Matt leaves us in Sal and we take a team photograph showing off the boat T-shirts, I got these made in Gran Canaria and will arrange posting ones to Ken, Eileen, John and Pearse (previous crews).
Use this web address in your web browser to see where we are, Alan will update the boat's position around noon (UTC) most days. You should see a screen like the one below, you zoom in and out using the arrows at the top left and it is easier on a PC than a phone.
Anyway I row Matt ashore at 7 am and he departs for the airport, it was really good to have him onboard, even if he always won the gin rummy games...
We head out for the next island - Sao Nicola 60 miles westward. A rolly beam reach and we slow down a bit for comfort. Arriving at dusk we head along the South coast to a bay anchorage highlighted by Don Street's Pilot. Normally anchoring at night is not recommended but we note the bay has steep cliffs and we use radar to ensure we know exactly where we are in relation to the shore - the charts are said to be inaccurate (they are close here but 500 feet out on the next island!).
The steep cliffs shelter us from the wind and we anchor in 10 m with a scope of 5:1. Hitting the Man overboard button on the chart plotter and zooming in to the 20 foot scale allows us to monitor our position, also the echo sounder is kept on all night. If we dragged we would end up in a 1000 feet of water so I sleep soundly!
Nice steep cliffs
There is a narrow gully with a dock just to the East of the anchorage but it would be too tricky at night.
The next island is a nature reserve - we agree it looks a bit spooky, this and the next adjacent small island is known to be turtle breeding grounds according to the pilot. In any case this one is a bit unwelcoming. There is a viable anchorage on the next island but the Garmin and Imray charts show no data - basically uncharted. Hence we head to the slightly larger Sao Luzia which has a gorgeous beach shown as a good anchorage in 10m. It is night again when we approach and we use the radar again - there is a small rock called Isla Zinho to avoid (which we do) and we anchor off the beach to the West of the rock - there is a french yacht already anchored to the East of the Rock. We note a discrepancy between the Radar and the chart of 500 feet.
The picture above is an overlay - the radar target at the 16m point is the french yacht. note how the chart version of Zinho ( yellow bit under the "Z" of Zinho) is a bit to the right of the orange radar image above the "I" of IIheu. Radar tells the truth and we use it.
View of the beach from the isla Zinho
In the morning we take the punt to the rock, lift it ashore and dive. Alan and I dive again on the south side of the Island while Peter and Doros stay on Shadowmere, A mid water leap from Shadowmere and an exit via the punt tied alongside works well. I use a delayed Surface Marker buoy when we ascend to 5m and this helps Doros and Peter - who could see our bubbles from the high viewpoint of Shadowmere's centre cockpit.
As usual, I need to upload edited videos to youtube but don't have good enough Wifi, here are a few tasters and I will edit the page eventually
A few stills from my GoPro Clone
A very nice dive - the variety of fish is astounding, we also see a couple of very small crayfish but do not lift them, meanwhile Doros has negotiated a good price from a small boat of fisherman ...
Later that night we enjoy our friend with a coconut curry and pasta (and a nice cold white wine)
Before - above and After - below 8-)
Before we get to Dinner we have to get to Mindelo - 15 miles up a rough channel with current against us and then 5 miles along the top of San Vicente island with the current with us but with overfalls and rolly seas. We get to Mindelo an hour before dark (it gets dark very quickly after 6:30 around here)
large number of anchored hulks here - a dozen or more, we radio the marina and they welcome us in. Nice marina - very rolly but good showers and a floating bar just beside the marina office. We arrive on a Saturday which is a national holiday and the Cape Verdeans put on marching dancers and music for us. but we are tired and go to bed without taking photos - sorry
A pleasant town, street cleaners, stuff getting built, roads being relaid and good fish and vegetable markets (as well as supermarkets and butchers) They can't process credit cards and Cape Verdean Escudoes cannot be converted back to Euros although you can pay for everything with Euros (probably a 10% penalty but given that a coffee costs 1 Euro and a Beer 2 Euro with a meal out running at 6 to 9 Euro it is not too onerous.
Here is a few shots of the Fish market taken by Doros and a street vendor also selling fish. Fish is everything here.
We don't buy any fish because Alan and Peter intend to catch Dorado from Shadowmere on the way over... details later!
Finally a shot of a van on its way to the vegetable market. We buy some bananas for the journey - we also buy 72 tins of beer but will ration this to one tin a day per crew member - in the old days Captains dispensed the rum ration (or grog) we may amend the rules when we arrive in the Caribbean as the there are 70 different types of rum and so little time!
We ready the boat for the departure; Fill the water tanks at 2 Euro per 100L - Shadowmere has 560 Litre water tanks (just a quarter ton) and we also carry 65l in 5l bottles (and beer) so we should be ok
