Dena Hankins's Blog, page 4

The Would-Be Log

It’s strange to post these with the inaccurate titles, but it’s true to what I thought we were doing. We left Mindelo for Brazil, probably Recife, went the thinking, but things changed.

Cabo Verde to Brazil Day 0

Sunday, October 20

We sailed off the anchor in close company with the sailboats that had clustered around us since we’d come back to Mindelo. The anchor chain is grassy and inside the links there are hard white growths, more coral than barnacle looking. It’s going to smell funky in the forepeak until that life gives up the ghost.

The anchor came free at 9:22 am, Cabo Verde standard time, and we spent the next couple of hours on a starboard tack. That could be the last time we’re on that tack for weeks, and it’s the more comfortable for napping because the full-length settee is on the port side. James took us out of the harbor and then had a lie-down while I got us clear of the first few points.

A little way through James’ next watch, he gybed us to a port tack and now we’ll settle in. Things will shift inside cabinets, knock against each other. Hopefully we did a great job and nothing goes flying, but there will be a lot of socks being stuffed into loose places for a few days, or a few weather changes.

By the time noon hit, we were clearing the southwestern point, the one with the lighthouse Farol de Dona Amelia.

Noon position: N 16° 50.237’ W 025° 06.883’

Distance 0922 to noon: 9.5 NM
Average speed: 3.65 kn

Trip distance covered: 9.56 NM
Distance to destination: 1683 NM


Cabo Verde to Brazil Day 1

Sunday, October 20

Coming south of São Vicente, we’ve already had the wind veer (yay, yankee), strengthen, then veer again and die down. At less than 2 knots, I think I’ll see if we’re broad enough to bring out the staysail.

…So that turned into a both-and. I got the staysail out right as the wind picked up a little. We hit 3 knots as soon as I got us trimmed and now we’re varying between 3 and 4. Cool.

At that rate, we’ll be there in…

Note to self: swimming right before leaving rocks.

I called reefing right before the end of 1300-1400 watch because the wind kept building and I realized we were leaving the island’s wind shadow. Through James’ next watch, we were okay with one reef but he did roll in most of the staysail. Then I reefed again within 10 minutes of starting my 1500-1600. James didn’t have to do anything on his 1600-1700 watch and we’re rolling along at 5-6 knots under full yankee and double reefed main with the wind just abaft the beam. We’ll switch to the staysail if it gets too hectic, but it’s feeling comfortable and strong for now.

We’ve passed the 3000 meter contour line and are about 17 NM from 4000 meters. We’ll be in the influence zone of the islands for another couple of days, though. Our route takes us within 20 NM of Brava, and Fogo’s huge volcanic peak can create a wind shadow that covers a hundred miles. We won’t really be in pure, open ocean until the wind picks back up after that.

When it’s edge-on, Saturn seems to have wings instead of rings.

I’m thrilled to report that, at 1927 hours, I spotted the comet Tsuchinshan-Atlas! It’s a smear using my poor vision, but quite visible through the binoculars. Wheeeeee!

It’s my last off-watch before my first long watch but I’m definitely not sleepy. I slept really well last night and it’s not even nine. I’ll wait to take tonight’s vomidrine (totally it’s real name, totally sounds like it does the opposite of what I’m taking it for). It will make me sleepy, so I’ll hit that about a half hour before the end of my watch. I’m not queasy and rarely get bad abovedecks, so I think it’s safe to wait.

I got to the companionway to take over for my 2100 watch and, before I could start up the ladder, James turned and puked.

So…we thought we’d be leaving on Wednesday, but decided that Thursday was better and then I started feeling crappy. Bad bad belly cramps and later, terrible vomiting. At the end of the day, I developed a fever, stopped puking, and burned so hot James couldn’t sleep next to me. The fever broke before morning.

I wasn’t fit to do anything robust for days. The dinghy was on the foredeck so James couldn’t go ashore…we were out of data and didn’t even get to tell anyone we were still in Cabo Verde.

James didn’t seem a hundred percent this morning, but he jumped right into setting up LoveBot and taking off the mainsail cover.

He got shaky after we got underway and took another vomidrine. I guess it helped, but he said, at the beginning of his 2000 watch, that he felt really bad and had the sweats.

I shouldn’t be surprised, but that’s a long incubation period! If I got it ashore somewhere and he got it from me…I thought we’d waited long enough to be in the clear.

I’ve cancelled the route we were navigating and put us on course for Brava. In the morning, James and I can decide whether we need to go to the town or just anchor so he can get better.

…This isn’t on the level of James having a stomach flu, but I just spent a half hour tracing down knocks. The two water jerry cans shifted outboard enough to let the epoxy container start knocking about. Even better, that left a can of torch fuel rolling back and forth. Unfortunately, I can’t see the problem on the port side, aft of the bulkhead separating the lazarette from the area with the…cough…rudder post. We’re steering easy, so I’m going to believe I tied everything well enough for safety if not quite enough to keep something from rocking.

Monday, October 21

Hello early morning, you’re lovely.

The moon and Jupiter are hanging out like cool kids, making it hard to spot any shooting stars from the Orionids. Hard to complain, though. It’s a lovely pairing and light, fast moving clouds add an element of the strange.

We will definitely stop at Brava, though James isn’t feeling quite as bad. As much anti-nausea medication as he’s taken, I’m not surprised he’s not puking. He’ll be shaky for a couple of days, though, and will need to rest.

Noon position: N 15° 04.219’ W 024° 48.735’

Distance noon to noon: 111.3 NM
Average speed: 4.64 kn

Trip distance covered: 120.8 NM
Distance to destination: 15.8 NM

Land ho! James sighted the peak of Brava at 1245. I’m not envious…I saw two whales! One was maybe 13 feet long and the other a little smaller. They were making a ruckus and I thought it was another saga of life and death between fishes, but then they came towards us and breached…fully out of the water in a move that is etched in my memory. I couldn’t see them clearly enough for identification and they never came back up.

When we came around the point and saw a sailboat already in there, it was a disappointment. We’re as far towards the northwest side as I’d ever want to be. We know them from Mindelo, had a drink at the floating bar once with a Swedish couple. They’re French and he speaks better English than she does, though she seems to follow the conversation just fine.

This place is gorgeous. The water is crystal blue…we can see the sand 30 feet below…and the hillsides are green and brown. No swell is making it into the cove right now, so I think we’ll be quite comfortable here.

Anchor position: N 14° 49.890’ W 024° 44.360’

Time underway: 4h 46m
Distance: 16.3 NM
Average speed: 3.91 kn

Trip distance covered: 137.1 NM
Distance to destination: 0 NM

Cabo Verde has been good to us

Here we go again, Schrodinger’s Sailors!

Assuming we get to the other side of the Atlantic, on the other side of the equator, we’ll have so much to tell you about!

Meanwhile, it’s a glance back at cachupa and feijoada and serra caril, at the nice people and the standoffish ones too, at the only place in the islands that lets you use your own (unscented) laundry detergent, the women working food stalls and clowning to make the day more fun for everyone, at the swimming and provisioning and getting shit done in the heat and humidity…

Now…

Away!

System Failures

Way back in 2016 we were living aboard in Back Creek, Annapolis, Maryland when it became painfully obvious to me (James) that I couldn’t live with my incredibly painful dental situation. Dena was seasonally managing the Watergate Point Marina and I was working at Bacon Sails so neither of us had anything even close to a dental plan that would deal with my oral issues.

Storm a-brewing in Back Creek

My aforementioned dental apocalypse actually started a few years before then. In 2011/12 while we were wintering in Baltimore and just before our epic adventure from Baltimore to Maine and back down to Connecticut, the tooth pain started to get really bad. So before we got underway from Fells Point, I went to a local dentist with cash in hand to take care of a toothache the old fashioned way: needle-and-yank. Well, the doctor basically told me that I was genetically orally fucked and that all of my teeth should be removed in favor of some form of alternative mastication system, i.e. dentures or implants. In my head I told her to shut the fuck up and pull but in reality I thanked her for her expert advice, asked her to remove the worst aching tooth, threw down my $120 bucks and went sailing.

My Happy Place

I spent the next four years in agony. No really, it was horrible. If you’ve ever lived with a constant toothache from paycheck to paycheck without insurance, I can literally feel your pain. It’s an intensity far beyond my worst nightmares and it never goes away, not even in your sleep. While we were wintering in Groton, Connecticut, in ’12/’13 I went to another dentist for another removal and he (after giving me anesthesia) tried to make me sign a contract for a $30,000 set of implants. It was at that point I decided I would rather be in pain than spend my life in American medical-debt prison.

(Literally) Sailing through Hell Gate, NYC

That same winter we scored a gig as Cruising Editors for the Waterway Guide, a job that was very close to perfect for us but without even a remote chance of a dental plan. For the next three years we sailed up and down the Atlantic Seaboard rewriting and editing the mess between Cape Fear, North Carolina, and Downeast Maine. We would sail and write in the summers and get part time wage-slave gigs in the winter until the pain just got to be too much for me to take.

Sailing the Chesapeake 2016

That brings us back to Eastport in the autumn of 2016. Dena’s job at Watergate Point was coming to an end for the year and my gig at Bacon Sails was a take-it-or-leave-it kind of deal. I mean they wanted me to stay but winter in a chandlery is a lesson in patience punctuated by sleepy-eyed boredom and the retelling of retold stories.

And besides…my mouth was killing me and I do mean that literally. By that time every tooth on top was broken, infected or both. My breath was so bad that it gagged even me and Dena, bless her incredible soul (or whatever), was finally at the end of her patience. It was time to make a decision about my teeth.

Stow the boat and head east

As I said before, I didn’t want to waste any time or money on the American Medical Complex, that’s just silly. We could sail to Mexico, Central America or Brazil where we had researched and heard the dental care was good and a whole lot cheaper but I was in an immense amount of pain and not up to an offshore adventure at that point. But there was another option.

We could go back to India!

Ahhh, India

In 2008 we spent almost the entire year in the Indian subcontinent from the Punjab to Kanyakumari. We ended up settling in the state of Kerala in the city of Thiruvanathapuram. We went there because it was inexpensive, the food is awesome, neither one of us had ever been there and, let’s face it, Hindustan is about as exotic as it gets! We ended up, both of us, writing novels that year in India but not without also thoroughly exploring the culture, the food and the environment of that incredible place. We fell in love with the entire experience and, let me tell you, India is an awesome experience in every sense of the word.

living on the trains

We wouldn’t have thought of India as a place for dental care if we didn’t have some experience of medical care there. I (Dena) got very unexpectedly pregnant not long after we settled into our flat on Pournami Nagar. It made me terribly sick and I dropped about seventy pounds in only a couple of months.

I knew something was weird, but I thought it was just me

Besides the sickness, I didn’t want to be pregnant or raise a child. James and I were in agreement since the night we met that a life without children sounded better than one with. We’d been free to do so many adventurous things with so little backup resources, free to live on the fly, and we wanted to continue living as we’d planned.

Abortion is legal in India but socially judged and not all that easy to access. My searching for information brought us to the free public hospital for women and children and, whew, was it ever a judgy visit. Also, the waiting rooms teemed with people waiting their turns and, though there was cleaning going on constantly in every room we entered, a serious amount of age and grime throughout the place, right down to cracking leather on one of the exam tables.

Long story short, I miscarried before I had to make a final decision on whether or not to trust myself to that hospital’s care and, luckily, found another side of the healthcare in Kerala.

The hospital down the road from our little lane was private and didn’t perform abortions. They were more than happy, though, to take care of a women in the middle of miscarrying, including sending me for imaging and doing a D&C. While the expectations would have been wildly difficult to figure out without some of James’ friends knowing the system (things like they don’t feed the patients because families want to take care of that), the level of expertise and care was impressive. The facility was not sparkly-new in the recovery areas but it was far improved over the public hospital.

Whatever I have to do to get discharged, I will

Only a couple of weeks after going home, I was back for the one and only elective surgery I can imagine I’ll ever get in my life: tubal ligation. No way was I chancing another pregnancy, between the not-wanting-kids and my previously-undiagnosed bicornate uterus which ensured I would never carry to term anyway. I trusted the doctor and her staff, and the price was right.

So there we were in Annapolis looking forward to a six-month break between ending the season at the marina and coming back to restart work. James clearly needed a paradigm shift in his mouth, not just a slow ejecting of teeth one by one. And the rhetoric around dental implants was in full swing.

Nomad Stowed for another winter in India

So, we put the boat to bed at Watergate Point Marina for free, asked our friends at Bacon to keep an eye on her and flew back to India to get me (James again) a brand new mouth.

It was good to be back

A friend of ours, whom we met the first time we lived in Trivandrum, had a condo there but lived in Bangalore. He offered us the condo for the duration of our stay. It was a bit out of the town-central but not so far that we couldn’t make due in our new locale. The place was a bit of a wreck but it was free so we weren’t complaining. We just got to cleaning and buying a more comfortable mattress.

Walking the streets of TVM

We walked around for the first week or so looking for oral surgeons and hit a couple of genuine losers before landing on a business called Trivandrum Smiles that really won us over. Dr. Pradeesh was young, professional, spoke English very well and was genuinely concerned about my health. I was getting a bit desperate so we decided to go with him. Unfortunately Dr. Pradeesh wasn’t qualified to do implant surgery so he brought in a colleague, Dr. Allen (fucking asshole), to do the work. Dr. Allen was always late (without exception and once by almost two hours), his bedside manner totally sucked and his work only lasted a few years before it started coming apart in my head. But we went to work immediately on the process removing old teeth and implanting the new denture.

We bought new duds and bikes to get around

Only six implants can hold an entire top denture! Implants reverse bone loss! It’s the closest thing to having your youthful teeth back…if it’s done right. First they had to get my old teeth out which was a seven surgery process that took a total of about twelve painful hours because of how broken up and infected my original teeth were. Then Dr. Allen fitted me with a temporary removable denture so I could eat while he was installing bone grafts and the hardware into my deteriorating upper jaw over another three surgeries. After that he did the measurements, took an imprint and went to work building the new permanent denture while I heal up from all that sticking and cutting.

in the meantime we did some epic adventuring

I healed up rather quickly because South Indian food is the best food in the world and we aren’t really the sedentary types.

By mid March of 2017 I had a new set of teeth in my mouth and for the first time in almost two decades I could actually eat an apple without weeping from pain. Everything in my life had changed but that change was soon to be proven short lived.

We did one last train ride to Malabalipurm before heading back to Back Creek

For two years after the surgeries I had little to no issues with my new mouth but the denture slowly started to loosen with time. By the time we took off on our electric circumnavigation I was back to eating as much soft foods as I could and staying awake on my off watches with pain.

Sailing into Mindelo, Sao Vicente, Cabo Verde

By the time we made landfall in Mindelo my mouth was once again full of infection and I could hardly speak from the pain so we (and I do mean Dena because by that time I was almost useless) found a dentist once again in a strange new place. The place is right here in Mindelo and it’s called SmileMed. The Doctor’s name is Joianne Melicio and so far she’s been awesome. She took us in off the street without an appointment and did everything she could to make me comfortable and safe in her care. But make no mistake about it, there was very little she could do with my situation until she could get the infection out of my oral cavity. She gave me a prescription for a heavy dose of antibiotics and after some failed triage sent me on my merry.

Not my best day ever

The next day I took one of the antibiotic pills and, about forty-five minutes later, the entire denture fell out of my head, hardware and all!

I didn’t swallow a single screw

The little bolts went through the denture and threaded into the hollow side of the big bolts, which were threaded into the bone and nova-bone-graft material in my skull. Two of the big bolts are still in there while I shake this infection.

…And this is what has been stabbing me in the gums for the past couple of years!

It’s amazing what a person can get used to

So here’s the thing…Today I’m no longer in pain and because I actually have a tooth, a single molar, left in my upper jaw I can eat stuff. I mean, it takes a lot of concentration to move the food around in my head and I’m not going to any fancy restaurants anytime soon but the pain is gone, I’m on the mend and we have a path for my complete recovery over the next 4-6 weeks.

So hey, it’s all just another part of the adventure.

An offshore passage between Cabo Verde’s islands

We sailed straight to the capitol of Cabo Verde from the Canaries because of James’s passport problem, and that put us in the Sotavento, or leeward, Islands on Ilha Da Santiago the island at the very bottom of the chain. Once his new passport was in his hot little hands, we had a quandary.

Beluga Greyfinger enjoys life at anchor

The world’s weather will make it easier to get to the Amazon River delta if we spend another couple-few weeks here, but Praia isn’t a good place to spend more time than necessary. We’d tried the only other anchorage, the one at Cidade Velha, but it was far too rough and the surf line was really close to the anchoring spot. If we were going to spend more time in Cabo Verde, we wanted to get ashore more easily, have cleaner water for swimming and watermaking, and get away from the stench of rotting trash.

Polluted water warning?

The only marina in Cabo Verde is in Mindelo on Sao Vicente. But that is in the Barlavento, or windward, Islands. Going from leeward to windward islands means…sailing to windward! Ugh! And it’s not like we’re talking 10 or 20 miles. It’s 170nm between Praia and Mindelo, so it’s likely to be a three-day close-haul. Beating into the wind is not generally our style, but doing a haulout, working on the mast, being able to swim and make water safely…these blandishments put us in mind to go ahead and take our medicine. And believe it or not I (James) was the biggest proponent of leaving. I was so over the smell and the filth of Praia that I figured a stiff beating was better than another minute in the capitol.

I couldn’t find a translation for this which made me happy

There were no taxis near the port on that Sunday, so we did the long walk around the harbor one last time. The policia maritima fumbled around for almost an hour finding our documentation and issuing us a “saida”, our leaving papers. We needed a break from the hot-and-humid walking, but the cop shop is not air conditioned and they don’t even use the one dirty old fan attached to the ceiling! The television was on, though, showing the Canadian women’s basketball team gain a lead on the Nigerian team. No, I (Dena) neither know nor care how it turned out. I did enjoy that the Nigerian team members had glorious hair.

One last push up yet another huge bluff and we celebrated at Restaurant Annabel. Putting salmon, cream cheese, and arugula between pancakes and then drizzling the pile with balsamic is an inspired choice. That and another excellent cachupa was way too much food but sometimes plenty is a pleasure.

Celebrating having our saida (permission to leave) and our USCG Certificate of Documentation back from the Policia Maritima

We hit the grocery store near the restaurant one last time and got a cab to transport us the 4.3km back to the Port in the 34C temps and the 90% humidity.

Being free to leave changed the dynamic completely. Instead of jumping at leaving, we looked again at the weather and decided that the next morning would be soon enough. Coffee was barely down our throats when we stripped off the dusty mainsail cover. I raised the main while James hauled the anchor and just like that we were back in our happy place, under sail and underway!

So long Praia

We sailed along the south side of Santiago and bent our course northwest as we cleared the island. The breeze was light but enough to send us merrily out to sea. It wasn’t all that long, unfortunately, before the island itself was a wind break. Motorsailing with the electric motor is so easy and peaceful that we don’t grumble like we used to, but the swell added an irritating jolt to our motion, slatting the main so badly that we finally dropped it altogether.

So calm that we barely furled it

Without much to do, it was a good time to simply be glad that we were underway.

James demonstrates excellent doldrum-selfie technique

As the sun descended on the gray horizon the wind rose to a light close-haul and we were sailing once again. Throughout the night the ship traffic kept us awake and we watched the island of Santiago fade from our reality.

Between the islands of Santiago and Sao Nicolau is a wide open stretch of the Atlantic flow that, much to our amazement, is a violent beating just waiting to happen.

All the laundry aloft

As the golden sandy sun rose on that second day the winds and waves were off the starboard bow, steady and freshening throughout the day. The chop gained a toothiness by dusk and it, along with a serious foul current, was slapping Cetacea almost to an standstill every few seconds. Just as we could gained any speed at all another big wave would slam into us and we’d almost stop right there in the middle of the ocean…this went on and on and on. Luckily the waves had little effect on the sails so even though our average speed was very low the sails remained full and quite beautiful.

This view isn’t getting old

The beating and the lack of speed through the water was frustrating, no doubt, but the near constant loud bashing from the waves on the bow was becoming down right nerve wracking by sunset on the second day.

Another Sahara sunset

The ship traffic between the Cabo Verde islands is done mostly at night in “smaller” freighters ranging from 30m (98.4ft) to 80m (262.4ft). These ships travel at about 13-15 knots and sometimes come within a few hundred meters of each other. As a tiny sailing vessel with no automatic identification system (AIS) signature it is our job-one to avoid these speeding ships at night. As we’ve said a few times before we have great tech aboard S/V SN-E Cetacea so we can receive AIS signatures, we just don’t broadcast an AIS signature of our own.

At about 0130 I (James) got an AIS signature from a 60m (196.8ft) freighter called Santa Maria. Our AIS told us she was traveling a 13 knots and would cross our bow in about 30 minutes and we’d be about 75m (246ft) from a collision. When you’re used to wide open ocean 75m is way to close of a call so I hailed them on channel 16 on our VHF radio. They answered my hail very cordially in English so I told them that I was a little sailboat without an AIS signature a few nautical miles off their starboard bow doing a little over 2 knots and that I would pass abaft of them and take their starboard side. They replied that they had us on radar and that our plan was an acceptable one.

(Standard protocol at sea is for ships to pass port-to-port if heading in opposite directions, which we were, unless otherwise negotiated over VHF, which we did.)

Right about 0155 the wind puffed out and the current took hold of us and spun us in a complete circle and I do mean 365 degrees.

The Santa Maria was coming in fast so I had to furl the head sails and get the boat under control with the electric motor in a crazy pitching sea in short order. I was cussing and kicking up a big fuss through all this shit so it’s not like Dena was sleeping through the calamity. She called from below decks to see if she could help and I, like a dickhead, not only denied her assistance but was quite rude about it. Now to my own defense I was in a pitching sea going in circles at night trying to do about six things at once with a giant ship bearing down on me at 13 knots. But I didn’t have to be rude and at the very least I could have been a little quieter.

I got the headsails furled and as I went for the motor controller I looked up and there was the Santa Maria 15m (yeah, about 50ft!) off our starboard midships and bearing down fast. I called down to Dena and asked her to inform the Santa Maria via VHF that we were directly off their bow and to please steer hard to their port which she did with clear and urgent exclamation. I could hear the sound of their prop through the water, I could see a bunch guys on their deck yelling and pointing at this tiny sailboat they were about to destroy in the middle of the ocean. I slammed the motor controller to full-forward and we jolted forward and the bow of the Santa Maria passed behind us with about 3m (10ft) to spare. As she slid on behind us I could clearly read her name on her port bow. The freighter Santa Maria didn’t kill us that night.

I (Dena) went back to the forepeak, but sleep wasn’t really an option. When I’m not-sleeping on either of my two overnight three-hour off-watches, I prefer lulling myself into slowing down at least. Sometimes I can get some useful rest even if I don’t sleep. Other times, well…there are always daytime naps.

When I took over from James, he crashed like someone who had experienced an adrenaline crash. He didn’t even make it into the bunk, but Beluga Greyfinger actually prefers him in this position.

Beluga keeps an eye on the flies while James sleeps

The sailing was so flukey and required so many reefs pulled and shaken out, so many furlings and settings of the headsails, so much fiddling with the sheets, that my hands got bruised tired. By the third day, I had new rough spots and chafe spots across my palms, too.

We’ve covered more nautical miles in the last year than ever before, but my hands are less tough than usual.

We’d been beating as close-hauled as possible without stopping our forward progress because there was a route line on the chartplotter that went from Santiago to Ilheu Branco. That was the first of the Barlevento Islands we might be able to anchor at but alas it was not to be. Then we thought maybe we’d stop at…no…

This had been the plan the whole time. Sail for the nearest island and accept whatever island we ended up on. Being swept all the way out of the Cabo Verdean chain seemed highly unlikely and we were glad to be right about that part. When we neared Sao Vicente, it took my (Dena’s) breath away.

Drama much?

The last couple hours of a trip can be the longest. We had passed the cliffs on the southeast coast and needed to get to the bay on the southwest side. James got us most of the way there.

Yes, it’s been hot but letting the sun soak into skin is actually less comfortable than light long sleeves.

Every twenty minutes brought a new dramatic vantage for looking up into the valleys between the craggy volcanic mountains.

Not very green for a place called “verde”

The trip had taken quite some time and we were eager to get the hook down and relax. Another factor that slowed us down on this adventure was towing the dinghy. Normally when offshore sailing we dress the little boat on the fordeck but Tursiops came through just fine.

Unfortunately, the seagrass growing on the bottom didn’t budge. Oh, maybe that’s the “verde” they mean.

Finally, we were hook down in the Baia Sao Pedro. A strong set in good sand makes for a pleasurable night’s sleep. After all those hours doing watches and being happy to go below, we both found it a pleasure to simply sit in our comfortable cockpit and enjoy the cooling evening air.

We realized the sun was heading for the lighthouse on the point, but it set behind the next island over. James, of course, got the stellar (heh) sunset shot before it did.

Sunset over the Farol de Dona Amelia

…And then

The strangest thing happened to me (James) after setting the hook off Praia on Ilha da Santiago… a pain in my chest, no really, on the left side, a pain like I have never felt before.

Hook down Praia with the quarantine flag flying

We traveled over a thousand miles offshore and I felt stronger than I ever have, meaning I didn’t feel anything at all physically. I mean sure, I felt hammered by the Earth. I felt exhaustion from lack of sleep or whatnot but I didn’t feel anything like…well, you know, old and decrepit. But all of a sudden, and I mean immediately after I got settled down below, I felt a sharp pain a little left of center in my back that went straight through to a little left of my sternum. Holy fucking shit!

It was hard but I had to tell Dena. Now, this is a person who knows me better than anyone else in the world, who just witnessed me sail over a thousand miles without as much as a cut, so she knew to ask as many questions as possible and to go into it with the grain of salt it deserved.

“Let’s sleep on it.”

I slept in a restless state with real nightmares and all that shit but, physically, I was having chest pains. I did not want to experience this but I actually was. And there was no time to figure it out or wait it out.

The only reason we sailed to Praia was because we had some very important business to attend to.

Praia is not only the capitol of the Republic of Cabo Verde, there’s a US Embassy and my passport (at that point) was about a month from expiration. “They” say a person can not enter the country with a passport that is within 6 months of expiration but we had very little choice. We prepped the defensive arguments and gave it a go.

The dink on the beach

The Multi-Fingered Gauntlet

The thumb…

First, the Policia Maritima: We rowed into the beach on Sunday, the morning after we anchored, secured Tursiops between all the other beached boats, and followed the futbol players’ directions to the Policia, only a few hundred steps from the beach. On a Sunday, there was only one cop, who was gabbing with a buddy outside the building, and he really couldn’t be bothered with our check-in issues. He started the conversation asking if we were leaving tomorrow and seemed put out when we said we’d be a couple weeks. He grudgingly led us into the office and laboriously tracked down paper and pen. While Dena was filling out the form, he took me out to show us where he wanted us to move our boat in the anchorage…an order we very quickly ignored. Dena finished filling out the form (I [Dena] used our Azorean paperwork for the Portuguese words for things), she gave him the original, official copy of our certificate of documentation, and we were on our way.

Then we walked…Remember those chest pains…yeah, getting worse by the minute.

We mounted one of the town’s big hills and, at the top, stopped into a local chain bakery shop for some refreshment and to take a load off. They took Euros, which was good because we hadn’t gotten Escudos yet. We made it to the grocery store just before their half-day Sunday closing and discovered the truth of the warnings that this isn’t the best place to provision for a big trip. We did get local money from an ATM, though, and it’s pretty cool that they foreground musicians so strongly.

Local money

The bottom bill features Cesária Evora, which brought me (Dena) back to the early Naughties in Oakland, CA, when James and I would get an egg-pesto-cheese panini at World Grounds and listen to Putumayo compilations, including the one of music from Cape Verde. Recognizing her gave me a thrill.

James, though, was doing his absolute best to take his turns, pain be damned. I rowed in; he rowed back.

I got this, I think…

Back on the boat, I (James) collapsed into a meat-pile of sickness on the portside settee. I can’t even remember the rest of that day.

I (Dena) set an alarm for 6am so that we could have coffee and then leave the boat by 7:30am to get to the immigration office by their opening time of 8am (according to the cruising guide we’ve been using).

Index finger, the Immigration stamp…

On Monday, the next day, we rowed to the pro-fishing dock where we met Enrique and negotiated payment for him to watch after our little (nobody would ever want to steal) rowboat for the day. We cut his fee in half and realized we were still getting hosed, but…whatever.

Then we met and interacted with four different local cops who (each) called the Immigration Officer to let him know a couple of sailing folk wanted to be stamped into the country. There were no cruise ships or even ferries in port so, though we arrived at 8am, it was 9:15am when a guy from the main office arrived, got the computer booted up, and stamped us in. He totally forgot to charge us the entrance fee of 25 euros each and didn’t bring up the passport expiration date problem at all. Not complaining here!

Middle Finger, passport photo and document printing.

Holy shit, this finger was a great big fucking deal! Since clearing into the country took a little longer than we’d scheduled, we decided not to walk the several km around and then onto the lofty expanse of the Plateau. We took a cab’ish (a broke-dick-dog of a car with a driver hollering “taxi!”) to the shopping center area. It cost all of five bucks (a total rip off that we only discovered later) and dropped us off in front of a photo studio.

The “foto shop” was so packed with people that we honestly thought we couldn’t possibly be in the right place. The space was about 500 sq ft deep and was packed with maybe 30 people, all yelling at each other and waving their hands in opposite directions. We somehow managed (through no great gift of mine) to relate to the very understanding staff that we needed my passport documents printed and a photo that turned out to be the absolute worst picture that anyone has ever taken of me.

When I told him that was the ugliest old man I’ve ever seen, the photographer replied, “Oh, you like?” Of course, I said yes.

It was so hot in there I honestly thought I was going to pass out. For some reason, this Monday was about passport photos for children, all of whom seemed to have arrived with their entire families…go figure. We hadn’t gotten SIM cards for internet yet but we must not have seemed like hackers, because one of the guys fired up his cell phone hotspot for us. One email sent and they had the application and receipt we needed printed.

The thrifty photo processing guy made sure that he used each sheet of photo paper to the max, so we waited for him to lay out images of several tiny people on the page before he hit print, but eventually he did. The photos, the passport renewal application, and the receipt for paying on gov.gov or whatever were in our hot ass hands.

The trip from nearly-sea-level up to Plateau (literally the name of the neighborhood) took us up a set of somewhat steep steps that wound upward. The paintings and the view were a good excuse to stop a moment.

The top of the longest stairway of my life

Ring finger, or officialdom encroaching

Believe it or not, we were a little over an hour early for the 11am drop-off time at the US Embassy. I had all of my paperwork in order, my geriatric picture, and my old passport so all I needed to do was get through those doors. A long, leisurely people-watching period and a couple of fresh OJs gave us the fortitude to head back to the well-armed security personnel at the door of the US territory in Cabo Verde.

Several people checked James’ paperwork and took bits and pieces of it and finally took him too. I (Dena) remained outside with his backpack and cell phone (verboten beyond security inside) for what seemed like a really long time…and that was before I struck up a conversation with Claudina, who will be visiting her brother in Providence, RI, on her first visit to the US in September. Having a good time watching well-dressed folks walk by and getting to know Claudina helped me with my patience until I realized that James had been inside for over an hour. I can’t say I started to sweat, since I’d been on a bench in the sun the entire time, but I definitely started to worry.

I (James) walked into the embassy and of course it was like walking into a airport in the US: disgusting in aesthetic and insulting in every other way. They told me to remove my belt and I told them if I did that my pants would quickly fall off in front of all these people. The guard allowed me to hold my pants up while they slowly x-rayed my belt for… what? Nukes?

I somehow managed my dignity through all that and the same guard pointed me to a window where I was to drop off my paperwork and then exit the building forthwith. I stuffed my paperwork in the bullet proof slot and a faceless voice said to me, “We’ll call you.”

Two hours later…no, really, you don’t have to live through a room full of nervous locals waiting to be welcomed or denied by a country that will hate them from day one simply for the darkness of their skin. Finally with only two people in line before me, a young light-skinned woman dressed in embarrassment and blushes asked me to approach the window, apologized profusely for making me wait, took my application, and released me to the wilds of Praia. It took all of 45 seconds to prove to me, once again, that the US sucks.

By this time, my back and my chest were on fire. I walked out to the street where Dena, my love, met me with a beautiful smile and a lovely story about a friend she’d just met.

We walked (stumbled) back down the long stairway to a pharmacy for some sunscreen, ibuprofen, and I forget what else that we didn’t have enough cash to pay for, walked to and stood in a bank ATM line for cash, walked back to the Farmicia, walked to the grocery store, shopped our little hearts out, and then fell into a cab that schooled us on the proper price back to the marina.

Unencumbered by any semblance of consciousness, I climbed down an industrial ramp to take Tursiops’ aft seat so Dena could row us back to Cetacea where I quickly lost track of reality.

…My (James’) savior

Isn’t the pinky finger supposed to be small?

We took a day off, but we had to provision the following day. We walked about four kilometers around a toxic Coca-Cola runoff river that empties into Praia’s harbor just downhill from the cliffside trash dump that smells like the trash collectors’ strike in Thiruvananthapuram in the phase where rotting dog required that we hold our breath as we bicycled past.

Once around the corner, we had to go uphill and my (James’) back and my chest were once again trying to kill me. It was a kind of pain I’d never experienced before so by that point I just wanted to die. It felt like it was 1000 degrees by the time we got to the top of the Plateau in Praia. All I could do was beg Dena to just let me sit somewhere…forever. I just couldn’t breath. Every breath was like lifting the world on my chest and every step was another sail across the ocean.

Dena scoped the hood for a restaurant where we could sit, eat, and rest without someone calling an ambulance on me. After what is considered the national dish, cachupa, a nice meal of maize and bean hash with a fried egg and a fried banana, we went grocery shopping one last time before cabbing back to the marina, rowing back to the boat, and passing out once again.

Getting the fuck out!

Okay, so here’s the thing… We set sail the next morning and, by the time we were out of Praia harbor proper, my chest had stopped hurting and my back felt normal and, by the time we set the hook in Cidade Velha only 7 nautical miles west of Praia, I was feeling totally normal again.

Clean and clear

I have no idea what happened to me. Maybe there was something in the stinky air that one lung couldn’t process. Dena felt no ill effects from being in Praia though the stink was omnipresent. My pain is not Dena’s or anyone else’s, so no one can experience it but me. Believe me, this was a moment of absolute mortality for me and I know for a fact that I almost died on that bluff that day in Praia.

I didn’t die that day. Today I can clearly see the bullet I missed and, without actually knowing what happened to me, all I can do is remember that my partner loves me and will do whatever she can do to help me through whatever it is I need to get through so we can be together the next day and the next, and the next…

Home, once again

We set sail from Lanzarote in the Canary Islands on June 23, 2024 and had the LoveBot rig set up astern within minutes of getting underway. Immediately we knew there was something wrong! It wasn’t able to recognize a course which meant we still had some tweaking to do. The Monitor Windvane (LoveBot) self-steering system is a truly rugged piece of kit but, make no mistake about it, it must be finely tuned or it doesn’t work at all. Because our Monitor sits so far off our Norwegian stern, working on it while underway posed some serious problems.

Dena Hankins, sailor

The cool thing about being in an island chain in the middle of the ocean is that there are plenty of bolt-holes to drop the hook for emergency repairs or adjustments.

Pozo Negro off the starboard bow

About 35nm from our anchorage off Lanzarote was a very nice little cove tucked into the island of Fuertaventura, one island west of Lanzarote. We made very little to-do about the fact that this was the first time we’d sailed west in well over a year but we did have a few other things on our minds.

Sailing into the bolt-hole

We put the hook down in a lovely (although rolly) little cove called Pozo Negro (Black Sands) and went to work on fine-tuning the LoveBot the very next morning.

LoveBot with the power system

It took us about an hour to get LoveBot dialed in but we made the mistake of looking at the 10-day on Windy! I (James) have been grumbling about that stupid app for a few months now because, for me, it seems to be a little too much information with totally scary graphics to illustrate their predictions. Now granted, weather tech has exploded in accuracy the last few years with Elon’s lower orbit bombardment of high albedo telescope distortion but at some point a sailor just has to get-the-fuck underway. Sure, we looked at all the models and they all said the same fucking thing and that was…we’d have intense seas within 100nm off the African coast and winds to match in the Canary Islands acceleration zone but we were done with the Canary Islands…we have a totally awesome sailboat…a bunch of great food aboard so, yeah, we’re out!

One last look at the Canary Islands

July 3rd, 2024, was an absolutely perfect sailing day! With a single reef in the mainsail, we sailed off the hook from Pozo Negro on a downwind run for an island chain only 1000 nautical miles due south and a little west of where we were on that day.

LoveBot dialed in

Dena gave the Monitor one more adjustment from the cockpit and we haven’t had to worry about it since then. We set the self-steering system up before we left the anchorage and didn’t strike it again for a week after leaving the Canaries. LoveBot drove Cetacea with a sublime perfection that truly blew our minds. Every little gust and wind-direction change sent the air vane over and the water paddle immediately twisted and then swung to pull the tiller the right direction decisively if not with suddenness, depending on how fast we were going through the water.

An ol’ dude in the sea

One of our favorite stories about our sail to Hawaii way back in 2006 is about the complete lack of ship traffic. We saw a total of four ships the entire 20-day trip and only one of them, a dumb cruise ship, didn’t answer our hails and provide us with a weather update. For this leg of our global circumnavigation, that was not to be the case.

Heading into night

Because of that stupid war in the Middle East and the drought in and around the Panama Canal, ship traffic around the globe has been forced to reestablish the more traditional routes from days of old, meaning Cape of Good Hope around South Africa and Cape Horn around South America. Every ship that has to make either of those capes from Europe or the Mediterranean heads south from the Straits of Gibraltar, hugging the western shore of the African coast…right about where we were over the past couple of weeks. And we saw literally hundreds of ships! At one point, I saw 18 AIS signatures within 10 miles of us and most of those ships were in excess of 600 ft. long. So even though LoveBot was holding our course like a champ, we still had to maintain our watches, steadfast and alert 24/7.

Bioluminescence off the bow

During the day it was easier because it never happens fast. Even if a 1000 ft. ship is coming at us at 13 knots, we didn’t really have to do any avoidance maneuvers until we were absolutely sure they couldn’t see us and they were on a collision course. At that point we’d hail them on the VHF, tell them where and what we were and hopefully all agree to change course enough to miss each other, allowing for a 100% survival rate aboard both vessels.

…and then there’s night

At night it’s a different story all together. At one point, I gybed the boat three times on one overnight dog watch to avoid three different enormous ships traveling at about 12 knots (a little over twice our speed at the time). We don’t have an AIS (Automatic Identification System) transceiver, only a receiver, meaning we could see them but they couldn’t see us unless they were actively looking at their radar. Most of those ships didn’t know we were there until we told them we were. Usually, it was no big deal for them to adjust their course for avoidance but sometimes the shipping lane was so packed that any course adjustment for a giant ship at sea was a dangerous one. We dodged as necessary.

We got this

Ultimately we adjusted our course to go about 15nm further offshore and that more or less did the trick. The problem was those giant ships stacking up around that pinching point between the Canary Islands and Morocco and us being right in the middle of it all. Once clear of all the ship traffic and the island acceleration zone, we were able to relax a bit and enjoy the ride.

Beluga Greyfinger taking good care of James

The days flowed with the seas behind us and memories blended into each other like the yellow sunrises and sunsets. One reef in the mainsail then two reefs then back to one was all we did to our sail arrangement until we could feel the influence of the Cabo Verde chain of islands. On day 9, I (James) spotted land off the port bow about 5 nautical miles out. It was the island of Boavista. We had been electric-motor-sailing on glass water for about 18 hours so we were seriously considering dropping the hook off Sal Rei, the capitol of Boavista, for a few days of propulsion battery charge but, as we rounded the point of the island, we felt that wind freshen up and opted to continue on.

Land Ho!!!

The Cabo Verde Islands are warm and friendly not only in their weather patterns but also in the people we interacted with almost immediately after making landfall. Our approach to the Republic of Cabo Verde’s capitol city of Praia on the island of Santiago was like so many approaches we’ve experienced through the years of being underway on this beautiful planet…it was like a dream, a dream that you have always wanted to live in the real…a dream about living your dreams.

Landfall, Praia, Santiago in the African country of Cabo Verde, Saturday July 13th. Ten days, eight hours, and fifty-three minutes from our anchorage off Pozo Negro on the island of Fuertaventura in the Canary Island chain, and we are home once again.

Fuertaventura, Canaries, to Santiago, Cabo Verde, Day 11

Saturday, July 13

Land ho Santiago!

James’ 1400-1500 watch

It’s turning into a real nail-biter. Will we get into the harbor before dark? Well! Maybe!

I had us heading a bit off course to keep the yankee full and our speed up, and adjusted up or downwind based on the variable wind strength. We can slip by Ponto do Lobo very near land, which will help. 

Maio is an intriguing hazy lump and we’re both hoping there will be a good opportunity to check it out while we wait for James’ passport renewal to come through. There’s a handful of anchorages that seem attractive on the four easy-to-reach islands.

Approaching Ponta das Bicudas

In the realm of workable but not optimal, we have digital charts on our phones but not on the chartplotter. It’s even less comfortable here than it was in Nova Scotia, where we dealt with the same thing. Using the chartplotter as a radar screen and the phone to tell us where we are, we discovered that we could go between the land and this bohemoth with an AIS listing as a tug.

Wonder what’s so big that it needs this kind of tug?

We maneuvered into the harbor to find a boat right where I’d hoped to anchor. They are on a mooring, though, so we wouldn’t have been able to take that spot regardless. The sun went down as we approached and the light dimmed fast as we made ourselves safe at anchor in the Republic of Cabo Verde, on the island of Santiago, within Praia (the capitol) harbor, between the fishing port (Porto do Pesce) and the cop station (Policia Maritima). The third leg of our passage from the Azores to Cabo Verde was complete.

Final position: N 14° 54.831’ W 023° 30.297’
Distance noon to 2100: 26.9 NM
Average speed: 3.0 kn
Trip distance covered: 1010.0 NM
Distance to destination: 0 NM

Fuertaventura, Canaries, to Santiago, Cabo Verde, Day 10

Friday, July 12

James’ 1300-1400 watch

It’s hot here! I can’t wait to go swimming.

We have a little over 100M left and we’re going about 2.5 knots. That’s 40 hours…not that we can count on keeping up this speed. To come in to Praia in daylight, we’d either need to cut that down to 31 hours for a Sunday evening arrival…seems unlikely…or actually slow down a bit at some point for a dawn arrival on Monday. I imagine that’s what we’ll aim for.

James’ 1500-1600 watch 

The wind steadied and I shook out the reef. Now we’re doing 4 knots under full main and yankee with the wind just behind the beam. 

I got a wisp of internet access and promptly recorded the new 10 day forecast. The news is good! The wind will strengthen tonight, but only to about 12 knots, and even better it’s going to be a northwesterly. That means we made the right decision going west of Boavista. We won’t lose the wind in the shadow of the 390 meter mountains.

Yes Chef!

Saturday, July 13

Dena’s 2400-0300 watch

The weather forecast has been quite accurate so far. Enough wind to keep us sailing (average 3 knots) but variable. Now, right when it said it would, we’re getting stronger periods and doing 3.5-4 knots. Next I’m looking for it to stabilize at the higher speed.

We might make it to Praia well before dark tomorrow…I mean today. That would give us all day Sunday for checking in with the Policia Maritima, a grocery store trip, getting a SIM card, and having someone cook for us. Sounds nice, eh? Except visiting the cops, of course.

Dena’s 0600-0900 watch

I just got up and I can’t honestly say I’m actively hungry, but I’m thinking about breakfast. Last night, James took advantage of our new smooth ride between the islands and made smeaty bean dip and turmeric rice so we could have burritos. (See photo of the handsome chef above.) Half of the leftover rice will become egg fried rice this morning and the other half will be lunch as a bed for the tofu pumpkin cream curry I made day before yesterday. The tvp and refried bean mix (aka smeaty bean dip) will wait for after we’re anchored. It lasts up to a week in the fridge.

The wind didn’t stiffen up for long, I guess…it’s pretty gentle now. We’re still making good time, still looking at a daylight arrival about 12 hours out.

0720 Well, that was fun. It was definitely a fishing boat, and I think it had a swordfish bowsprit. It didn’t show up on radar until we were within 5 miles and was a spotty target until within a mile, so probably a wooden boat. Long story short, I had to gybe twice to stay out of the way.

I didn’t call on the VHF radio and it really came down to the feeling that we wouldn’t have a language in common. I should try anyway, I guess? I’m going to have to think on that.

Noon position: N 15° 16.404’ W 023° 20.081’
Distance noon to noon: 80.1 NM
Average speed: 3.3 kn
Trip distance covered: 983.1 NM
Distance to destination: 25.0 NM

Fuertaventura, Canaries, to Santiago, Cabo Verde, Day 9

Thursday, July 11

Dena’s 1700-1800 watch

The wind varies a little, but we’ve been making 3.5 knots on average since noon. The gentle breeze doesn’t feel like enough for that progress, but we are running with it and this is the standard direction of the current. Some combo of factors is keeping the sail full and helping us keep our mileage high.

It’s hard to use a forecast this old with any hope it’ll be correct but they did call it on the wind easing last night. If things go as forecasted, we’ll probably have to motor at least part of tonight. We can cover about 50M very slowly, so we’ll have to bail to an anchorage if we use a bunch of that power and have another gloomy, low-sun day tomorrow. I’ve marked a handful of options for places to stop, but I’d rather sail slowly on through if that’s an option. We’ll see!

Dena’s 2100-2400 watch

Full main! It’s good to see the whole thing up. If the wind dies much more, I’ll have to reef so it doesn’t flop.

We’re close enough that the wind dying out is a bit worrisome. We’ll have to conserve battery power for use when it’s needed, but we could motor to a temporary anchorage from where we are right now, if needs be. It’s all about patience at this point, which is surprisingly accurate to how I thought this trip would go!

Friday, July 12

Dena’s 0300-0600 watch 

Motoring. Not much to say about that except to be glad, again, that I’m not sitting over continuous explosions.

I did have to drop the main altogether right after my watch started. Left it a mess out of an excess of hope but it’s almost the end of my watch and it’s still dead.

Dena’s 0900-1000 watch

James motored all through his watch. The flat water revealed the dolphin to him clearly. I was sure I’d heard them on my last watch but couldn’t catch a glimpse in the moonless, cloudy dark.

A slight breeze has come up from the northwest and I pulled the yankee out rather than commit to the main. I have it sheeted too tight to create proper lift because the wind is so weak and we still have a swell rocking us slowly. Regardless, it’s a good indicator and actually does boost our speed a little.

Please just let us sail!

Dena’s 1100-1200 watch

Sailing! 

The breeze steadied a little and we have a favorable current, so we’re gently sailing between 2 and 3 knots. Main with one reef and full yankee because the little wind we have is northwesterly.

Feels good.

Also, the sun has come out and is blasting the propulsion battery pack with power. Even if we end up having to motor again, we’ll have recouped some of what we used overnight and this morning.

Noon position: N 16° 25.750’ W 022° 46.004’
Distance noon to noon: 65.1 NM
Average speed: 2.7 kn
Trip distance covered: 903.0 NM
Distance to destination: 103.8 NM

Fuertaventura, Canaries, to Santiago, Cabo Verde, Day 8

Wednesday, July 10

James’ 1200-1230 half watch 

Yay! I’m now farther south than I’ve ever sailed!

I achieved my previous record when rounding the Big Island of Hawaii from Hilo to Kailua-Kona. A different segment of the World Ocean, and no lava-seeping volcanoes on this trip.

The person I was would be thrilled to hear about this, if confused about what took so long.

The other little bit of math I did while logging the last (record-fast 117M) 24 hours tells me that we’re 56M from hitting 10,000 nautical miles aboard Cetacea. Sometime overnight, then. I’m hoping for enough calm to make a celebration breakfast.

James’ 1500-1600 watch

We took water over the starboard side when a cross swell slapped us hard. Since that’s upwind, it got blown even higher and slapped its way into the cockpit. The cushions I was leaning on took the brunt of it and I was pretty smug.

Just now, James went to the head in preparation for his watch and found that the wave had also come in through the porthole there. Nothing really damaged, but filling the boat with salt water isn’t optimal.

Since we don’t shower in there, we haven’t bothered to fix a clog in the floor drain. It’ll slowly empty into the bilge and seep down to the bilge pump but, again, not optimal.

Thursday, July 11

At 1236, we passed 10,000 nautical miles traveled aboard Cetacea since September, 2018. I woke James for kisses and congratulations. 

We don’t have strict accounting for the distances we sailed on Sovereign Nation, Sapien, and Nomad, but it’s something around and probably over 20,000M. Even though we did offshore passages on both Sovereign Nation and Sapien, we sailed Nomad a lot more, and over more years. Sapien took us transPacific and Sovereign Nation down the US West Coast. We’ve taken each sailboat farther than the last!

Full sail for the first time in months

Noon position: N 17° 17.985’ W 022° 11.284’
Distance noon to noon: 100.9 NM
Average speed: 4.2 kn
Trip distance covered: 837.9 NM
Distance to destination: 169.7 NM