MADEIRA TO THE CANARY ISLANDS, 1st September

Having cruised from the Island of Porto Santo to the new marina of Quinta Do Forte, and explored the beautiful island of Madeira for a few days, it was time to move South East to our next destination of Lanzarote. We had booked into the 'Marina of Lanzarote' situated beside the main town of Arrecife.

We left the Quinta Do Lorde marina at 8.08 on Tuesday the 1st September and motored out into the big blue, passing the uninhabited island just five miles to the South.

The winds were light so we raised the asymmetric spinnaker and zoomed along at 7 knots in 10 knots of wind. However as got behind the uninhabited islands the wind was disturbed and gave us some trouble with controlling the spinnaker. By nightfall the wind had gone up so we changed over to normal sails and sped into the night and through the whole of the next day.

As we approached Lanzarotte late on the second day the wind and sea state went wild. The waves were short and abrupt and wind was 20 gusting 30 knots, so we reefer the main and Genoa to a manageable level. Our intention was to sail over the North of Lanzarote and down the East coast to Arrecife, but the weather was too bad and we diverted into the anchorage off the island of La Graciosa at the North tip of Lanzarote for a rest. We continued the next morning in a howling gale up the channel between Lanzarote and La Graciosa and over the top for the downwind sail to the marina.

Arriving at the marina was okay except for high winds, but all went well with our berthing in position I22.

FROM LISBON TO MADEIRA, 23rd August

We departed from oeiras marina at about midday on the 23 rd August after fuelling both tanks with a total of 229 litres of diesel. Next stop was the bay of Cascais a few miles to the West. We wanted to be able to leave quickly and easily for our crossing to the island of Madeira.

The Cascais anchorage was not very pleasant due to the high swell during the night, so we were not in the best of moods when we departed the next morning at 08.08 hours.

The trip would be almost 500 nautical miles and would take 100 hours at an average boat speed of 5 knots.

The sea state just off Lisbon was terrible. Swell was at least 2 meters and sometimes 3 meters. There was not enough wind to allow us to sail which made the 'rolling' very annoying. The best we could do was motor with the main sail set to try to dampen the roll.

As we motored into the first night the wind picked up to 10 knots which meant we could stop the engine. Great relief because we do not like motoring. The yacht glides gracefully when under sail, but staggers along when motoring.

The dawn of the second day the wind died down and on came the engine again. Luckily the wind kicked in again on the evening of the second day, and the pattern continued. Motoring by day and sailing at night which on reflection was not a bad situation.

After three days, and almost four complete nights we arrived at the island of Porto Santo.

We rounded the Eastern lighthouse and dropped the anchor in the calm clear water off the main beach.