sailing around the world – Sida 2

Panama Canal 1feb-2feb

Wednesday morning and we are ready to go trough the Panama Canal. Our crew Clause, Chris and Anne arrives in the morning and I was baking since there was no good bread to find. No we just wait for our adviser to come so we can leave. All boats need an adviser from the canal onboard and also five adult on each boat. When arrives we leave the marine and starts to motoring towards the first lock.

Just in front off the first lock we make a nest with Lover of the light and Cacique IV. Then slowly we go in the lock and having the three other nest behind us. We are in and attached in Gatun lock. The line holders made a great job with reviving the lines from land.

Two more locks and we will be staying by a buoy over night in the lake. The Gatun lock have a web camera so this journey any one can follow as I wrote on instagram and fb. Ella was trying to see us but we are first far out on the way in and then when we are in the lock we are very deep. It is our nests mast you see.

Last lock and it is still light. We head to the buoys where we attach us to wich was not easy at all since it was blowing hard and a lot off waves.

Next morning the adviser arrives around 8.30. We get a new adviser Oscar who has been working with this for over 20 years. So happy we got him feels much better than the previous one. We get lose from our nest around they buoy and start our motoring on the lake for some hours before we arrives in San Pedro lock.

Time to tighten the nest for San Pedro lock and after that Milaflores where you can see the lock live. Here Ella is also once again with us even if it is pass bedtime for her back home in Sweden.

We have done the Panama Canal and now it is just less then an hour before we are in La Plaita Marina. Letting the nest go and also our adviser. One of the picture is a big crane working to lift up an anchor and the chain from a huge ship that cut it off when they got on fire. All went well with the crew and the boat needs some attention. Now we will have three nights in the Marina before we leave for Las Perlas and then Galapagos

It has been a great adventure going the canal with the World Arc Fleet and extra nice to have company on the boat. It’s been a pleasure to have Anne, Chris and Clause onboard. We would love to have more company on our sailing. So glad that we will get Eva onboard from Tahiti.

Hugs Eva

Days in Shelterbay

Saphir went up on land and we check in to the hotel in Shelterbay. It is very nice to sleep in a air conditioned room so we decided not to sleep on the boat when it is on land. The hotel was full so we book a room in Colon. Not a place where you feel safe walking around in and it is very poor and many broken houses

A bit shopping was also done with Lorraine and Annie. Trying to find a new pare of good walking sandals since I manage to forget mine on one of the island in SanBlas.Not easy to find they only have flip flops and sneakers. It was so nice to have two hours going shopping . Ended up with a Panama hat, basing suit and some groceries. Me and Edgar went shopping and got a ride back home to the boat from the shop. Now we should have enough of soft drinks,beer and wine until New Zealand we think…. We are good to go on the Panama Canal after inspection from the canal. On the skippers briefing we was inform how we will attach our boats to each other when we go in the locks and how we will attach us during the night on a big buoy. We are the middle boat in the nest.

I joined a guided tour with Sara of Sweden and parts from BlueSunshine to Gatun locks which is the first lock we are going trough in the Panama Canal. The museum is where the new lock is, not the old where we are going trough. It was very interesting and fascinating to see. The locks are huge 55m wide and 427 long and these are only for the enormous big ships. The pools are for reuse the water and safes around 50% that would have just gone out in the ocean. It is not only the locks that keeps control of the lake not flooding. There is a trap door that when it is open it provides with electricity.

The ARC organised a guided tour to one of the natives village Embera village in Charge national park. This was a fantastic trip. First an hour in the bus then 45 min in canoe until we reached the village. They live very close to how they always have lived. Although even they are getting effected/ influenced what happens in the rest of the world. They have a school that is provided from the government up to 6 grade and after that they go to school in the nearby city. Some stay and some comes back to live in the village. In this village there was 132 people living in 40 different houses. One of there income is to sell products that they make. We bought some baskets that are made out of bamboo. They use leaf, nuts ect to colour the bamboo. We had a lovely lunch served on bamboo leafs, and some dancing. We really enjoyed our day here in the jungle.

Tomorrow our crew comes to help us trough the canal.

Hugs Eva

SanBlas a place in paradis.

We had few lovely days in this paradise before we left for Shelterbay to lift the boat. This is paradis, wish we could stay for more days. Easy relaxing life at SanBlas anchoring and just jump in to the water, walk around the island, meeting our sailing friends, grill party , snorkelling ,paddling (getting better). Lots of pictures for you to enjoy.

Last dip in Caribbean for this time. Next time it will be in the Pacific. Lots of boats near the entrens to the canal. Up again with the boat to get it painted before we leave for Galapagos.

Hugs Eva

Santa Marta to SanBlas 240NM or 430 km ish

Time to sail over to SanBlas. Looking forward seeing this paradise in about 40 hours. We got company buy these two lovebirds that probably have started build a nest. Hope they just started to build a nest.

Start shot came and we sail east and some of is slightly more south. After a couple of hours we came in to a really dirty water. This is from the river that comes out next to the city Barranguilla. From other boats we learn to be careful and keep good watch since there might come a three or anything else in the water that the river brings along.

Lovely sunsets and sunrise. Love them and continue pinching my arm to realise that we are hear and doing this fantastic adventure. We didn’t see many other boats with our eyes ther came a ship and also our friend boat Enalia suddenly cross just in front of us.

Almost at the finish line. Count down. We need to pass 078 30 000 W and at 02 58 23 we passed the finish line. It took us around 4 hours more before we where anchored in Holandais Cay close to our friends on Sara of Sweden. This looks fantastic and here we will stay for some days.

Hugs Eva

Sailing from St Lucia to Santa Marta Colombia

Time to leave Caribbean and sail to Colombia. This time it is 815NM and will take approximately five days. We have put on seasick plaster to make sure we don’t get seasick. Getting out in the start line we see Infinity laying in the bay and waving to us. They crossed the Atlantic with us. Mary1 came out to cheer on us and the other boats.

The start signal went of and we was not near the starting line……we crossed the starting line last. We couldn’t have our wing by wing from start, there was little wind for our mainsail so we didn’t go that fast in the beginning.

Finally we turned and took a new course. The wing by wing sail setting with our genoas was hoisted. Slowly we are getting closer to the fleet and after a few hours we are not last anymore

We are enjoying our sailing and taking watch turns. Edgar is doing the first night ours and I take over around 02.00 until morning around 6-7. This goes on for the hole sailing and during daytime we read,knits, eats or sleeps. Some nights we have rains and we can see them coming on the radar. Bit by bit we continue to get more boats behind us. It seams like the nights gives us better winds. Boats comes and goes on the Ais. I have so lovely sun sets and sunrises during my watch and it is very hard to choose photos so here comes many. The moon is shining on us every night so it is not totally dark which makes the watch much easier.

Getting closer and we see land and we are getting in as the fifth boat in Santa Marta. So happy and pleased with our sailing. Now it will be nice to sleep a full night in our bed. This is the longest we have sail by our self.

Hugs Eva

St Lucia preparing for next leg

Back in St Lucia I started to make sun screens for the sides of the boat which is very much needed. They also helps prevent the rain to come in to the cockpit. Not totally when it pours down then we need a tarpaulin. Which we bought here in StLucia and it was needed for a few days to keep the cockpit dry.

St Lucia Marina is very cosy with lots of restaurants, cafe, different shops even a small swimming pool. It is very easy and relaxing to see and talk sailors. The kids runs a round to each other boats and in the Marina. There is 11 kids divided on 5 boats that will be sailing around the world with their parents. You meet so many nice people and get new friends along the way. We had a few nice evenings with Michael, Helena and Martin.

Before we are going sailing our 815NM there is some preparation to do like cleaning the boat, washing clothes, food shopping and preparing some dinners. You are not that keen on going down in the boat the first day and do cooking when the boat rolls in the rough sea. Then being part of ARC you have different meeting with good information about the sailing, weather, place we are going to and then the evening events to meet the others sailors. The ARC also organised excursions. I went on one taking Alex,Inez and Elinor with me while their parents needed to work on their boat. It was very fun going on zip lines in the jungle. All in all we where 3 mums, 2 young adults and 11 kids.

We also got help from Jörgen and Mats to put up the second genua. First they had to take down the one that was up so both could go up together. Down is one thing but getting both up if it is blowing is not easy but the guys did it. So now we can sail wing by wing again.

Mats also went up on our mast to check that everything was okay. He taped the antenna since the screws didn’t sit very well. Thank you Mats for the help.

Now we are ready to sail away to Colombia and Santa Marta.

Here comes the planed route for our sailing. The world Arc continues after Fiji but we jump of there and spend some weeks there extra before we sail down to New Zealand

Hugs Eva

Fixing Saphir and New Year

The sailing up was a bit rough with big waves, wrong wind and some rain. It took us little longer than we expected so we came to late to get in to the Marina so we had to anchor out in the bay. That was quit okay and specially when we got this lovely sunset.

At eight a’clock we contacted the Marina and went in to get our boat lifted. Entering the Marina you wondered a bit where are we going with all these shabby houses. They do need a lot of attention and love.

Before they would lift our boat Edgar had to go and declare us in . After that they lifted up the boat. The turner made us a new mount for our anode and at the same time we got the boat clean and the propeller needed that really much. Now we will sail little faster.

We spend a few days in the Marina enjoying the easy life and happy that our boat is whole again for now.

New Year is coming up and we decide to sail down to Marigot bay to spend New Years even with our friends on Maty1 and Northstar. A very short sailing and we are in this magical place. Very lovely bay but very pricey as well. We had a great evening with our friends even if there was some issues with the restaurant that at the end got solved

Happy New year to our family and friends around the world!🎉

Hugs Eva

Spending days in Grenada

After a nice full night sleep we where ready to fix things in the boat . Edgar went to declare us in. That took some hours. I was happy he was up quite early and was almost the first otherwise he might have spent queuing until after lunch since many boats had arrived during night and also needed to declare in. We went to do some grocery shopping. The food store was much better equipped then Cape Verde. Bit more expensive but that we knew. Our crew finally found tickets to fly home without needing to have to many stops on the way. They leave on Sunday afternoon so before that we needed to get the mainsail down so the rigger could have a look and hopefully fix our fueler. Just needed to wait for the winds to calm down. It was not that easy as the sail is 66m2 and the battens on the boats are standing . That means the longest is 21m long and the shortest app 3m . The sail came down and tied around the boom.

Matti went to a hotel to get better sleep. Although it didn’t roll any more. He needed to stretch out and get some better sleep maybe also a little bigger bed. The cabins beds are not the biggest one although Magnus stayed on the boat with us. The three of us went for a walk and ended up almost in the city center. We didn’t want to walk back in the heat so we decided to take the bus back to the Marina. These minibuses fit 14 plus to in the front. Only cost 2.5 Caribbean dollar wich is 10 sv kr. They let you jump on and of where you want on the route.

Our last night together we went over to the hotel where Matti stayed at and had a lovely dinner. Before that all three of us had to take a swim in the ocean. The first one since we leaft Cape Verde. Very nice hotel would have loved to stay there but maybe next time😀

We wave by to our crew who went home to their wife’s. Five weeks away and three off them on the sea where there was limited contact. The wife’s was happy to get their husbands back home. I finished my knittings to my grandchildren so Matti took them home and I know that they will get them in time for Christmas. Let’s hope they fit them also. If you get caught in the rain you get really wet.. what to do then ? Bake Lussekatter of course. Glad I brought saffron with me. It is hard to find. In this heat you don’t have much energy and all things you plan to do takes so much longer time and you need to rest in between maybe take a dip in the pool in the Marina. Which was very popular amongst many of us but guess the kid’s most. I am so glad that we got help with cleaning the hull and all our stainless steel. Vinegar in the water is the trick to get rid of the salt and after that wash the hull with boat shampoo. The boat is shining again. For now… The riggers fixed the fueler and now it is working. With help from Even, Jörn and Johnny from the Norwegian boat Lise the sail is back in the mast. Thank you guys for the help. Me and Edgar couldn’t have done it without your help. Lise and Saphir is actually roommates. Hmm you think a boat can’t have roommates but they can. In wintertime they are at the same yatch service in Henån. And now we have been sailing from Las Palmas via Cape Verde and to Grenada. The world is not that big…

The next morning we had a guided bus tour around the iland toghether with Even,Jörn and Johnny. We went to Annadale waterfall where we could jump in tomtar water but to many people and the water look so and so. Next stop was at Grand Etang national park with a lake in crater. Grand Etang Lake is a 36 acre crater lake inside an ancient volcano, one of two crater lakes in Grenadine. The lake is full with fish but you are not aloud to fish there. The guys was not that impressed. More fun was it with the monkeys. I wanted meet them. While Johnny was taking photos of me he got surprised by the others monkey that jump on him.

Time for lunch at Belmonte and see the chocolate factory. It was a very interesting guided tour where we got to know from harvesting the cocoa bean, fermenting, sorting, drying and becoming chocolate. Most of these steps are by hand only machines are used to sort out the size of the beans and getting the chocolate out of the bean. When they are drying they walk on the beans to spread them around and to give love to them as our guide said. So of course I had to try that. By the way the chocolate is really good but very expensive. Will eat it on special occasion.

The tour has one more stop. The River Antoine estate. A rom distillery that also using old tradition. Interesting to look at the procedure but didn’t feel so much for trying or drinking this rom. It is also very strong 74 % and can only be bought in Grenada. Very popular rom amongst the inhabitants. The last picture is when they are bottling the rom by hand and doing the last filtering.

Almost all boat us arrived and it is time for price ceremony. Lots of prizes for many boats. Best prize in my opinion was to Infinity that was keeping Helga company after they got problem with their rodder and was on top of that getting in water. Time to say good bye or fare winds to lots of new sailing friends, some of them we will meet along our sailing or follow on different ways. We also look forward to get out of a Marina and trough an anchor in a bay wheee we can jump in to the sea from the boat.

I still love to get feedback 🙂 Hugs Eva

Atlantic crossing

Tjohooo we made it!!! I am so happy to have crossed the Atlantic together with the love of my life my dear husband Edgar, my brother-in-law Mattias and our friend Magnus. Extra thanks to M&M who join us and to their wife’s who manages a month without them. The picture is of us on our last night together in Grenada witch was a very nice evening, but let’s go to back to Cape Verde and the start of the crossing.

Friday 18 Nov at 12.00 the start shoot went of and together with 90 others boats we started our longest sailing leg so far 2164NM. Crossing the Atlantic here we come.. just before the start the little fishing boat came in front of our boat and through in a net and after 15-20 minutes they where done and had caught some fish.

After a couple of hours the wind stopped and the waves came from all sides and Saphir started to rock and swing. Luckily we had scopoderm plaster to avoid seasickness.

After a few days on the Sea the days goes in in each other. You have your watch, we eat, prepare dinner and lunch, read, knit(only me) and sleep. I tried to bake bread of raw-flour that we bought in Las Palmas. Had to trough it over board. It was like eating sand… back to plain wheat flour to make bread and it worked. When I was on it I also made a lemon cake and it was very appreciated by the crew. Heard that is was the best ever … Cocking is very interesting when the boat rolls. On top off the oven is a thick pancake. Waiting for the oven to be warm. Luckily the oven swings, but I was a bit scared that the pancake batter would scump over.

This rolling on a boat can be okay and it can be very hard and also make you use different ways to stay safe. On thing you learn is to always have on hand on something when you move around and use different techniques to stand safe when you are cooking, washing, reading,sleeping. Wide legs and have your feet, hip, but against something that is steady or use the tall .Edgar had the best technique in bed. Look like a toad.

We also had good moment and great moments on the boat. Lots of laughs great food and interesting eating…. Either you eat or you drink. The plate don’t stay on the table nore does the glasses. They tip easily in a wave. It took half the sailing until I realised we have a great thing to have our glasses in since these anti slip cloths only helps the plate to stay in place. It also helps other things in there place a bit better but even then things can move around when a wave comes hard. Sadly my camera was one off them. Don’t have the long object working anymore but the camera is working even if it is a bit damaged.

Crossing the Atlantic gives you a perspective and appreciation of the beauty of our world. Sunset, sunrise , stars in the night( definitely not possible to take photo on), rains, sunny days, grey days and so on. It is hard to take a great photo special when my big camera is broken or it works still after falling but unfortunately my sd card brook later.

Long sailing is tearing on things on the boat. Comparing a summer sailing for which has been 6 weeks and maybe 2-3 night sailing during that time and around 500-600 NM.????Crossing the Atlantic was approximately 3000 NM from Las Palmas-Cape Verde-Grenada. So it isn’t strange that things wear and tear. The biggest for us was that we couldn’t get the mainsail in or out when we had 700nm left. After long trying we manage to get the sail in and didn’t dear to use it anymore.

Sailing 2164nm is long and yes we get in to routines and one was to keep track on how far is we from finish line. Some figures are more even than others. The second thing is keeping track of the squalls in at night on the radar. We didn’t get many. There was only one night we got really much that we had to reduce the sails. Most of the time they just passed us very close but didn’t give us much extra wind and extra rain. Following the distance we celebrate halfway with a glass of bubbles.

You can get wet also without rain, specially when the waves come behind and from side and are big. Poor Matti got a quick wake up

The sailing slowly comes to an end. We see land and just in front off us comes the boat Maroro. They kept us company on the LasPalmas-CapVerde leg and just sail in before us there and also this time… probably our ways will cross again. So after 13days 8 hours 3 min and 13 sec we crossed the finish line and was greeted by other cruisers, Arc staff and the harbour staff.

We even got to students singing for us. We felt very warmly welcomed

This night we will (and we all did) sleep very well in a no rolling boat! First some nice dinner ,champagne and wine. Didn’t know if it was the wine or the not rolling boat that made us sleep well.

Hugs Eva

A week in Cape Verde

First day after a long sail is nice to relax and you really need it to. After that it is time for maintenance on the boat, from filling oil, get off all salt from deck,taking down sail which was a challange due to the wind. We went up 6.00 one morning to manage before it started to blow again.

There is also time for some adventure, like a tour on the Iland together with other Arc sailers. We went up to the top off the highest point and had a fantastic view. The sand is coming from Africa with the wind. This we even saw one day. You think it is foggy until you realise it is brownish It is very dry on this Iland so not much agriculture here. Had to put my feet in the water ofcurse and the guys was happy for all the stops to stretch there legs and relax from the bumpy road.

Arc have had a welcoming gattering with local music and dancing. We also had a price aword i n the first leg. We didnt get to the podium but we came in as nr 9 wich we are very please with since we thought we would come in in the middle.