When the wave breaks

Weather forecast from 26.07.2021: In the south of Gran Canaria mostly sunny, with temperatures around 25°C. Weak winds, between the islands of Gran Canaria and Tenerife 17 knots, in the gust 23 knots, from northeasterly directions. Wave 1,5m from north 5 sec. This is not exactly a coffee ride now, if you add the obligatory 5 knots of wind to the weather forecast, here in the Canary Islands, but quite doable.

Puerto Mogan

We are still off Puerto Mogan, in the shade of the island before the northeast trade wind and it blows a gentle breeze. The dinghy well lashed and last preparations, for the 70 nautical mile trip, to La Gomera taken, we are in a good mood. With the setting evening sun, we enjoy the pasta and look forward to the way to the Cape Verde Islands, which we want to approach via La Gomera. The routing gives 17 hours, under sail, in these weather conditions. This is mainly due to the fact that south of Tenerife we come back into the shade and have to cross a doldrums area. Our destination is San Sebastian on La Gomera, which according to the weather forecast, at 1pm predicts the lowest wind, on this day. At shortly before 8pm, we go anchor on and drive into the twilight. With 6 knots of wind from the southeast - yes right, not from the northeast - we make only moderate progress. A, now already, two meter high wave, hits us unpleasantly from the side. As Gran Canaria opens the view to the north, a black cloud wall stands in front of Tenerife. Suddenly wind, this time actually from the northeast, takes hold of the sails. The main in the first reef and the genoa just rolled out a third, we pick up speed. With 22 knots of wind we quickly reach 8 knots of speed over ground. Again and again gusts with more than 30 knots bang into the sails and we sail along partly with 11 knots. Thereby a four meter high wave builds up, which breaks around us with a hellish noise. In the meantime it is night and the big things are hard to make out. Since the wave, by the gusts, only shortly before us strongly build up, it does not remain out that one or the other, breaks over us. From the front, the bow rises and falls crashing into the wave trough. The spray, protected by the superstructure of our catamaran, flies over us. The waves that hit us from the side cause much more chaos. Because the skipper refuses to drink his red wine out of paper cups, glass breaks every now and then in such rough weather conditions. Miraculously, only one glass is broken in all the chaos, but the cleanup takes almost a whole day. With a loud roar, the next wave breaks and floods our cockpit. There stands then times evenly half a cubic meter or 500 liters of water in the tub. After all, over 500 kg. The bilge pipes have their hands full transporting the water back to where it came from. That takes about 3 minutes, although we have four of them in the cockpit. However, the additional weight is not noticeable in the speed, despite overloading we sail on with eight knots. In front of Tenerife the wind drops to 18 knots and makes things bearable. At 5.00 o'clock in the morning we get into the shadow of Tenerife and we quickly lose speed. Now it goes only with 3.5 knots there and our patience is put once again, on a hard test. Still 16 nautical miles to San Sebastian. Since the wind turns more and more to northwest and through the nozzle between Tenerife and La Gomera, again rises to 31 knots, we throw, at 6.30 o'clock, the engine on.

San Sebatian, La Gomera

At shortly before 12:00 we reach San Sebastian with 25 knots of north wind. It literally blows us into the box, but we make it without a scratch and stop in time. Once again 70 nautical miles, which have demanded a lot from us and which can challenge a small crew quite a bit. Now we get some sleep and then we start to clean up the mess on board. In the late evening we interrupt our work and explore San Sebastian. We are hungry and since the galley is not yet operational again, we go out to eat. In the middle of town we find the tapas bar La Tasca in a sheltered courtyard. Wind-protected places are always in demand on La Gomera, because it is unpleasant especially when eating, if the wind blows away the bite in front of your nose. 

Arrived on La Gomera

Whether we continue our journey to the Cape Verde Islands in time and whether the weather is better this time, you will find out in the next block, here on www.glenswelt.com. It may also take a little while, as we have no internet connection on the way, but we'll let you know as soon as we can. Until then, as always, fair winds and keep a stiff upper lip.

https://www.noforeignland.com/boat/5619486585520128?sid=6083432710930432&tc=1576319441080