a lovely and nice way to prolong the dinner. We were too full to have desert, although I had planned to have two different ones I had to admit that there was barely place for a small coffee.

Six a clock this morning was the time when Odin, Maggie V and Safari had planned to leave. Of course we went over there to give Sofia a last hug and wave them off. Sofia sent me a really sweet text message from her new bunk during the night, she couldn’t sleep although it was fantastic in her big and warm nice smelling cabin. I will miss her a lot and it was sad to see her sail away, but I know it is for the best. We wish them fair winds and I will keep you updated on Odin’s progress, maybe Sofia will be able to post something on the blog, if not she will tell you all about it when she gets to Dublin.

Emelie is staying at a hotel with Alan, so it’s only Catrine and I on Cantare now. Catrine will stay until the 6th of June two days after the arrival of my dad. Now it is time to explore the island! / The Captain

Big Changes

2010-05-29T11:16:00.002+02:00

We had a lovely dinner on our first night here, lot’s of friends joined us and celebrated our arrival. When they closed the bar we went to the Norwegian yacht Maggie V and had some delicious chicken soup together with cold Caribs that reminded us of what we have left behind and what we have shared. We have all been together on the Atlantic two times and here we were gathered for a last joyful night. Dawn came in no time and it was well after seven in the morning before we returned to Cantare. Two hours later it was time to wake up and move the yacht. We were moored as the fourth boat and the big ship closest to the pontoon was leaving. It was blowing a lot, but with four girls onboard, although all of us were a bit shaky, it went without any problems. Now we are the second yacht tied up to Trollwind another Norwegian yacht that arrived a few hours after us.

We, Maria and Sofia, have a rather big announcement to make. We have decided to split up, from now on Sofia will join the Norwegian yacht Odin and sail with them towards Norway via Ireland and Scotland. Maria will sail Cantare with the help of her father to England and from there on she hopes to get help from friends. Don’t take this the wrong way though. We are still good friends and will finish this adventure together. Sofia will join Cantare again somewhere on the way back. But, right now we need time away from each other. Almost 11 months on tiny Cantare is a long time. We are very different and most of the time that’s what makes us so strong but sometimes, and more frequently the longer we’ve been away, we tend to argue over small and unnecessary things. All though the decision came quite quick we have given it a lot of thought and are both very pleased with the solution. Actually since we took the decision we have stopped argue, both feeling this is the right way. Had we not taken this step who knows how we would feel about each other in the end. We have great respect for each other and the fact that we can solve this without fighting will make us cherish all the good times even more. Sailing is all about changing plans, you never know what will happen, as we’ve told you before. / Captain Maria and First Mate Sofia

The Coming Home Party

2010-05-29T08:10:00.000+02:00

Don't forget to book the 10th of July in your calendars, it is a very special day! The 10th of July we will try to return to reality again and the fantastic adventure we are experiencing now will sadly come to an end. Sometimes we think we almost live in a dream, the life we are living is so far away from reality back home. As much as we are looking forward to coming home and see all our friends and families again it is also little scary.... The 10th of July we are sailing home to Höganäs harbor and we promise a big arrival party in true sailor's style! You are all so very welcome to Höganäs to celebrate with us! We are so much looking forward meeting all of you new friends that are supporting and cheering us during our trip! You are amazing! More information will follow! /First Mate and the Captain

Champagne

2010-05-29T03:17:00.002+02:00

Pictures from Cuba

2010-05-29T02:29:00.002+02:00

New (or old) pictures from Cuba are uploaded. Enjoy them while we explore Faial and we will give you pictures from the Atlantic as soon as we have time. / The Captain

ARRIVED IN THE AZORES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2010-05-27T20:39:00.003+02:00

Around 1400 UTC (same as local time) we arrived in Horta, Faial, the Azores! Our dear Norwegian friends onboard Safari, Maggy V and Odin welcomed us as well as Alan and Tom onboard Starfire! The champagne was soon popped and the four starving souls of us then went to Peter's Café for lunch, too bad it wasn't lunch hour, kitchen closed but we luckily managed to get som toast. It is so strange being ashore again, but indeed wonderful!! Our much longed for shower will have to wait until tomorrow though since the showers just closed, but what the heck, wait another day for shower is not that big of a deal since we after 30 days at sea sort of have forgotten what it is all most taking a long hot shower. Will go for the Gin and Tonics at Peter’s instead……:)

I just tried to update some pictures and movies from our arrival but the net seems to be very slow at the moment, but as soon as we’ll get sober enough to find proper net there will be loads of pictures and movies. We have about 240 pics from Cuba waiting for you!

Now we are off to celebrate the fact that we made it to the Azores!!!!!!

Over and Out!
/A very happy First Mate

Day 30 - The last night and day!

2010-05-27T14:07:00.000+02:00

Position: N 38° 30' W 028° 49' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 11,1

Oh what a night! I had a real good sleep this night and didn't even wake up when the other girls started watching Sex And The City in the saloon. And when the time came for my watch I gladly got up and put on my clothes. Sofia told me that we only had 50 nautical miles left. Wow, that felt like nothing! In the cockpit this night/morning it was really cosy. The wind vane steered perfectly, we were doing a good speed at about 5 knots, it wasn't raining and no unwelcome waves surprised me in the cockpit. What more can a girl ask for on her last night watch?

Maybe a cup of tea. I started boiling some water in the electric kettle but all of a sudden it started smelling like burned plastic and there were some smoke coming from the top of the kettle. Quickly I pulled the cored out of the socket but of course all the girls had already woke up by the bad smell and asked me what was going on. I reassured them that we weren't in any danger and that they should go back to sleep. It smelled awful in the boat but if you should think positive at least it was good timing for the electric kettle to break down now in the end of our Atlantic crossing and not before. And I did get my cup of tea because the water was warm enough for that!

My watch passed by quickly and after it I creped down in a bunk again to work even more on my beauty sleep. I managed to sleep for two hours and then I woke up to the sharp smell of perfume. The smell came from Emelie who was working on her appearance for the arrival and doing some makeup! By now she is all set for a big welcome party at the harbour! Which is coming closer really fast now. It's only 15 nautical miles left, Maria has spotted land and we are listening to Portuguese radio! Our estimated time of arrival is at 12 am and we are hoping on that today's lunch can be eaten ashore.

It feels great and a bit surreal that we finally are closing in on Horta. 30 days onboard Cantare has gone by quickly, at least it feels like it now in the end. All the trouble we have had has at least been manageable and when I in the future will think back on the crossing, I'll only laugh about all of it and have some great memories.

/Deckhand Catrine

Day 29 - Paradise a place that lies beyond hell

2010-05-26T21:02:00.000+02:00

Position: N 38° 23' W 030° 55' UTC 1700

Nautical miles left: 110

When I woke up this morning I was totally convinced that I had woken up in hell. The boat was rocking heavily from side to side, I was still as wet and cold as when I went to bed, and the floor looked a bit like a swimming pool. I looked at the mobile. Only half past 8. Good! 30 minutes until I had to be dressed and up on watch. I pulled the duvet over my head to try and get a little bit warmer. But the smell from the duvet was almost unbearable, so I quickly gave up. What was I to wear today? My still soaking wet clothes from last night, or my last dry, clean sweeter and pants? I looked outside. Still raining. I reached out my hand to feel how my sailing jacket and pants were doing. Not noticeably dryer than when I hang them up 5 hours ago. A sighed, and started to put on the wet clothes.

Yesterday was a great day. We were making great speed, the waves were tiny and the sun was shining. With less than 300 Nm left, me and Sofia decided to take a shower. Since we are still living on a small 31 footer in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, we are not talking about a long, hot freshwater shower. No, we are talking about a quick, cold, saltwater shower. Some may say - Why bother, you are soon in harbour. But after 10 days trying to wash yourself with wet napkins, even a cold saltwater shower seems tempting. We spent the day relaxing in cockpit, talking about everything that we wanted to do and eat when we get to Horta. I think that we agreed that a shower, diner at a restaurant and one or five beers at Peter´s café, sounded like a great plan. Excited over the fact that we were starting to get close, me and Sofia decided to do a " 2 on watch night". Even if it means being on watch from 21.00 to 3.00 it is so much more fun. And who wants to sleep anyway ?

The watch started out just fine. We were holding a steady easterly course and doing about 5.5 knots. The wind had started to shift from west to blowing a little bit more from the south, so we decided to take off the spinnaker pole from our headsail, that we had put up earlier. When we are sailing downwind, we sometimes spread the headsail with the spinnaker pole to increase speed, but when we have the wind in on our beem, the spinnaker pole tends to be inefficient. Just as we had taken it down the wind seemed to pick up a bit, increasing the speed even more. 30 minutes later the rain came. And from there it just got worse. During the rest of the watch the rain was pouring down. The wind shifted speed and direction a hundred times. I can't even count the times we put a reef in the main, furled the headsail and then the wind died and we had to take the reef out again. With waves flushing over the boat, and us. Monitor struggled bravely, but had a hard time to keep up with all the sudden changes, so we had to hand steer quite a lot. After a while my sailing jacket and pant gave in and I could feel how the water found it's way all the way in to my skin. Despite all of this I actually had quite a great time. We were surfing the waves doing about 7 knots. And you could feel the adrenalin pumping. Me and Sofia were cheering each other on while steering, gossiping a bit in between. The few times the monitor actually managed to steer we kept warm with some silly gymnastic exercises, making us giggle and forget the rain for a while. 6 hours later Maria and Catrine took over again and I could step down in the saloon. Tired but happy. Me and Sofia did our best to hang up our wet clothes so that they would dry, but it is hard when the space is very limited and the air humid and cold. I quickly brushed my teeth and crawled under the duvet and put in the earplugs. Boat was rocking, throwing me from side to side, the duvet was damp and I was freezing cold. Somehow I managed to fall asleep anyway.

Back to hell. So there I was sitting in my wet clothes, preparing mentally to take the step out into the cockpit. I kept telling myself, only one more day left, only one more day left. Before I stepped outside I went to the forepeak to tell poor Sofia that it might be best if we did another double watch. So that we could help each other with the sails and steering. She yawned and nodded. I stepped out into the cockpit and placed myself behind the steering wheel. Sending a very happy Maria down below. I stood there in the pouring rain, fighting to keep a steady course through the waves, and actually feeling a bit sorry for my self, when all of a sudden I saw a strip of blue sky behind me. I don't know why, but somehow that was all I needed. The feeling of being in hell slowly started to drift away and I started smiling. Ten minutes later I could hear music streaming out of the cockpit speakers and Sofia jumped out in the cockpit. Ignoring the weather and waves we danced and sang along for a while. It is funny how fast things can change.

Right now it is sunny and we are still doing great speed towards the Azores. Hopefully we will get there around noon tomorrow. It feels unreal, exciting and a bit sad. All at once. Despite all the bad luck and the days when everything have felt like hell, this is greatest trip I have ever done. The experience, the craziness, the sailing, the teamwork and friendship, the wildlife, and all the fun. I am going to miss it so much. But when we get to the Azores it is time for me to set of for new adventures. One of the things that I have realised and always will keep with me, is that paradise is a place that lies beyond hell. Sometimes the road there is hard to walk. But in the end the reward is definitively worth it.

Love / Deckhand Emelie Hope to see you all in Höganäs the 10^th of july

Day 28 - Hell turning to Heaven

2010-05-25T22:02:00.000+02:00

Position: N 38° 13' W 033° 33' UTC 2000

Nautical miles left: 235

Always look at the bright side of life, (whistle).....

Always look at the bright side of life, (whistle)..

I'm not too sure about the rest of the lyrics, but I hope you get my point! Yesterday was really about finding those small things that make you happy. Like for instance finding an extra pair of dry socks to warm the freezing feet and discover a lost package of crackers. But what really made the grey, rainy horrible day much better was a message on the satellite phone from Peter Knudsen. Thank you very much for your contribution, Peter, so kind of you!

And as they say, every cloud has a silver lining. Today I woke up to a sun shining from a clear blue sky and a the wind coming from a pleasant westsouthwesterly direction. It was little too close downwind though causing the headsail to hide behind the main so I helped Emelie put up the spinnaker pole and voila we increased speed at once with little more than 1 knot! Wonderful! We have been butterfly sailing smoothly since noon and hoping to continue doing so all the way to Horta, Faial. At the moment our ETA is Thursday afternoon, so let's pray the weather forecast is true and we can keep the southwesterly wind! Love/First Mate Sofia

Day 27 - Hell on the Atlantic

2010-05-24T14:51:00.000+02:00

Position: N 37° 59' W 035° 50' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 343

I would love to be able to write that life is wonderful aboard Cantare, that we are doing good speed towards Horta and that the food served is delicious. But, it's the opposite! Today we are experience hell on the Atlantic. Our hell features grey clouds, heavy rain, wind against us, constant wind speed changes, building waves, unpleasant unpredictable boat movements and a damp interior with mould smelling quilts. To make it worse there is water on the floor, some of it because we forgot to close the valve on the toilet sink and the rest seep in from different hard-to-do-something-about-places. We have to take turns going down on our knees and scoop it out, the small bilge pump that is supposed to do the job has long since stopped working, of course. Still, I think it is days like this that show how good the team work is and the memories of this crossing will forever entertain ourselves. So much has happened and we aren't there yet. A few more days and we will see land! / The Captain

Day 26 - "Negerbollar"

2010-05-23T20:21:00.000+02:00

Position: N 37° 51' W 036° 50' UTC 1700

Nautical miles left: 391

Today is another gray day on the ocean. Not much is happening and it feels like all we do is sleep and dream of what we are going to do when we get back on land. I'm definitely planning on eating a hole lot of gourmet food! But I shouldn't be complaining because things are going pretty good anyway. The wind vane is doing the steering and although there isn't that much wind we are doing a steady speed of 5 knots. It's pretty warm in the air and during my watch in a few hours I think it will be quite nice to sit in the cockpit and finish of the book that I'm enjoying right now. Maria actually did some cookies earlier called "negerbollar / chokladbollar" (which translated into English perhaps is called "chocolate balls"). They are a easy to make Swedish cookie since you just mix up the ingredients oatmeal, sugar, cacao, water and margarine, and then roll small balls out of the mix. And if you are really lazy you don't even need to do the rolling part, you can just grab a spoon and start digging directly into the mix, which of course it what we did. They were really tasty!

/Catrine

Day 25 - Bad luck has turned around

2010-05-22T19:42:00.000+02:00

Position: N 37° 40' W 039° 07' UTC 1400

Nautical miles left: 499

Finally it feels like our bad luck has turned around. At least for a short while. Yesterday was an amazing day. No wind what so ever, but sunny and relaxing. With dolphins playing around the boat. Normally slow days like that make me a bit stressed, but not yesterday. After all the bad weather we have had lately it was actually nice to have a calm day. We motored the entire day, and since the diesel indicator is not working properly it was a little bit risky. We made some calculations and decided to stop the engine when the indicator said 10 litres left. And save the hopefully existing, last litres for entering the harbour in Horta. When I got of my watch at 24.00 last night we had 11 litres left. But just then the winds had picked up again and we could start sailing again. Perfect timing!

This morning we had our first close encounter with an other sailing yacht in a very long time. I called them up on the VHF and it turned out to be our Russian friends from the ARC. It is amazing how a big ocean sometimes can seem so small. We chatted for a while and decided to meet up for a beer in Peters' café when we get to Horta. Since they have a bigger boat and more diesel left they will probably get there a while before us. But we are slowly getting closer.

Today we actually have less than 500 Nm left. This is going to be celebrated with canned fruit salad . Since it also is Catrine´s fiction birthday today we might even open a tin of pineapple. Already looking forward to tonight.

LOVE / Deckhand Emelie

Day 24 - Reflections and Satellite Communication

2010-05-21T22:39:00.000+02:00

Position: N 37° 26' W 040° 59' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 590

As the story of the girls on the Atlantic Ocean told you yesterday, my lunch consisted of a shrimp cocktail a la mustard and parmesan. An extraordinary combination if you ask me, almost deserving to be on the menu in a michelain restaurant, almost. The attempt of cooking pasta and rice with the slowest electric kettle on earth wasn't as successful though, and to be honest, living on cold cans isn't that exciting and definitely nothing we planned on doing when we took off from Cuba. When thinking back on whether we could have done something differently in order to avoid some of the problems we have had onboard, we haven't really come up with something particular. There are just some minor things we would consider changing. Like for instance not having the fishing line dragging behind the boat when the thunderstorm hit us. (The fishing line later got caught in the propeller of the water generator and destroyed it). Doing the crossing again we might would consider a stop at Bermuda to refuel etcetera since 3000 nautical miles isn't round the corner so to speak. However, when planning the route the power problem caused by the broken wind/water generator that left us with the engine as our only battery charger, wasn't really in mind. I just wanted to give you some reflections upon the problems we have had and let us face it, when crossing the Atlantic Ocean or during any other longer trip, you have to be aware of the fact that you most certainly will have to deal with a number of minor or major issues! And to conclude my reflections, we were damn lucky who had such a smooth crossing last time!

Now to what I intended to talk about in today's post: satellite communication, our link to the outer world while at sea. We have had some questions concerning our communication possibilities and whether we have internet or not and I will try to sort it out. Friends have asked us why we haven't replied to text messages they have sent to our cell phones. On the ocean there is no mobile network whatsoever, if we are lucky we sometimes have network coverage some miles from the coast but that is it. While sailing our only communication with you is through satellites. Onboard we have a satellite phone called Iridium Motorola 9555 (we have gotten some requests whether it is on sale and yes, most probably it is when we are coming home). The sat phone more or less look like an old cell phone with antenna one used to have 10-15 years ago, or what we in Sweden refer to a brick - tegelsten, an extremely expensive brick. Anyhow, before we left Sweden we signed a contract with a company called Mailasail and purchased 500 minutes to a total cost of around 600EUR. The 500 minutes are valid one year and have recently rapidly diminished mostly due to the large weather files we have downloaded. How do we use the sat phone? We use it simply to upload and download emails with a "secret" email which we operate though Outlook on my old computer (banned at sea while it is so power consuming and nowadays almost falling apart) and Windows Live Mail on Maria's computer. The computer connects to the sat phone through an USB cable and then we connect to the internet. To update our blog we send an email to the blog account which thereafter updates automatically. Theoretically we can surf the internet, but since the connection is so slow it would take forever and cost us a fortune. The minutes are ticking while loading mail and this being so we have chosen to not to go public with our sail mail and therefore only given it to family and friends. Our 500 minutes finished yesterday and we had to buy another 50 minutes. And to answer the question whether it is possible to sponsor our blogging: Absolutely! More minutes mean more pictures! lol!

So far the engine is running and we are not out of diesel yet! In today's calm Maria took a little refreshing bath and put back the wind vane rudder on which we have changed the breaking tube. So when it starts blowing we hopefully have self steering again! The wind generator is also temporally fixed and can with a bit of luck give us some amps and episodes of Sex and the City if (when) we will run out of fuel. The story of the girls on the Atlantic Ocean continues and until next time have a look on the blog of our insurance company Europeiska, I have posted a Swedish update about leaving Cuba and the crossing so far.

Have a very nice weekend everybody and to my dear friend Lotta who is getting married to her Magnus tomorrow; best wishes!

Love/First Mate Sofia

Day 23 - The story about life on Cantare

2010-05-20T20:13:00.000+02:00

Position: N 37° 08' W 042° 24' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 660

In the sunny cockpit of Cantare, somewhere on the Atlantic Ocean, four girls were enjoying life. One was behind the wheel, complaining about how cold it was. Girl two and three were stretched out on the benches, one each, and the fourth girl, the last to join, had to sit on the floor. Although there was almost no wind the air felt chilly, memories of the warm West Indies were becoming more surrealistic and the final destination Sweden felt closer. The girls not behind the wheel were somewhat sheltered from the wind and had stripped down to their panties trying to heat their bodies with the sun's help. Inside the boat it was damp and freezing, making it hard to sleep during the nights and leaving a lingering feeling of coldness during the days.

The sisters were comparing how long the hair under their arms had become when Sofia said:

'Catrine, what's that white stuff under your arm?'

Catrine answered calmly:

'It's deodorant for the coming days.'

Swimming around the boat was now almost impossible, the water temperature was well below the recommended 25 degrees, last time the girls checked it was only 19 degrees. Therefore it was not possible to wash oneself daily and extra deodorant was a smart move.

A while later Sofia said:

'What are we having for lunch today?'

Emelie though for a while and answered:

'I'm thinking about a tin of carrots.'

Sofia:

'Could you mix those strange mushrooms with some parmesan for me?'

Emelie:

'Sure.'

Sofia:

'If your not having your bread crumbles could you maybe add themand some mustard.'

Maria wrinkled her nose and started to discuss her lunch with Catrine. They agreed to split Maria's kidney beans tin and Catrine's green beans tin. They topped it with some parmesan. It was a lot better than it sounded. Sofia claimed that her rather nasty combination was good as well. Life without LPG wasn't that bad. Still, every conversation about what's possible to eat ashore had been banned.

The wind died after a while and the girls were forced to start the engine. Almost 100 motor hours now, will they make it through Azores High before the diesel tank is empty? To be continued / The Captain

Day 22 - Diet for the rest of the time?

2010-05-19T23:42:00.000+02:00

Position: N 36° 55' W 043° 40' UTC 2000

Nautical miles left: 721

We just saw another whale! Maria called us all up to the cockpit because she saw a lot of water splashing ahead of us, and shortly thereafter we all saw the whale on our portside! That was cool! And it was really close to us, about 10 meters distance from Cantare maybe.

Another overwhelming thing that has happened to us today is that we have come to realize that we are out of camping gas. This means that from here on after it will only be served cold food onboard Cantare, since we can't use the stove anymore. The second bottle of camping gas that we thought was half full actually turned out to be empty. Which is strange! We used it for a while during our sailing from Bahia de Vita to Varadero but we really thought there would be more of it left. Apparently not though. Emelie went practical and started going through all of our food and sorted it up in different groups: eatable without cooking and not eatable without cooking. Luckily most of it were canned vegetables such as beans, pees, corn and olives so there are actually a lot of it that we can eat easily without heating it up. And we got 3 cans of tuna each! But some of it like the canned sausage I'd rather not eat without cooking so I do hope that we get to the Azores soon. Tomorrow however we have a real good plan! The winds are going to die out by then and therefore we are going to run the engine for a while, and during that time we are going to use our water cooker for boiling water which will hopefully get us some eatable couscous, rice and pasta. Which we then can stash up on for some days so that we get some more food. Splendid, isn't it?! Lets just hope it works. Otherwise I think these last days on Cantare will be a real tough diet for me!

/Deckhand Catrine

Day 21- Great speed

2010-05-18T19:53:00.000+02:00

Position: N 36° 26' W 046° 29' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 860

Today we have been out at sea for 21 days. Some days it feels like forever and some days it feels like we just left. After this long the days seem to float together. It gets hard to remember which day of the week it is and what date it is. Luckily we have a calendar, friend and family to remind us. But I must say that with only 850 Nm left, the Azores are finally starting to feel close. Right now I would give a lot for a hot shower, dry and good smelling clothes and a bed in which you don't have to sleep with all our clothes in to keep warm. Soon, very soon that is reality.

The last 24 hours we have had a lot of wind and we have been doing great speed. Me and Sofia did 18 Nm in only 3 hours! Not bad at all. And that was towards the Azores. Now that we don't have a GPS on all the time it is hard to sail in a straight line. We only check GPS every third hour. So sometimes even if we make great speed we don't get as much closer as we thought. I woke up this morning still not dry from last nights flushing waves and my muscles definitively reminded me that I had been hand steering for 3 hours in high waves. But for getting 18 Nm closer it was definitively worth it. And to be honest it is actually quite fun to hand steer when Cantare is surfing down the waves.

Today almost as a reward for last days crappy weather, the sun has finally decided to make an appearance again. It is still cold. But even so I think that an hour or two sitting in the cockpit in just t-shirt and shorts is necessary. To get the slowly fading tan back and to recharge.

Hugs and kisses /Deckhand Emelie

Day 20 - Pringles instead of Champagne

2010-05-17T22:10:00.000+02:00

Position: N 36° 16' W 048° 11' UTC 2000

Nautical miles left: 942

It is freezing cold in the saloon! Even I, the most warm-blooded person onboard I think, have started to look for my underpants and skiing socks. And I can't count the times I woke up this early morning with my teeth chattering, shivering of cold. And as you probably already are familiar with the list of things that are breaking down is just getting longer every day. But I will not focus on that, it is what it is and misery is part of the adventure! Instead I will celebrate the fact that I had a wonderful hand steering watch during the afternoon yesterday. Surfing down the waves, sometimes doing 8 knots, that is awesome sailing! Unfortunately the wind had eased a little to my night watch, but instead I was accompanied by splendid stars and playful dolphins. There is another thing I would like to celebrate too, this morning we broke the 1000 line, now we have less than 1000 nautical Miles to the Azores, Hurray, Hurray, Hurray!!! This happening should have been celebrated with champagne but since the fridge is shut down to save power, it would be a waste serving the sparkling drops room temperature. -Why not put the champagne in the freezing cold saloon? I have thought about it too, but in the daytime the sun often comes through making the saloon rather pleasant, We'll celebrate with an old dented box of Pringles instead. Love/FirstMate

Day 19 - A Grey Day

2010-05-16T15:19:00.000+02:00

Position: N 34° 55' W 050° 43' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 1083

Yesterday close to midnight the second low hit us. Emelie and Sofia had 40 knots wind from the SW with gusts of more than 50 knots. Strangely I slept very well in the fore cabin. The best I have in many days, I guess it was because Cantare moves more steady with stronger winds and in the fore cabin you don't get disturbed by watch changes. Emelie woke me up at 3 am, three hours earlier than my watch start. Catrine was due to go on watch and I was to keep her company since it was so windy. The wind had by then dropped to "only" 30 knots, Catrine felt secure in the cockpit and soon told me that I could sleep on the lee bunk in the saloon if I slept without ear plugs. I kept all my clothes on as well as my lifejacket, ready to go out in an instant should Catrine call. When it was time for my watch I stepped out into a grey world. Although the sun supposedly was above the horizon it felt like early dawn, the grey compact clouds diminishing the daylight. A minimum of the headsail was unfurled, still the covered distance had been good during the night. As the wind decreased and settled on 20 knots I unfurled the sail. The grey waves towered behind us and once in a while white spray jumped into the cockpit. I tried to hide behind the spray hood, sometimes I failed and got covered in cold (20 degrees) water, some of it trickling down my neck. From time to time a group of dolphins swam around the boat, playing in the waves. I felt quite good in my little world, happy to be doing nothing while Monitor the wind vane steered. I had awaken Emelie and adjusted the course when the sails started to flutter. I went behind the wheel to get Monitor on course again. It didn't work, as soon as I let go of the wheel Cantare turned. I looked astern and noticed directly that the Monitor rudder was floating on the surface. Sadly it wasn't disengaged but broken. The tube that is broken is a part that's supposed to brake if we collide with something, therefore I have a spare one. But, right now the waves are way too big to allow me to change the tube. I have secured the rudder and we will have to await smoother sea. Hand steering it is, at least for a while. It is a grey day. / The Captain

Day 18 - Yet another day on the Atlantic

2010-05-15T18:47:00.000+02:00

Position: N 035° 00' W 052° 58' UTC 1400

Nautical miles left: 1188

Today is a sunny day and we try to relax and gather our strength as much as we can, preparing for the arriving low that will hit us in the evening. It's strange that the weather can shift so quickly, going from sunny to stormy in just some hours. While the waves are still quite small Maria is going to bake bread. Yummy! Our food supply is getting less exiting for each day that goes by so newly baked bread will be a real treat. A lot of the talks we have nowadays is actually about the topic food. This morning Maria and I were listing food that we want to eat back home in Sweden: avocado, strawberries, smoothies, ham, lasagne, salmon, beefs, apples, potatoes and so on. Emelie joined in by announcing a menu for a coming party that she has planned for the future. Her menu sounded so delicious that it started to water in my mouth! Apart from dreaming about food I dream a lot of that marvellous day when we will reach the Azores. It's a long way still if you look on the map, approximately 11 days left, but it feels like we are closing in now. And when we get to the Azores we are going to treat ourselves with some nice restaurant dining!

/ The very food loving deckhand Catrine

Day 17- The low

2010-05-14T20:53:00.000+02:00

Position: N 34° 48' W 054 19' UTC 1700

Nautical miles left: 1254

First of all I want to say a big thank you for all the nice e-mails and text messages I got on my birthday. I appreciated them a lot.

Yesterday was the day when the long expected low arrived. Our first low so far on this Atlantic crossing and the low that we had been preparing for the last days. I am glad to say that we sailed through it safely. Hopefully the bad luck that we have had the last week finally is over. We were expecting winds around 30 knots, high waves and rain. And that is also what we got. Occasionally we had winds up tp 45 knots but they didn't last long. I must admit that the waves got a little bit scary high during the night but Cantare handled the waves great and you soon got used to them. As a safety precaution we had watch in pairs 6 hour at the time. To be honest it was actually quite cosy to have company during your night watch. Me and ´Sofia spent the night singing Christmas carols, gossiping and drinking tea.

This morning we downloaded another big weather file and it looks like we have new lows hitting us every other day for the next week. At least we now know that we can handle them!

Love / Deckhand Emelie

Day 16 - Emelie's 26th Birthday!

2010-05-13T15:43:00.000+02:00

Position: N 34° 29' W 056° 49' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 1377

Happy Birthday to You, Happy Birthday to You, Happy Birthday dear Emelie, Happy Birthday too YOU! Today we are celebrating Emelie's 26^th birthday and meanwhile awaiting the low. So far so good, we have taken all necessary precautions and are ready for the worst! The main is furled along the boom and we are doing 5-6 knots with one reefed headsail up. The wind is blowing from the south west around 20 knots. Cantare is balanced and monitor is steering. With a bit of luck this is what we'll have. After the bad luck we have had the last couple of days I think it is definitely time for some luck now! Hopefully the centre of the low will pass north of us and according to the weather files we downloaded this morning the low is approaching now and will last for about 12 hours. It looks like the low will have passed us around 0200 UTC tonight, we certainly have an interesting time ahead of us!

PS. Yesterday was really the lull before the storm and we therefore took the opportunity to start celebrating Emelie with pizza made out of scones, her favorite, and we also celebrated midway to the Azores with a bottle of champagne.

Happy Ascension Day! Love/FirstMate

Day 15 - Bad Luck

2010-05-12T15:59:00.000+02:00

Position: N 34° 55' W 057° 50' UTC 1200

Nautical miles left: 1421

As I've told you before our two plotters are broken and therefore we have borrowed a handheld GPS from Alan on Starfire, Emelie's boyfriend. In addition to that one we have a spare battery driven GPS in the grabbag. Yesterday the charger for Alan's GPS broke and now we are left with only one working GPS, and since it runs on batteries and consumes them in no time we can not have it on all the time. To steer we have to look at the compass. The problem with that is how small the numbers are, I have good eyesight and didn't think about that when I bought it, but Catrine and Emelie on the other hand find it difficult to see where they are going. Most of the time they get it right, though. Yesterday I badly regretted not trying harder to find a third handheld GPS when the plotters broke, but we did look for one on Virgin Gorda and Gran Turk. What happens if our last GPS breaks down? We really hope that it does not. We keep it inside and turn it on every third hour to write down the position. If worst comes to worst we have a back up plan. We would have to trust Starfire, right now about 20 nm behind us, to find us with the help of our last known position and then guide us to the Azores or lend us another spare GPS.

One could think that would be enough bad luck for one day. But, I was getting ready for my new night watch when Catrine told us to get out in the cockpit. DuoGen's wind propeller was spinning franticly, the part that connects the propeller to the generator rod was broken again, making it possible for the propeller to spin with out resistance. It has happened before on Cuba, then a very nice man in the marina fixed it temporarily for us. We have been in contact with the manufacturer and they have sent a new part to the Azores free of charge. Nowadays they make it out of aluminium which is stronger that ours in plastic. Not having the wind generator spinning means a lot less power. The engine os our only other charger and we don't have that much diesel left. The fridge has been turned off, posts for the blog have to be handwritten first to minimize computer use, no Sex and the City and we have to use as little fresh water as possible since the watermaker is rather power consuming. We are almost close enough to the Azores to manage on the water we already have in the tanks. Our plan is to fill up some spare water tanks (plastic foldable) next time we run the engine and then stop using the watermaker.

Before I finished my watch I spotted the third problem, one of our main's travellers has disappeared, but I think we will manage quite alright without it. That's enough problems for one day, hell, that's enough for the rest of the trip. Now we could do with some luck.

Today the wind has decreased, from time to time we can hardly sail. The weather shifts very fast here, tomorrow we will have strong winds again as the low reaches us. These last days we have changed course, not going further north, maybe we can escape the worst wind. We will see/ The Captain

Day 14 - Whales!

2010-05-11T19:54:00.000+02:00

Position: N 34° 54' W 059° 21' UTC 1755

Nautical miles left: 1493

Today when I went on my watch I was welcomed by an excited Maria. She had seen a whale during her watch! All of sudden when she was looking up she saw a big whale just 15 meters ahead of us (but her first thought was that it was a submarine). Maria steered Cantare a bit to the left of it and the whale didn't move until she was alongside it. She think it was a "Spermwhale" and its size was about the same size as Cantare! It's a bit scary that those big animals are lurking around in the Atlantic ocean - especially if they don't move out of the way for Cantare!

After just 15 minutes of my watch I felt that the wind was increasing drastically. I called Maria up again so that we could reef the main sale and take in some of the headsail. Maria checked the wind indicator and guess what it said - 50knots! That's a lot of wind. But my watch went well except from some big waves splashing over me and some cramp in my arm for pressing the steering wheel against the strong winds.

Very soon, maybe tonight, we will have 1450 distance left to the Azores, which means that we have made it half the way there. And it also means that we are changing our watches today and turning the clock two hours forward. So I will take Marias watch from 3-6, she will take 6-9, Emelie will have 9-12 and Sofia will take 12-3. Even though I now will get the worst watch it feels kind of nice. Half the way over the Atlantic is a moment to remember and the champagne is already in the freezer for this special occasion!

/Deckhand Catrine

Day 13 - Another Crazy Night...Thunderstorm

2010-05-10T20:41:00.000+02:00

Position: N 34° 39' W 061° 21' UTC 1840

Nautical miles left: 1591

Two days ago when I sat on my night watch and saw a star falling, I wished for more winds. That I have regretted a thousand times already. First we had our little misfortune with the sails the other day. Last night we had our second bad weather experience. I think that we all were a little bit tired after being up late the night before, cause all we seemed to do during the day was sleeping. Catrine made an impressive effort though and baked bread. Right now our breakfast is down to porridge or damp hard bread, so it was really welcomed. Usually we watch one or two episodes of Sex and the city during the evening, but not yesterday. We all went to bed early. Somewhere around 21.00, still half awake, still half asleep I could hear Sofia and Catrine discussing the lightening outside and whether it was getting closer or not. After a while I heard them unloosen the grab-bag and put the satellite phone in the oven. After that it was quite hard to go back to sleep, but since it seemed so cold outside the duvet I stayed in bed and tried to close my eyes. An hour past by and nothing seemed to happen and Catrine also went to bed. I could still hear Sofia walking on and of in the boat. I realized that I weren't going to be able to fall a sleep again so I decided to make Sofia company instead. The rain was pouring down outside so we sat down in the saloon. We counted seconds between the lightening and the thunderclap and it seemed to still be quite far away. I guess we were wrong. All of a sudden we heard the sails starting to flap. The wind direction had rapidly changed from SW to NE making it really hard for the monitor to understand what to do. We rushed out in to the cockpit and tried to un connect the monitor, by loosen a little screw on the steering wheel, but it seemed to be stuck. The thunderstorm seemed to get closer and closer for every second, and the wind picked up even more. The rain and waves seemed to take every chance to try and find it's way inside my sailing jacket and rubber boots making me soaking wet. We quickly decided that we had to try and disengage the ropes to the monitor instead. After what seemed like forever, with the rain lashing, boat being thrown from one side to the other and nothing but the lightening to light up the cockpit, we managed to get it of. My heart was now pounding faster and faster and I grabbed the steering wheel. Trying to steer the boat in to the wind so that we could reef the sails. Maria and Catrine had at this point waken up and Maria got out in the cockpit to give us a hand. When the sails were reefed Sofia went up one foredeck to sort out the sheets of the headsails. She then noticed that the headsail halyard had felled into the water and got caught in the Duogen (our water/wind generator that was in water mode). Once again we had to get up into the wind and try to pull the Duogen out of the water to untangle the halyard. Not as easy as it sounds when the boat is bouncing up and down in the waves. With good teamwork we somehow made it work anyway. Everything now seemed to be under control again, but we were still in the middle of the thunderstorm so we decided that both me and Sofia should stay up on watch. Maria and Catrine went down to try and get some sleep. Both still wet and cold me and Sofia took turns on the steering wheel. Since the wind still were blowing from a north-easterly direction we had to beat our way forward. Finally at around 2.00, the thunderstorm seemed to loosen it's grip on us, and we could see some stars in the sky. When we woke up Maria at around 3.00 the sky was starry, but we could still see the lightening in the distance. Me and Sofia had just went down in the cockpit and began to get out of our wet clothes when we heard Maria shouting from the cockpit. As if the thunderstorm wasn't enough our GPS had now decided to give in. Luckily we have borrowed a spare hand held GPS from my boyfriend that we will use from now on. Not a good night at all. A really crappy one actually. But we are all alright and now resting from last nights adventures, getting the boat in order again, steering easterly and trying to dry our clothes. Luckily it looks like we have at least 2 days now with calm weather before a low strikes us on Thursday. I guess it is going to be an other adventure to write about then. This time at least we will be prepared for it.

LOVE/ deckhand Emelie

Day 12 - A Night full of Action

2010-05-09T23:57:00.000+02:00

Position: N 34° 16' W 062° 46' UTC 2145

Nautical miles left: 1661

Did I say something about boring and slow night watches the other day? Maria's birthday didn't end quite as peaceful as we thought it would and I got an adventurous night watch ending up soaked wet with some bruises. After a late supper Maria and I discussed whether we should drop the extra headsail for the night or leave it up. The boat was balanced and we did good speed, but having to drop the sail and the spinnaker pole in the middle of the night if the wind would increase is a tricky maneuver that can be dangerous. Luckily, we decided to drop it at once. But it was already dark and the wind seemed suddenly to increase every minute and the disturbing waves grew bigger. Emelie and I was on foredeck trying to hand in the sail and struggled to get off the spinnaker pole. Maria was in cockpit to organize the sheets and a drowsy Catrine was called up on deck to grab the helm while we tried to solve the situation. The sheet was too tight for me to be able to get it of the attached pole but when Catrine head up to wind to loosen the forces the pole and the sail started moving uncontrollable creating other crazy forces. Emelie and I was forced to lay flat down on deck and I yelled at Emelie to seek protection in the cockpit. After having regained balance I eventually got off the pole from sheet. Finally we could drop the damn sail. Maria carefully dropped the spinnaker halyard while I tried to collected the headsail and prevent it from falling in the water and cause more devastating problems. Meanwhile Emelie was fighting the spinnaker pole and Catrine did her best at the helm. Sail down and halyard on the mast we dragged the sail to the cockpit and doing that I found myself close to man over board hanging in starboard cap shroud. I was secured with a safety harness from my life jacket to the jackstays on deck so if I would have lost my grip I would hopefully not have disappeared too far. However, even if the safety harness would have hold me it would be hard for the girls to get me over the rail and back to the boat. When I was on my way over board Maria just told me she was holding her breath back in cockpit. Falling over board is simply not an option onboard Cantare! But please don't worry back home, we had the situation under control and it was a good wake up call after some lazy sailing days without wind. Now we are prepared for a coming low that might hit us in the middle of next week! /First Mate

Day 11 - My 26th Birthday

2010-05-09T01:31:00.000+02:00

Yesterday around half past 9 am when Catrine asked me if I wasn't supposed to wake up, I told her that I wouldn't because I had decided to allow myself some extra time in bed since it was my birthday. For a short moment Catrine looked confused, then she laughed and told me that it was not, it was only the 7^th of May. Hmm, she was right, sometime during the night I had mixed up the days. That's what happens on the Atlantic. This morning though, the 8^th of May, it actually was my birthday, and when I started to stretch in my bed, awoken early by a chocolate smell the girls sang Happy Birthday for me. I was given hot chocolate to drink in the bed and a nice card that entitles me to a dinner when we get ashore, including desert of course. After breakfast the wind started to blow, not a lot but enough for us to hoist the sails. Our new secret weapon to get to the Azores faster and without running out of fuel is to hoist the small headsail separately with the spinnaker halyard and spread it to windward on one of the spinnaker poles, at the same time we have the normal headsail and the mainsail up. Right now we are broad reaching and the extra sail make us go about 1 knot faster, and it also makes Cantare more stable. It has been a sunny day which I have spend on deck enjoying the easy sailing. In the afternoon Sofia called us all to the cockpit where we had chocolate cake with Swedish flags and played a game. Now while I'm writing this my dinner whish is being carried out, pizza with tuna (tinned, no luck with the fishing yet) and pineapple. The wind is stronger now, we are doing a bit more than 6 knots, we are on the Atlantic Ocean in my favourite boat on my 26^th birthday. What more can a girl ask for? A bit fewer Men of war maybe, swimming from the front of the boat to the back yesterday was thrilling, a bit like Russian roulette. We would like to thank all of you who answered Catrine's whish for more information about the strange animals called Man of war. Being very beautiful and interesting looking you want to pick them up and inspect them at a closer range, knowing the impossibility of this want makes them even more fascinating. How cute they are bobbing on the water around us! I would also like to thank all of you who have sent best wishes on the satellite phone this day when I became one year older and hopefully a tiny bit wiser. / The old Captain

Friday Night's Entertainment - Naked Swim with Dolphins

2010-05-08T01:13:00.000+02:00

When we had to start the engine and drop the sails due to zero wind and 2,0 knots speed some of us took the opportunity to go for a swim. I was the first one to throw myself in the freezing cold water (nowadays the water temperature is "only" around 24° C.) Immediately I got company by a group of dolphins that came rather close. Awesome and they made me quickly forget the unpleasant water temperature. Dolphins weren't the only creatures visible to us tonight, tuna fishes were also jumping around and at a safe distance the deadly Portuguese men of war were bobbing At a safe distance, hm, at least that was what we thought until we read Harry's text about how long the tentacles can be, 165 feet!!!!! Luckily no one got burned, and since it is not every day you get the chance of taking a bath in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean you have to go for it! Thanks for all greetings to our sat phone, keep them coming, we love them! Have a nice weekend! /First Mate

Day 10 - Wildlife at the Atlantic

2010-05-07T20:44:00.000+02:00

Position: N 33° 02,8' W 066° 49,7' UTC 1845

Nautical miles left: 1876

This morning while we were having breakfast in the cockpit we got some nice company. A group of dolphins, maybe 10 or 15, were swimming around Cantare. It's really fascinating to watch these amazing creatures in their true element and not in an aquarium! (I was a bit against Maria and Sofia's adventure when they were swimming with them in a aquarium on Cuba since I think it's cruel to keep these intelligent animals looked up.) The dolphins kept diving up and down around Cantare, maybe because they were curious about us or maybe because they just thought it was fun. Anyhow I watched and enjoyed for the 5 minutes that it lasted and then all of the sudden they were gone. Maria managed to get a picture of one of the dolphins as you can see below, and she also took a picture of the funny jellyfish called Portuguese man of war which keeps popping up in the water around us. The first time I saw one of them I thought it was some plastic garbage floating around. But then I saw another one, and then another So finally I realized that it had to be an animal. Looking them up in our fishing book doesn't give any information about them except their name and that they are very dangerous. So I thought that maybe one of our dear readers at home would help us google them!? And if you find some interesting information about them you can send a message about it to our satellite phone! (Not being able to google things during sailing is one thing I really miss.) To top the wildlife studies of for today, Emelie and Sofia also spotted a tuna jumping one and half meter up in the air. So right now Maria is preparing our fishing rod to catch one!

/Deckhand Catrine