37:18.659N 009:01.770W
SV Eleonora
Michael A. Andronov
Fri 24 Aug 2018 21:45
We are clearing Arrifana…. It is the anchorage, about 7-8 nm on our port side… But we are not going to stay there. We are going straight to Cabo de Sao Vicente.
Why ? As I mentioned before — there is nothing in Arrifana. It is a small ‘transient’ anchorage, opened and unprotected from the West. We do have a North West swell already, and it is not clear, what is going to happen closer the shore…
It is already late. Wonderful full Moon… But I prefer to be in the open water, rather then trying to drop the anchor in the unknown harbour, probably with the boats, and may be covered with fog…
Cabo de Sao Vincente — about 20 nm further… It would be not the first sleepless night in the Ocean, and then, tomorrow, in the morning, we have a chance to be in Lagos… Which would be ‘strategically’ much better place to be, anyway.
Until now — it was a busy day…. It was a good introduction to sailing in the fog. Real fog, with visibility — 0. May be, to be more precise — with some decimal points… The radar and AIS proved to be extremely useful and helpful. How people were sailing in those conditions without it — I do not know…
Crossing the anchorage of big ships — was educational, to say it politely… The closest analogy — like crossing the railroad yard in front of the trains… They are not moving, but… you do not know if they do have intention to start to move….
And then the sounds started… The MSC Valencia started to make horn sound… Periodically… I see her on the radar… I see that she is probably drifting… since the speed is about 0.5 kts, in more or less the same direction… The ship of 330 meters long…
So, the sound of the horn — coming with the same period… and seems to be from a wide sector somewhere ahead… ( Though the radar is showing that the bearing is changing, the ship is not moving, and we are clearing OK… ). And then — the noise of the diesel… spreading through the water and the fog… somewhere… on port, dead ahead ? Who knows… ;-) No matter how much mentally you are prepared, no matter how much you are looking into radar, and praying it will pick up everything… Those sounds are getting to your nerves… I guess I would remember those 57 minutes for a while…
We cleared the tanker anchorage… the horn finally started to be heard from ‘kind of astern’, and radar shows the clean ‘water’ ahead…. The wind picked up, and we started to move…. About 6 kts, with a tiny better visibility…
About 1600, finally the fog started to lift… Now we can say that we have ‘ a very greyish day’, with some light wind…. As the fog started to lift, the wind started to die…
Why is that always coming in a pair here ?
The .grib files shows that we should have the wind… The intercepted conversations from other ships - further from shore — that they see 25-30 kts… We have a slowly diminishing wind… But the growing NW swell… That increasing swell gave me a concern — it means that there is a wind somewhere in NW direction behind us — which is corresponding to the .grib files… And if that true… that ‘nordata’ winds, as they call it here, may eventually catch up with us… Well, it nice to have some wind, but I do not want to be in unprotected anchorage, late in the evening /early night, with 25 -30 kts… ;-)
Somebody heard my thoughts… The wind died completely on us, the swell stopped growing too… and we were bouncing on the waves… One thing — slow sailing… Another — no wind, and no sailing at all…. So, the motor was called to help….
For a change — we have a wonderful night so far. The full Moon… the sky with stars… Yes, the amount of condensation on the boat suggests that the fog will formed again… But I hope — by that moment, about 0100 UTC — we would clear the Cabo already… and , hopefully, on the way to Lagos the conditions would be different…
Though a bit frustrated that we have to use a motor again…. Everything is OK, and we are moving!
Have a great evening,
Talk to you soon,
M.