The reality of maintaining a boat rears its ugly head again. With visitors coming soon, Trip turns his attention to the toilet, which has not been flushing well. After confirming that the motor works fine and the macerator blades are clear, he pulls out the entire hose that runs from the toilet out the side of the boat. As we feared, it was lined with a thick scale that greatly reduced the amount of waste that could flow through. Without a water maker, we flush with sea water. The sea water, combined with the contents of urine and other things, over time line the hoses. Yours truly took the hose out on the dock and spent an hour banging it with a hammer to break up and release the scale, and flush it all through. Disgusting messy work, no question, but we’re good for a while now!
The marine world keeps you on your toes. Boats require constant maintenance, and we always have a list of things we want to do, and then there are the ones that we discover that we have to do. Offshore passages especially beat up a boat.
Boat bottom cleaning
That list at the end of this season included: Varnishing (more than a week of scraping, sanding, and varnishing in between bouts of rain), cleaning & reconfiguring the sink drain hose, propping up dying batteries (we’ll replace the house bank in the Spring), fabricating a new riser (stainless steel part of the engine), scraping the hull where it meets the water, re-filling propane bottles for cooking, and keeping mildew out of the inside of the boat. There’s probably a hundred other items, but those were the hardest and most time consuming. Six weeks of living in a marina wound up being a lot more than we planned, but we still found a few days to relax and enjoy the area. And we’re raring to go for 2023!
I always fight the urge to roll my eyes when someone comments on our ’vacation’ when we’re cruising, knowing full well that most days on the boat are perfect for us, but nothing that appeals to most.: Tight quarters, limited water, exposed to the weather, seemingly endless maintenance, repairs & projects, just to name a few.
Send off to new friends
Cruising in a new country brings its own challenges. You arrive and you have to figure out where the authorities are to clear in both yourself and the boat (something that would be right at the airport when most of us fly). You need to get currency or hope that they’ll take dollars.
Cleaning the boat bottom from the paddle board
You need groceries next, as we can’t afford to and don’t like to eat out every day. Grocery stores and markets are one of my favorite places to visit in a new country, but it’s an experience looking a new products on the shelves and figuring out what to cook. And it all has to fit in just a few bags, as we are usually walking or biking or bussing back to the boat. Between the Internet and new local friends, it’s not too hard to figure out, and Trip is very happy with most meals on board. Lotta clued me in to Peruvian pink peppercorn trees that grow as an ornamental tree near our marina, and after a few days of drying, we have peppercorns for next season!
Peuvian pink peppercorns (schinus molle) drying for the pepper grinder
Of course something on the boat is always breaking (cruising = fixing things in exotic locations). In Europe there’s the added challenge of tools and new gear being metric. Because we don’t know the area we don’t know who to call. Again, the Internet usually comes to the rescue. We’re also able to reach out on social media to groups like ’Women Who Sail’ or our global cruising club. Sailors are a group that really enjoy helping fellow sailors. And one of the most wonderful things we’ve discovered this year is the friendliness and resourcefulness of the Portuguese. We have been helped over and over again, big scrapes and small, by local strangers who asked little, if anything, for their help. We can only hope to pay it forward.
Valeriy, Elena & Ozzie
Living in a marina in a new country is like moving into a tiny apartment in a huge apartment complex in the United Nations. We have new neighbors from Germany, Sweden, Ireland, Denmark, England, Russia, just to name a few. Some are temporary as they get ready to head further east or west. Others are there longer term, like us, such as Valeriy and Elena, with their always happy wire-haired dachsund Ozzie. Elena has already taught me how to make borscht and where to buy the best pelmeni (Russian meat dumplings). And, of course, our friends Mads & Lotta, who live near the marina. While we’re back in the US, we regularly get pictures of Kalyra from these friends along a note about how she is still floating and is looking good. Such a crew of new (& old) friends is fun to embrace.
Farmers market near the marina
There’s lots more to deal with – new SIM cards for local Internet, figuring out how to do laundry in a machine with instructions in a different language, getting a haircut, etc. It’s all a bit of adventure, but if you’re patient, it’s pretty rewarding.
We are not marina people. Our boat is heavy. We have a small engine and no bow thruster, so maneuvering in tight spaces (ie. in and out of slips or berths) is not easy. Marinas can be expensive, hot (boat does not face into the wind), and crowded. We usually prefer to anchor. However, that’s simply not a good option for winter storage. So here we are in Marina de Lagos for the winter.
Ozzie – one of our neighbors
This marina could not be a better place for leaving the boat. It’s in southern Portugal where the weather is quite mild. It has a long entryway and is virtually protected from all swell and nearly all wind. Gates are secured from public access, and there’s a winter population here living aboard, so theft is generally not an issue.
Boat leaving Lagos marina through footbridge
Living aboard here in the marina is socially exhausting, but wonderful. It’s like living in the middle of the United Nations with so many countries represented. Everyone has boating in common, and everyone is happy to help, offer a solution, commiserate, or simply relax with a drink.
Cocktails on s/v Zabava (Valeriy, Elena & Ozzie)
The marina is situated in the middle of town (population 90,000) and one can walk or bike to nearly everything. I shop every other day for groceries as needed, and especially relish the Saturday morning farmer’s market.
Farmer’s market
Most boats, like us, are here for 6 or 9 months waiting for the spring to sail east into the Mediterranean. Other boats are here for just a few weeks provisioning and waiting for weather windows to head west to Madeira or the Canary Islands, followed by crossing the Atlantic to the Caribbean. We’ve had so much fun trading information with these boats on anchorages, marinas, expectations, etc. I love learning more about where we’ll be sailing next year, and it always feels good to pass on information to someone else. And the list of friends keeps growing!
Norbert, Steffi and Joeline on Kaimana getting ready for the Canaries
And with all the new friends we meet, we have Mads and Lotta just up the street as well. We see them every few days for dinner or drinks, and they’re always so good with information or advice about the area. And they are a perfect excuse for movie night!
We had two days of winds blowing in the 20’s, gusting into the 30’s. It was a solid anchorage and we weren’t worried about the boat, but days like these are extremely wet and uncomfortable for the dinghy. I picked up expensive cheese and iberico ham, pork rillettes, and a lot of red wine to get us through the weekend.
And there’s always projects. One of the things we noticed was the amount of moisture that came through the hull during the big passages. Book pages have developed mildew stains, and a few electronics like the portable USB power bank were rusted out completely. We took everything out of the cabinets so Trip could check the chainplates for any structural weakness. All looked good, so we cleaned everything up, threw a bunch of old or damaged things away, rebedded the chainplate covers, and packed up again. One less thing to do at the end of the season….
We were in Leixos for much longer than we expected, but making repairs to the boat is never a timely process. I’m quite proud to say though we managed, just the two of us, to get the broken headstay off, as well as remove the jib and furling gear. In most situations a team in a boatyard would be doing this, but we got the job done ourselves.
It sucked being tied to the pontoon (or in a slip) when the remnants of Tropical Storm Danielle came plowing through. It’s much better to be at anchor. The surge of the storm had us bouncing up and down against the dock, with one cleat/hawse bending from the force (Trip was able to bend it back), fender covers ripping to shreds (though that had started earlier in the season), and one of our docklines losing strands several times because of chafe which required cutting & re-adjusting. No one was going anywhere, and boat neighbors were kind to lend us spare fenders to protect the boat from the dock. Marina staff would come out and check on us multiple times. It was uncomfortable, but never dangerous.
And then the storm passed and the new headstay came in! I hoisted Trip up the mast so he could disconnect the dyneema line (temporary headstay) and connect the top of the new headstay. I thought that would be the tough part, but it went pretty smoothly. It was connecting the bottom part of the new headstay to the boat that turned out to be a nightmare. Several hours, lots of lines, many a curse word, and it was finally on. We opted to wait to put the jib back on the following morning when the sun was up again.
We left Horta a bit later than expected, but we found a good window that didn’t involve much motoring (a common problem). Surprisingly our first afternoon out found us reefing down three times after a few hours, and a pop alerted us to something broken on the newly working windvane. Operator error this time, as Trip had not epoxied one of the turning block pads well enough, so the autohelm carried us through, despite 30 knots of wind.
This trip the weather was absolutely fantastic, it was the boat that let us down a few times. Trip was able to repair the epoxy job on the windvane, but we had to wait 24 hours for the seas to calm. By then we were motoring, except the alternator wasn’t charging the batteries, which we desperately needed. Ugggg, hoping that wind and sun would charge the batteries, which hasn’t worked so well on other offshore passages. Luckily Trip had a couple of reference books and was able to sort out the alternator problem and remedy it. Whew.
Up the mast in the middle of the Atlantic
Of course we weren’t done with boat problems. We were ready to sail again, killed the engine, and rolled out a bit of jib. Suddenly we heard a bang and immediately started looking around. I noticed the jib swaying much more than normal, Trip looked up and realized the headstay had snapped. We managed to furl the jib and next thing we knew he was climbing the mast in relatively, and surprisingly, calm conditions, wind and sea-wise. He was able to free the remnants of the stay, and to attach a line of dyneema (rope-like material that has the strength of stainless steel) that we ran down to the front of the boat where it was attached to a 4:1 vang (block & tackle). Combined with that; the jib halyard was still attached (with the jib), we moved the spinnaker halyard forward, and the inner stay for the staysail all worked in our favor to keep the mast in place. Trip eased the backstay a bit, and we kept our fingers crossed that the rig would hold.
Epoxy repairs
The weather held in our favor and we managed a beautiful sail for the next several days. It wasn’t easy, hand steering at times when the power supply dipped again, managing an accidental gybe when the preventer broke, and sitting through one night of soaking rain, but we made it. Not only that, but despite the reduced rig (triple reefed main and staysail) we only took one day more than planned.
Fabulous sunsets and incredible night skies
Thanks to the Iridium Go and cruising guides, we made contact with a marina and marine supplier just outside of Porto in Leixoes, Portugal. We knew we could start out at anchor and move into the marina to make the repairs. Best of all, we knew we could see Porto by bus in just half an hour!
Temporary preventer
With just a few hours to go and with landfall in sight, we had our first whale sighting on this passage! It surfaced only 20 feet or so next to us, coming up several times alongside before it moved on. What a fabulous omen for dropping anchor!
New neighbor
We knew Leixoes was an industrial port, but it was still an eye opener. A gas refinery lined the wall to port as we entered, and we stared at the tankers and the commercial fishing boats around us. We dropped anchor, jaws dropped, next to an industrial dredger the size of an apartment building operating next to us. Just minutes after we dropped the hook, a cargo ship was towed out of the harbor by a couple of tugboats. It was alot of energy and motion given the solitude we had had for the last 11 days, but it didn’t stop us from passing out, no longer sharing night watch!
No matter how well prepared you think you are for an off shore passage, things will go wrong. Hopefully those things will be insignificant and few in number, but what’s important is how you react to the problem, and your approach to fixing it or getting by. After all, cruising is ’fixing things in exotic locations’ and I would say the Atlantic Ocean qualifies as ’exotic.’
Resting after shaking out reefs
Everything that went wrong was functioning properly when we left, and nearly all were the result of being in caught in heavy weather. Here goes:
: We encountered big winds and big seas, but nothing uncommon for the Atlantic. We did get our cockpit ’pooped’ a couple of times, filling with water before draining. This led to the failure of a sealed electrical unit that controlled our ability to start and stop the engine. The engine starting solenoid is unfortunately located in an inaccessible place on the engine, further complicating the ability to jump start the engine. The Iridium Go satellite communication link now proved critical, as it gave us the ability to communicate with help back home. Friend and fellow sailor James (conveniently another Tayana 37 owner and an electrical engineer) assembled what we began calling ‘Team Kalyra’ (other Tayana owners, Yanmar diesel mechanics, etc.) to troubleshoot and solve the problem. Through a multi-day, extremely detailed set of communications, James and team helped us eliminate non issues, and get to point of successfully bypassing the failed unit and starting the engine again. We were also fortunate enough to have solid winds that made for beautiful sailing during this time period, so all was not lost. We were also able to communicate during this time with Azorean OCC port officer Linda Lane Thornton, who reached out to marina managers on the different islands and re-routed us to Terceira where we could sail in to anchor and find access to a diesel mechanic if needed (luckily neither were needed, but what peace of mind to know they were there).
The engine loss did create a secondary problem, and that was general power for the boat. We have a solar panel, but experienced multiple days of no sun. The wind generator was producing barely enough power to keep up with the constant draw of the instruments needed for navigation, the self steering autohelm, the lights and the refrigerator. We did opt to only run the refrigerator for an hour or so a day, and we often turned the auto helm off and hand steered. Even so, at one point the batteries were low enough that the solenoid for the propane wouldn’t engage. Luckily we have a camping stove on board and I was able to make coffee and heat soup in the cockpit.
Wind vane repairs
: Wind vanes are finicky, and ours is newly installed (actually we finished it just before we left). The self steering worked for the first two days, and then the oar kept popping off and dragging behind the boat. Trip and Greg fixed it, only to find it steering 30 degrees up into the wind regularly. Trip was able to communicate with the manufacturer, but unfortunately one of the potential fixes required being in flat calm waters, a luxury we didn’t have. Though it requires electricity, we at least had the auto helm to rely on.
Mixing elbow from the engine
: The marine world is hard on a boat, no matter how well kept. Big seas caused our windlass handle (for dropping and retrieving the anchor) to go overboard, but luckily we had a spare and were able to have a new one made in Terceira. The third reef stop blew out of its rivet, and the webbing attaching the slugs to the top of the mainsail blew out (both problems we faced on the sail to the Carribbean), but both were jury rigged and/or fixed at sea. The riser for the exhaust mixing elbow cracked and had to be disassembled and repaired. Moisture got into the boat which caused the VHF radio to go on the fritz until Trip dried out the connectors and got things back in working order.
What needs to be fixed now???
Despite everything that went wrong, I give credit to our crew for remaining calm, working through the problems, and maintaining a healthy sense of humor throughout the sail. If I didn’t express it clearly enough above, a huge debt of gratitude is owed to James and Team Kalyra for keeping our spirits rallied and helping to manage a solution when things went south.
Crossing the Atlantic is not something to be done blindly weather-wise, and no one needs to anymore.
Though expensive, we opted to purchase an Iridium Go satellite hotspot that would allow us to download weather reports, and we subscribed to Predict Wind, a weather routing service. We had used a weather router (Chris Parker) in the past, but wanted the data to make our own decisions this time. Trip had also been studying pilot charts that show decades of seasonal weather patterns in the Atlantic. The Atlantic is famous for weather in the south near Bermuda that leads to dead spots with no wind (we have a sailboat so we want wind) and weather in the north that can sometimes bring too much wind. Toss in the unpredictable Gulf Stream and the Azores high, and there’s a lot to consider.
The optimal months for crossing from the US to the Azores are May and June. Based on personal commitments we opted for the first weekend of June. Tropical Storm Alex was coming up the coast, but heading offshore further east. We used the departure planning feature of Predict Wind, which compares options for 4 days of departures, and had our date.
Once off shore, we would download weather reports twice a day and decide our route. It would have been lovely to sail straight from point A to point B, but currents, wind strength (not too little, not too much – like Goldilocks) and wind direction (as much as possible on our beam (side) or from behind for a comfortable ride) all needed to be considered. You could see weather highs and lows forming and decide how to pursue the most favorable winds, avoiding deadspots that required motoring as well as avoiding too much wind.
So how did we do? We came in contact with three gales in the first half of the trip. The winds alone were not the problem, but the addition of big or big & confused seas made things complicated. We practiced the technique of heaving to when the conditions got to be too much for the crew (the boat was a freaking champ, she would have plowed through anything), and sailed when it made sense. We went much further north than we ever planned (which made for a couple of really really cold and damp nights), but it allowed us to catch consistent westerly then northerly winds that allowed us to sail for a week straight, in beautiful conditions, right into the bay where we dropped anchor.
My opinion? The money was well worth it. The data downloads were reliable, and the weather predictions were as well. It was an exciting ride, but we made the right decision for us and the boat for this trip. As we get ready to move from Terceira to Sao Jorge, it’s rather amusing to be using it for something for only 50 miles (less than a day), but it’s still valuable!
When provisioning for an off shore passage, I plan on the number of days expected plus half that. This was critical for a passage like that to the Caribbean, which took 17 days instead of the expected 12 (lack of wind and limited fuel). These meals do not include the usual cans of soup or wraps and peanut butter & honey which can be fixed in a pinch no matter what the situation. I had planned on 30 days of meals. Greg was rather impressed, as he was expecting 5 days of meals, followed by leftovers, and then start the rotation over. I think I got through half the plan. Why?
Cook hard at work while crew looks on
It was nearly impossible to maintain my balance. I was able to wedge myself in between the steps to the cockpit and the galley counter, but the constant movement of the boat made things sloppy at best and sometimes dangerous (there were some conditions where I knew a knife wasn’t feasible). I joked that once onshore again I would charge people ridiculous sums of money to cook at a constantly changing 45 degree tilt – no better way to strengthen your core!
We were too tired/wet/cold. I consider myself a good off shore cook and I don’t get seasick, but some days nothing tasted better than a heated can of soup with a grilled cheese sandwich.
We had the sin bin. I keep a pocket in the table filled with all sorts of healthy and not-so-healthy snacks (granola bars, peanut butter crackers, dried fruit, trail mix, nuts, and candy bars). Any time anyone craved something extra they could dive in and find a little bit of energy for their watch.
I had the fixings for wraps – lots and lots of flour tortillas that could be filled with tuna salad, peanut butter & jelly, scrambled eggs & leftover veggies, egg salad, and anything else laying around. No need for knives or bowls to clean either.
It wasn’t always bad! I brought along my sourdough starter and made foccacia, pizza (twice!), and a loaf of bread. It just felt strange not to be doing it every other day like on other passages. Blessedly my crew never complained, they were always appreciative of everything I made.
Fresh sourdough bread
And the added bonus was when Greg caught the false albacore! Two nights of fresh fish 14 days into a passage was the best treat ever!
Typical meals:
Breakfast: Scrambled eggs, potato and fake meat wraps, cinnamon apple oatmeal, cereal, pancakes
Lunch: Wraps, leftovers from night before, soup
Dinner: Black bean & sweet potato enchilada casserole, lasagna, clam chowder with foccacia, ramen with leftover veggies, pesto pizza, pasta with sundried tomatoes, artichoke hearts, olives & feta, turkey chili with mac & cheese, salmon sweet potato cakes over salad, teryaki salmon and roast broccoli over rice, sesame albacore, and stir fried veggies over coconut rice
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