On the way back from Funchal to Porto Santo the first whales ever crossed T-Fish's path. It was a couple, unfortunately difficult to see (by the time you gave your camera ready, they are already several tens of meters away). Anyway, exciting! I guess these were pilot whales, a bit shorter in length than T-Fish (maybe 6m?).
....is an adjective which is not exaggerating to describe the magnificent landscape and scenery of the Madeira island. Some call it rightfully the European Hawaii.
After 10 days at anchor in the Harbour of Porto Santo, I had a fast downwind sail to Funchal, Madeira, some 40nm south-west.
As there are a lot of yachts from Northern Europe and the Med gathering in this region at this time of the year to prepare the jump over the Atlantic Ocean, it is somewhat difficult to get a place in the marinas. I already experienced this on Porto Santo where I had to anchor inside the port which was OK as there was only little swell. However, after arriving in Funchal, I had to wait 3 days at anchor just outside of the port with a terrible swell. In addition the anchor depth was at the limit for the length of my chain. Thus, whenever you leave the boat, you have a unsecure feeling knowing that the anchor place is anything else but not safe. Thus, in general you only leave the boat for a short time e.g. just to buy some groceries.
After finally getting a place in the Marina, I rented a scooter and explored this magnificent island. The first day of course in shorts and T-shirt - stupid me - not considering that I climbed up the mountains to a height of some 1800m and passing several rain fronts. Soaked to the skin I had to rest for 3 hours in a shelter to stop my body shaking before being able to descend back to the coast line where I could warm up and dry. Luckily I did not catch a cold.....
Here a few first impressions:
Do you know that Christopher Columbus lived on this lovely island? At least one thing I have in common with this brave man.
Porto Santo, some 30nm NE of Madeira is for most sailors coming from Europe main land the first stop after a couple of days at sea.
Accordingly international is the community which will welcome you. Many stay for weeks, months or even years as they like the island's nature and climate, the little town, and in particular the decelerated way of life. If you are looking for a place to come down, pack some books and music, this is definitely the place to go. The island also offers several spectacular hiking trails and diving grounds. See yourself:
.... makes an average of about 5.89kn which is not a bad average speed for the seize of my boat.
However, about half of the distance was motor sailing as the wind fell asleep Sunday noon.
I left Gibraltar Friday at around 9 instead of 8h30 in the morning as the gasoline station only opened 30 min later than supposed. This put me in a hurry in order to catch the outbound tidal current.
About 3-4 nm before Tarifa I saw a bigger dolphin or Orca hunting as fishes were jumping in all directions. When it realized my boat it quickly approached T-Fish which I observed with increasing heartbeat. Just in front of the bow it dived under the hull and... I never saw the IT again, not even sure it was an Orca or likely a bottlenose dolphin.
This was the only bigger animal I saw the whole trip, no other dolphins, no whales, only a few flying fishes and a handful of birds.
After crossing to the African side in between the two traffic zones at the entrance of the Gibraltar strait, I tried to set course directly to Porto Santo. Unfortunately, this was not possible as the wind came more westerly than forecasted. Slowly but surely it backed to the North North-East while increasing at the same time. Wind speeds peaked during the night from Saturday to Sunday up to some 34kn with some impressive waves (average height 3m but the bigger reaching up to 5m). With two reefs in the main, the Genoa rolled up until a little piece for stabilization reasons, T-Fish surfed down the waves with the autopilot in very controlled way without any sign of instability. These are the conditions when it really pays off to have a long keeler or semi long keeler as in my case. In fact, I did something I read before but never assumed I will have the guts to do. I locked the cockpit to make sure there is not water entering the cabin in case a bigger wave breaks into the cockpit, put on the headphones and watched some movies.
Around Sunday noon the wind fell asleep. I still tried the gennaker but with the remaining swell und not sufficient wind pressure this did not work out. Thus, the rest was motor sailing and a bit boring....
Here the longer version video of this passage: