Well, here I am in my office at home, having returned from Antigua about a week ago and it’s cold.
It is sunny but has been totally shocking to go from a little too hot in Antigua to a lot too cold within only a few days.
We celebrated Thanksgiving with our son Christopher at his apartment when we arrived back in the US in Manhattan and took a train back to CT where we are now.
Yes, it’s cold and all I can do is to turn up the heat, trading mid 80s for the high 20s. Not my first choice.
The good news is that the yard is in good shape as I did a lot of cleaning up before departing for Trinidad over a month ago and hired a lawn service to do a “final” cleanup. One less thing to do in the yard. That’s a good thing as everything is frozen solid given unusually cold weather for this early in the season.
And, speaking of final cleanup, I was on such a deadline to bring Pandora north to Antigua from Trinidad to meet the arrival of the Salty Dawg fleet, that I did not have an opportunity to get a number of little details settled on Pandora.
I had some paint shipped to Trinidad to address a few scratches that ended up being delayed by a hurricane and the usual bureaucratic issues of getting things into Trinidad and I had to leave before it was at the boatyard.
After taking a careful look at the boat over the last few weeks I have decided to take her back to Trinidad to have some final details finished, probably in March. Don’t get me wrong, Pandora looks great, like new, but with such a big job, it is inevitable that there would be a few small issues that were overlooked and need a bit more attention such as a fine paint overspray on the solar panels, that needs to be removed.
Amos, who managed the job, has been very understanding and happy to address these issues upon my return. I have been quite pleased with his work and have recommended a number of people to go to him for jobs, both big and small.
I don’t know exactly when we will be back to Antigua following the holidays but I am hoping that we might return a bit in advance of the 15th, Brenda’s birthday. As she has been away for so many of her birthdays over the years, it is reasonable that she’d want to be home this year. One can only hope…
Now that the arrival events for the rally are completed and we are back home, I am turning my attention to the schedule for the winter and all the issues associated with my planned run in the spring to the Azores.
I am particularly focused on crew for the run to Horta from Bermuda but will also be looking for crew to make the run to Bermuda from St Martin in mid May and from the Azores to Portugal in mid July following a month aboard with Brenda exploring the Azores islands.
Under the category of “random serendipity” Brenda and I ran into a lovely couple at the yacht club the other evening and as luck would have it, they had just returned from a week long captained charter in the Azores and we had a wonderful time comparing notes.
The “yacht” was a bit smaller than Pandora and they had settled on that particular boat based on a short 5 minute YouTube video that they had seen. Just for fun, as it does give a pretty good feel for the area, here it is. This is the video that inspired them to book the charter.
I’ll admit that any Enya soundtrack always chokes me up as my late Father loved her work. Admittedly, he did love what Brenda would with a wrinkled nose, call “elevator music” but then, so do it.
After spending a month in the Azores with Brenda, I will run Pandora toward the Med, where she will be hauled until the following spring. I have not been able to confirm where I will stop but was thinking about Lagos, in Southern Portugal.
Check out this short video and you can see why Lagos is so popular with cruisers and tourists alike.
However, a lot of this depends on the relative threat of being attacked by a killer whale, or Orca. There have been many reports of a pod attacking boats and chewing off the lower part of their rudder. There are a number of sites that track orcas and their boat attacks and it seems that the best defense is to just avoid being in the same waters as orcas.
As they migrate to follow their food, primarily tuna, they are in more southern waters near Logos and Gibraltar in the spring and move north as the season progresses. This suggests that I as I will be heading east from the Azores in late July, that it might make sense for me to go directly to Gibraltar and not farther west along the southern Portugal coast, my original plan.
Also, under the category of “serendipity” Brenda and I were introduced to a couple, Lynn and Ian, by longtime cruising friends Anne and Dick, who we sailed with in the Bahamas. Ian and Lynn have a vacation home in the Azores and we had a lovely intro to them on the phone the other night.
Their charming stone home in the Azores, perched high on a bluff, a short ferry boat ride from Horta.
Their patio. I’ll bet that the view is to die for.
And their cruising boat that I believe is in the US now, on the hard while they travel around the US visiting Friends.
Amazingly, and very spontaneously, they have invited us when I arrive with Pandora and Brenda flies in to Horta to stay with them and tour the islands together. They are fellow cruisers, spending much of their time aboard their own boat and their willingness to welcome us is typical, and very welcome, among the dedicated cruising set.
In my own shy and retiring way, after comparing notes with them on the phone for nearly an hour, I invited them to do a webinar for Salty Dawg on the subject of “cruising the Azores” and expect to have it in the first half of January.
I am very excited about hearing what they have to share and will be promoting it to the member of Salty Dawg. Stay tuned for details on that discussion as it will be free to all comers.
It is amazing how one thing leads to another and how hanging out with the cruising community has enriched our lives so much over the years.
So, lots to do in preparation for our time in the Med and with new friends in the Azores, all the more to look forward to.
All of this will help me overlook the sub freezing temperatures here in CT.
Aboard Pandora, the only thing cold is the fridge and freezer. And cold beer… Something else to look forward to.
That’s about all for now. Off to MD to see the grand kiddies for a few days.