Day 8 - looking Back and Forward
Posted On Monday, 30 November 2009 at at 13:56 by Kapten IngerupPosition: 1200UTC N 020° 42' W 030° 51'
When sailing at night, having the night watch and the sailing is going just smooth, one get a lot of spare time. Yesterday night was one of those nights, the sailing was absolutely perfect, no need for any hair drier. The last 24h we have done 139 nautical Miles towards goal and 147 nautical Miles in total, that is new Cantare record! We really needed that, the competitors are picking up on us and it would be really nice arriving in St Lucia before the finishing line is closed. During my 3h watch yesterday night I didn't need to adjust neither the course nor the sails. Everything went just fine, but after having finished the book I was reading, my neck yelled painful at me to stop me from reading. Nowadays, thanks to a kind a tacky, but very useful headlamp we can read also during nights. To rest my tired neck I leaned backwards watching the stars, started thinking. Believe it or not, despite the romantic scenery I didn't start dreaming of Prince Charming. Instead I came to think about how my life looked a year ago and how different it was compare to the sailing life we are living now. Exact one year ago I was in the middle of final exams, about to finish my semester abroad at a business school in Germany. Back then life was kind of stressful, the days booked from early morning until late night, in a good way though. I am a person who likes having a busy schedule. But in those days there where also other demands and requirements one had to fulfil. One had to do this and that and pass an exam in a certain way in order to succeed. Then there were also the financial crisis still threatening round the corner, making it harder for graduates to find a job. Now I hear from lots of friends back home who are about to graduate, that it is still very hard finding a job and companies having employment freeze. So for me, postponing my graduation and taking this "year off" couldn't be more timely.
Before I was to finish my watch and hand over to Maria, I also had little time to think about the future. What will I be doing in a year from now? The future is a big topic of interest onboard. We have lots of discussions concerning what will happen to us, what choices we will make etcetera. Life is in many respects about choices. I know I want to go back to school and finish my university studies with a master's degree, but I have to choose what kind of master I would like to do and where I would like to do it. Maria and Emelie have also choices to make. Maria intends to do some more studying, maybe try the real university life and Emelie is about to start studying as well. The period of application is first somewhere in March/April so we still got time to think. However, time is ticking faster than you would want it to, and making decisions concerning your future can be much harder than you expect.
PS. For those of you curious about how the shower was yesterday I can tell it was little cold at first but afterwards you felt like a whole new person. Then for dinner the fresh fish tasted absolutely delicious. Isn't it funny how minor things like that can make ones day? Love First Mate Sofia
Day 7 - Advent Sunday
Posted On Sunday, 29 November 2009 at at 14:57 by Kapten IngerupDay 6 - Part II - The fish
Posted On Saturday, 28 November 2009 at at 20:31 by Kapten IngerupDay 6 - Dark clouds at night
Posted On at at 14:40 by Kapten IngerupFriday night, movie night. Pizza, Coca Cola, popcorn and Sex and the City, what more can a girl ask for? We skipped the champagne, it didn't fit in, but Emelie said it was great anyway. For a short while we almost forgot where we were. But, then the pizza tried to leave the plate, the plate tried to leave the table and the waves did their best to support the escape. I was sitting on the door step with warm clothes on and my lifeline attached in the cockpit (I was on duty), ready to go out if anything needed to be adjusted. We had the active radar alarm on (no activity) and we took short pauses every 15 minutes to check for other boats. But the last two days we haven't seen a single boat. Monitor is very good at steering and we are not doing much with the sails, lazy sailing. What we do instead is; read, gossip, eat, sleep, run the watermaker, check where our competitors are, check the weather, try to make up the best route, sun bath and listen to music. And if we get tired of those things, we invent new things, like when we built a sun deck in the cockpit with the help of our table. I haven't been fishing yet because we have so much food aboard, but I think I'm going to start today anyway. I want to catch a big dorado before this crossing is over and with my fishing luck I better start soon. I am also waiting for the squalls. A squall is a big dark cloud with strong winds and heavy rain. The wind change is sudden, but usually the squall pass by very quick. During the day they are easy to spot, but when it's dark all clouds look like possible squalls. This morning I sat in the aft listening to music, not thinking much about the clouds starting to close in on Cantare, when there suddenly was a lightning in one of them, I became alert in an instant. I put the Ipod away, changes our course a bit, trying to avoid the cloud, and waited. Somehow I am looking forward to our first squall, or maybe I just want to know what it's like, but this night was not the night, and I am quite glad because I think I prefer them without thunder. /The Captain
Day 5 - What really happened in Las Palmas?
Posted On Friday, 27 November 2009 at at 12:35 by Kapten IngerupSince we had too little time left for blog writing in Las Palmas, I promised you a little summary of the weeks in Las Palmas, which I will try to give you now. Maria and I arrived little earlier than Emelie and the opening of the ARC weeks in order to get as much as possible done on the boat, or that was at least our intended plan. But apparently, two girls sailing alone tend to attract attention, and a lot of people were interested in hearing our story over a drink, consequently, the first days in Las Palmas was a lot about socialization. However, we did put early alarms every day and tried to get as much work done on the boat as we could every day before socialization. It worked out pretty well even though our sleep accounts got quite overdrawn.
One of the first to welcome us in Las Palmas was HMS Gladan, the Swedish Navy ship we already met in Lisbon. HMS Gladan was moored just next to the Texaco station were we filled our fuel tanks when arriving. Two tired sailors with a broken fridge couldn't be more happy when we were invited to join them for lunch. When being abroad and meeting kind fellow people like the ones onboard HMS Gladan, you feel like home, HMS Gladan is incredible hospitable! Thanks for everything! If you would like to know more about HMS Gladan, check out their web page,
www.gladanochfalken.se.Las Palmas´ marina is huge and the best way to get around the area is to use the dinghy. Volare, our dear dinghy, was very well used in Las Palmas. Speaking of the dinghy, every year the owner of the Texaco station, Don Pedro, is organizing a dinghy race. No engine is allowed, but besides no engine, basically everything is allowed. I wouldn't say it is correct calling it a dinghy race, it is more like a dinghy war. I mean we thought we were well prepared and well armoured, having filled water balloons and everything. Apparently, we forgot the rotten eggs, tomatoes and ketchup. However, we had a great time and managed to stay in the dinghy most of the time. But I and Emelie can assure you that getting hit by an egg from close distance is not very comfortable. Both off us had bruises afterwards. After the big dinghy war Don Pedro arranged a huge barbeque for everybody to join. And now we know why the beer in his little Texaco store is ten times as expensive as the one in an ordinary grocery: in order for him to be able to finance the barbeque.
The ARC Welcome Party was a success! Lots of tapas, drinks and entertainment. The local salsa dancers made marvellous performances! Besides the huge welcome party there were cocktail parties, fancy dress party, farewell parties, dinner parties and other parties during the two weeks. Every night the, for the occasion special build ARC-bar, had happy hours and if you happened to feel like you hadn't got enough party, the Sailor's Bar was opened until late at night. Believe it or not, we weren't actually the ones who partied the most, we did put a lot focus on the upcoming Atlantic race as well!
The ARC committee didn't only give us good parties, they also provided us with interesting seminars. The seminars were inspiring and gave a lot of practical tips to our preparations. Among others we visited seminars concerning provisioning, rigging, route planning and returning to Europe.
One day our friends from Johanna and Time Out visited us. In our so called collective it is only Escape and us doing the ARC. Johanna and Time Our are also on their way over as we speak, but since they are not participating in the ARC they decided to prepare for the crossing in the little less busy and more sunny marina, Puerto de Mogan in the south of Gran Canaria As always when the collective is together we have great fun. This time Cantare hosted the welcome drink and we almost sank because of all the people onboard. Afterwards we went to a local music festival, Womad and danced salsa all night long!
Not only did Johanna and Time Out visit us, so did Maria's parents, her grandma and aunt and my parents and my sister. It felt really good having the close one supporting our departure and waving goodbye as we left. On the whole there were lots of people coming to meet us, some of our blog readers from Sweden found their way to our pontoon to say hello, that was so much fun!
For those of you planning on doing the ARC next year, I will give you a small tip. Arrive in Las Palmas a week or two earlier than the ARC-events in order to have time to finish the boat for departure and still enjoy all the fun activities around the ARC. Or maybe finish the boat before arriving in Las Palmas. We managed to get everything ready on time and still have time for parties, events and meeting new people, however, it got little stressful in the end.
Of course lots more happened during our stay in Las Palmas, but as we girls use to say: What happens at sea, stays at sea, what happens in the harbor stays in the harbor, or is being gossiped about at sea. =)
Back to life on the Atlantic Ocean, everything is going just smooth. Tonight we are going to celebrate Emelie's fictitious birthday. We have all come up with fictitious birthdays that will occur during the crossing, making the trip little funnier. Tonight I think we are going to celebrate with coca cola and some episodes of Sex and the City, we will save the champagne until later. Have a nice Advent weekend all of you! /First Mate
