Today is Second Sunday of Advent. Tomorrow is St Nicholas’ Day, which falls together with the Spanish Constitution day, a public holiday.
Unfortunately Corinna and Rainer from SY Geronimo are planning to move on tomorrow 🥲 and invited for a farewell cake & coffee.
Really grateful as a single-hand sailor being part of this warm-hearted group.
Thank you & fair winds…
I have been plenty of times to Lidl in Puerto del Carmen for my grocery shopping since my arrival in Puerto Calero. While the Lild Plus App did to work in Netherlands, France, Portugal and Spain mainland, it is fully functional here in the Canary Islands (CI) without creating a new account. It is either an improved version or simply a matter of functionality depending on the country you are in. I am not sure, yet.
Besides other local grocery shops, which I also explore now and then for some selective products, there are 31 Lidl markets across the Canary Islands. I have also seen some EuroSpar markets here on Lanzarote but my favourite remains Lidl with its regional-local selection of products. Obviously the Spanish chains like HiperDino, Mercadona, etc. are also omnipresent.
While Aldi’s expansion plans into the Canary Islands are on its way with 21 stores over the next few years, it will take a while to catch up on the already established brands.
Same as last year while still in Germany, I enjoy again daily opening an electronic door of the Lidl Advent calendar. 😉
Today it was 20% on fresh milk – leche fresca!
Fair winds…
Superyacht Π is one of the yachts moored in Puerto Calero recently. Its kitchen window is bigger than the double sided panoramic floor window in our living room at home! This marina is build to accommodate some bigger ships as you can see on the photos. The golden bollards (take a close look at Superyacht Ravenger) together with the high general service level are setting the frame although as an ordinary sailor you won’t feel but see it!
Fair winds…
Today morning, four navigators met for a round table discussion on SY Hullu Poro to exchange their views and get an introduction to the basic functions of weather routing with my preferred program called qtVlm. While the program itself provides functionality for complete navigation, our focus was on weather routing only. I have used it twice only, first from Porto to Funchal and second from Funchal to Lanzarote. On both passages it worked well with minor deviations and surprises.
This software was initially introduced to me by Uwe (call sign DD1HUR), who is one of the Netcontrols within the Intermar e.V. association.
Fair winds to all…
One of these days in the saddle you won’t miss. Paddling through this amazing landscape in this pleasant climate (no wind today 😀) flushes body and brain with serotonin, endocannabionide and whatever hormons but it allways gets topped during the final downhill back to Puerto Calero. What a damned fortune!
It appears to become a drug.
Rainer, skipper SY Geronimo, said: 11am we throw the lines! Volker (SY Hexe), Achim (SY Jojo) and myself were on time as by no means we wanted to miss it.
Another fight against the wind took me to Arrecife today. Besides checking out the Specialized Concept 🚴♂️ Store I am chasing some fittings to install our new Seagull IV water filter underneath the sink in the cold water line towards the tap. It is part of an improvement project to ensure constant water quality for making delicious tea despite changing water supplies from varying marinas. Ferreteria is the Spanish word for hardware store, very well sorted.
I also had the opportunity to visit Jutta and Willi from SY Leonie. They have now arrived from Porto Santo/Portugal in Arrecife and we had to update each other on sailor’s fairy tales over the last few weeks since we met in Funchal. We are sharing the same adventure, spending the winter in the Canary Islands before heading North again towards the Azores.
Thanks for the coffee and cake!
Cycling in these winds is a new experience. They are not particular strong, perhaps 20 to 25kts, but the impact on the bike and its rider is remarkable. It’s worth another blog entry.
Fair winds…