Category Archives: LosLocos

Out on the ocean you rarely see any other ships. Sometimes a cargo will be visible on the horizont for a few minutes but we never came closer than a few miles. We never saw any other sailing vessel other than the SY Kira. And therefore the meeting really was something special. After days of thinking you’re the only ship out there it’s fantastic to see another sailing boat come closer and closer. We had a little chat, made a ton of pictures and that was it. – Both ships continued on their old course and would finally meet again in Barbados. (Which we did.)

A few minutes ago we arrived on Grenada. It was a short and uneventful trip of about 130 miles. The island looks amazing !!! Here are a few pics before we go off to clear in:

Yesterday everybody went to the deepwater harbour to clear out. This means: take the dingy to the fishing harbour, walk 15 minutes in the hot caribbean sun, show your ship’s papers and the passports at the entrance to get a visitors pass for the harbour. Then to the yellow building, pay 50US$, fill out two forms. Go to the customs, fill out two more forms and leave two crewlists. Now to immigration, another two forms and two more crewlists. DONE !

Now duty-free shopping for Mount Gay Rum and afterwards buy some ice cold beer to get rid of the last Barbados dollars.sgetraenk.

Afterwards we were at the local market to get fruits and vegetables. Through the city and we meet with Gui and the crew of the Hitch-Hike-Heidi in a bar. We wait for the live music but it starts too late. The kids are already asleep and we listen to a few songs but then get back to our ship. That was the last day in Barbados. Tomorrow we’re off to Grenada !!

Yesterday in the night, Wolfgang had to fly back to Berlin. We’ve had beautiful days in Cabo Verde, a wonderful crossing of an Ocean and a little Cribbean flair together. We’d like to thank Wolfgang for all the work he did on board, for the wonderful bread he so often baked, for babysitting, etc. etc. It really was good to have you on board !!

Our days in Barbados are getting to an end as we’ll stock up on food and probaly leave tomorrow towards Grenada. From there we’ll sail northwards through the Grenadines and pick up our next guest in Martinique. Guenther from Austria who inroduced me to sailing is gonna visit us for two weeks. Yay !

Well. Bruno’s at the SY Kira, Gui is asleep and Viola is ‘reading’. (Not yet.) I’ll finish this post and then head for the town to get our refreshments. Hehehe.

Tim and Claus from the SY Kira sit at the saloon table and stare at a box with butter. Yes – the butter is already melting – that was the first part. What now ? Aaah – yes. No we’ve got to sail westward. But the half-hourly check of the GPS always shows the same distance: 2008 miles. Maybe the sails are set wrong ? Well they’re not even set. And the anchor ? Oh ! It’s still on the ground !

So we’re still at anchor in front of Mindelo and wait for the wind to calm down a little. Yesterday the Harmattan was blowing hard and we had a constant 5-6 Bft. at the anchorage with gusts of 7 or 8 Bft. And everything is covered with a fine layer of yellow sand. Unfortunately the Harmattan was also the reason why the SY Chiloe is still in Sal. We’ve been on the lookout for our friends the last days but the wind was not too good to set sails.

On the other side, a medical incident caused the SY Ninita to make a short detour to Mindelo. We managed to persuade Nina and Ola to alter their course to Barbados, whereto we’ll probably start together tomorrow.

And if somebody thinks we’re just wasting time – you’re absolutely right ! Because we really want to get sure to NOT reach the Carribean in time for new year. We also managed to delay the departure of the SY Hitch-Hike-Heidi for another day. But in the morning, we couldn’t hold them back anymore. They lifted their anchor at 11 and left for Barbados. The Kira is supposed to leave today (we’ll see about that…) and we will DEFINATELY start tomorrow !

Beside that we had an amazing indian dinner the other day on bord the Rancho Relaxo and Wolfgang surprised us with excellent home made bread. Thank’s to Katja for the great receipt ! Right now Wolfgang, Gui and the kids are roaming the streets of Mindelo in search for a few last things and Tim and Claus are also running for last errands. In the afternoon we’ll tidy up the ship and have a security drill for the crew. After that it’ll be a last dinner and a long nights sleep.

Maybe we’ll have a little surprise when we try to lift the anchor: Yesterday a fishing vessel was drifting into the anchorage with broken engine. They managed to drop their anchor a few meters in front of the Rancho Relaxo. And while the crew was trying to repair the engine, the ship was going adrift in a wind gust and came to a standstill only a meter in front of our bow. A few minutes later another fishing boat managed to drag the damaged ship out of the anchorage but the anchor was left aground a few meters in front of our ship. We’ll see when we lift up the anchor…

A final word about our reachability while at sea: We’ll have our satphone switched on from 12 to 13 UTC and from 16 to 17h UTC. You can send us SMS for free or give us a call. – Details on the Contact-page.

Cabo Verde, Cabo Verde…. We should have arrived a few weeks earlier. This islands are just amazing !! Pleasent climate, friendly people, beautiful women, good food, cheap, no mosquitos, great sailing…. etc etc.

Just great, here ! It’s a shame we’re already about to leave. But first we had a lot of fun with our friends. We’ve spent an evening with the crews of Kira and Hitch-Hike-Heidi in the ClubNautico and afterwards had a party on board the Kira. Today we removed the carpets from the Rancho Relaxo – the barefoot-route doesn’t need them. We’ve also checked out already so from now on we’re actually illegal – but who cares ?

Tonight we’ll move into the anchorage but before that we had a little tour through the marina. Had a nice chat here and there with friends or people we didn’t yet know. We also met the crew of the Tres Hombres who invited us to a tour of their ship. But that’s gonna be in another blog post.

We’re doing everything really slowly and don’t plan too much for our days. Also we’ve decided that we’ll spend a few more days on the neighbour island to be sure that we DON’T make it for new years eve to Barbados. We made that decision to take the possibility of stress from our trip. That way we really enjoy the time on the Atlantic without thinking of the landfall….

Today we were at the local market to get some fresh food. Tomorrow we’ll take water and Diesel and then we’re off towards Sao Antao. There we’ll be tomorrow evening and spend one or two days after which we’re off into the great blue ocean. So here and now will be the last internet for three weeks. Then we’re stuck with shortwave radio and SatPhone. It’s gonna be beautiful. The trade winds are stable and we and the ship are well prepared. Yay !!

We had a wonderful sailingtrip from Sal to Sao Vicente. Half-wind sailing was something we had nearly forgotten about. It was wonderful sailing for nearly 24 hours under blazing sunshine or a full moon through the Atlantic ocean from one beautiful island to the next one. And the landscape of Sao Vicente is truly amazing. That’s what you’d expect a landfall to look like. I’m a bit short on time, so see for yourself:

Really beautiful also the ‘stairway to heaven’. And the rust stained motorvessel in that picture is actually still in operation. Yay !!

Here in Mindelo we also met the crew of the Hitch-Hike-Heidi with whom we’re out for dinner right now. We’ll gonna have a nice evening and probably sleep like stones in a while…

Dinner’s coming in a few minutes, but I’ve got the time to upload a few pics from the last island, we visited – Sal. Enjoy:

Unfortunately I forgot to bring the camera the other day but there’ll be more pics soon – promised. Today we already were at the local police station to check out. In a few hours we’ll leave for the next island of Sao Nicolao. There we’ll spend a night before we head to our last harbour in Mindelo.

So we’ll tidy up our ship on the inside and outside, jump into the water and sometime in the afternoon we’re off. It’s about 100 miles so we should be there tomorrow afternoon.

Pfew ! I think the whole Island of Sal shares one single DSL internet connection. To upload just a few pictures, it took me two or three hours. But hey ! Here they are:

Again – we had a WONDERFUL trip towards Cabo Verde. I really hope that the crossing of the Atlantic Ocean will be somewhat like this. In the meantime we’ve discovered a little of the island of Sal. A desert island without many attractions. A few hotels in the south and some of the best Kite-surf spaces around. But despite that you’ve got a few little villages connected via Aluguer (the local bus/taxi). You ride on the back of the pickup and let the warm wind caress your face. The people, the culture, the life – everything really is different from the other places we’ve visited so far. And we’re glad to have left Europe behind. Now it get’s interesting !

Yesterday in the evening our friend Wolfgang arrived at the airport and at one in the morning we interrupted our cockpit party to pick him up. So there we were. Tim and Klaus of the Kira myself and Karl, another sailor we’ve met here. Everybody a bit overexcited we dragged poor Wolfgang to the waiting Aluguer to get back to the ship. With the dinghy we rode towards the Rancho Relaxo lying at anchor with our new and beautiful LED-lightchain hanging from the mast top. Really beautiful. We had a great and funny evening and today in the morning we woke up, jumped into the water and had a nice breakfast.

More stories of Cabo Verde will follow – and also pictures. But now it’s time to turn off the Computer and focus on something more important. Four Caipirinhas were just delivered to our table…

Did I say we’ll leave on saturday ? Of course I meant sunday. Hehehehe. No, really – there were hundereds of little things to do and last night was short (again). So we decided to give it another day and set sail tomorrow in the early afternoon. We’ll be out on sea for approx. 6-7 days with destination ‘Sal’ in the Cabo Verde archipelago. As always, if you want to contact us, use the information on the ‘contact’ page. – Everything’s there.

But of course we’ll use our shortwave connection to post a few stories while underway so stay tuned.

After weeks of intense preparations, the day has come. – Or at least nearly. Tomorrow we’ll be leaving the Canaries ! We stocked up on food, the ToDo-list is (unbelievably !) empty, the tanks are full and everybody is getting slightly nervous. Not really because of the distance to Cabo Verde but because it’s been a while that we’ve been sailing properly. Hehe.

Yesterday in the evening the SY Kira finished shopping and somehow managed to stow an incredible amount of groceries and drinks inside their vessel. Only the now missing boot-topping reveals the amount of food inside. After that incredible performance in real-live-Tetris we opened a five liter can of beer to replenish our electrolytes. I was back on our ship at about 04h in the morning.

Today a couple of friends from the anchorage came by to wish us a good journey and exchange emails, etc. Some of them we will probably see in the Carribean others we won’t meet ever again. But you hardly can tell since everyone seems to change their plans quite as often as we do. What else ? Hmmmm. We got the new persenning for our Genua. We also had last-minute christmas shopping. Allegedly Santa Claus will come around even if we’re out on the ocean. Bruno says he’s got an incredibly fast dinghy – just like the coast guard.

Now it’s time to clean up the ship on the inside. There are still many things looking for a good space to be hidden. I’ll do another posting tomorrow, before we’re leaving. Speaking of: We might be sailing together with the Kira again ! But they have a problem with their spinnaker pole and it might take till monday to fix that. Hmm…

What’s the day today ? The answer to this question will take longer the more yachties try to answer it. But I’ll just ask the computer. Tuesday ? Well… We wanted to go sailing today – didn’t we ?  But that also has become a running gag. But we’ll leave – I promise.

Sunday evening the SY Tamora entered the anchorage and we immediately left the beach party to enter our friends ship. Just seconds after the anchor touched the ground, the crews of Kira and Rancho Relaxo were sitting in the cockpit of our friend’s boat. Last time we’ve seen each other was in Lissabon and so there are plenty of stories to tell. As 217 ships of the ARC-flottilla now have vanished, more and more yachts from the anchorage move into the marina to fill up their batteries, tanks and lockers. Even the LosLocos have started to make a big inventory list and a shopping list. In a few minutes Dieter and Silke of the Tamora will pick us up to go into town.

After shopping we have to check out (officially that is, at the customs), we have to store anchor, fenders, dinghy. Everything else is pretty much done.

Lately we had the discussion whether we’re nervous about the big crossing that’s ahead of us. But without even thinking about it the answer of everyone was: “No. Not at all !” – Well – that still could change. Hehehe.

We also updated our route – cancelled Senegal and made a few plans for the Carribean.