Quite nice here in San Sebastián de La Gomera. Got my fourth jab within ten minutes in the Centro de Salud. Strolled around in the city and finished the day off with a “sausage & red vine risotto from Jamie” having same accompany as yesterday.
Fair winds…
It got late last night, well 11:30pm, not to bad. I got invited from Anne and Marcel for a very nice dinner. Wahoo was on the menu, fresh from a local fishing boat. Petra contributed a delicious potato salad and myself the desert, a sweet melon gazpacho.
Wahoo is an interesting and same time healthy and very fine tasting fish. Fresh from the ocean, no farming. First time experience and it stays on my list.
Enjoyed the accompany very much including 
Gara, the lively 8 month dog from a local sanctuary.
Fair winds…
Many people I have spoken to, and who have visited all Canary Islands, vote La Gomera and La Palma to be among the most beautiful islands of the archipelago. Obviously this is very subjective but what I have seen today impressed me as well. Less touristy, slow pace, beautiful scenery and an attractive little market hall to name a few of the high ranking criteria.
After my short walk through the town this morning, I went out biking for a sniff tour in one of the many vales the island offers until the dead end road stopped me.
The elevation profile of today’s trip is representative of the overall island’s elevation profile. With the mountain peak of the island reaching 1487m and sitting pretty in the island’s circle centre, it grades down to the ocean from all angles like a sugar cone.
Fair winds…
It is one of the rare moments, where I consider to delete the Boating from the Biking. They come and go regularly. The six hours from the southern tip of Tenerife up to La Gomera stressed me out and I just finished a 6 hours sleep, which is normally not required after a one-night-sail only. But this time my battery was below minimum charge.
The wind came on the nose as expected but was with 15 to 25kn a bit stronger than forecasted. The sea was choppy but again, nothing dramatic. Besides that, the current going south was also against us. I was just annoyed that we had to go against the wind/current again rather flying south to Cabo Verde. Still the right decision was taken.
6 hours motor sailing brought me on a straight line to the Marina de La Gomera without further tacking. Exact wind and sea state conditions at the entrance were not known to me and the darkness did not give a good feeling either. The question comes up: What the hack am I doing here? I arrived a bit early and had to hang around until sunrise, which was wonderful. Approach turned finally out – as so often – easy and safe.
Washed the lady and cleared up the boat for a week’s marina live.
Tomorrow the world will be fine again and I will start to explore La Gomera besides working on the never ending To-Do-List.
Another intensive 24 hours added to the adventure!
Fair winds…
It is another 15nm to the southern tip of Tenerife. Wind is around 10-15kn but took a breather a bit earlier and we motor sailed for about one hour. On the other side, there was a short acceleration zone which peaked 18kn for around 15 minutes. It remains dynamic and keeps us busy. Once we have reached the southern tip, the wind will probably be more on the nose but let’s first get there.
SY Sutje is running along in parallel on our starboard with 1nm distance. Boat speeds are very much aligned. The stars are out and some left-over moon is expected shortly.
Today is Day 2 at sea on our passage to Cabo Verde and I unpacked present #2 of the emergency package received from Elke und Ulli in Puerto Calero. It made this overnight passage a lot more sweet! Thank you.
Fair winds…
PS: I have 7 presents left, which will now need to wait for a while until we finally head off south.
We have thrown the towels, both SY Sutje and myself. The high pressure system on the Atlantic has intensified over the last two days giving it another notch over night with expected wind speeds now in the second half of the journey of 35kn and waves up to 3m. We concluded, enough is enough.
The start would have been perfect but conditions are getting heavy – too heavy now – at arrival in Cabo Verde, which is a bit of a tricky approach same time.
We were pumped up and had all systems checked but gut feeling was not right, which was not caused by dinner the day before. Better slow and safe we concluded.
On the upside, both ships got a berth in San Sebastián de la Gomera and we plan there for a week until this huge high pressure system has moved further NE and more favourable winds are expected to take us to Cabo Verde and further on as per the plan. No change to that.
ETA Marina de La Gomera, tomorrow dawn time.
Fair winds…
Today was a slow Sunday with just a few more short bike rides. Together with approximately 13 other Germans we stormed into Lidl simultaneously as soon as the door lock got released at 8:00 am.😅
As there was a bit of a cloud cover all day, I applied Boracol 10Y to the toerail. It showed some signs of black stains and I hope Boracol will tackle it over the next two weeks or so.
Jan and myself have studied and discussed the weather forecasts intensively and it looks like we are going to throw the lines tomorrow morning.
Fair winds…
I am doing some final miles for stockpiling food and jumped into the saddle this morning to get some fresh tuna into the fridge for the upcoming passage. Our departure date has now been set to coming Monday @ 9am. Luckily the marina accepted us another night.
I went to the Pescaderia in Arguineguin about 10km west of Pasito Blanco. Full trip and additional photos can be seen under this link. Carrying almost 2kg of tuna in the rucksack on the way back. Upon arrival I shared with SY Sutje and SY Momentum of Fal, as we are all tuna addicts.
After completing various other jobs from the To-Do-List and a short siesta nap, I took another ride to Lidl, this time via Playa de las Meloneras, a promising route, new to me. Find some photos under this link.
Rushing back against the sunset – with, again, a heavy rucksack on the back – the focus moved onto cooking.
8pm, after dinner, was time for a round of Brändi Dog on SY Sutje, a parlour game we played before and I am still learning. It’s hard brain work at the end of another sugar day…but good fun and makes you even more tired.
Fair winds…& good night!
Together with René, skipper of SY Momentum of Fal, we went out for another evening 
ride. The Dunas de Maspalomas were on my list besides some food shopping at Mercadona on the way back.
The copy right of the above photos goes to Oliver H., my close sailing mate at that point in time, while both of us serving the German Navy. He also inspired me for photography to be an art.
We have been to these dunes together in 1988 and I got vague memories on them but one aspect is very clear. The number of buildings and developments over the past 34 years has changed the scene. So have the people. Glad there is still something left of the dunes itself and its more than a stretch of a three meters wide beach. Construction industry sometimes does not stop. Maspalomas is pretty awful nowadays, if you ask me. A beautiful natural spot turned into an artificial touristic showdown.