Madeira to Rabat

 Getting underway

We got up at 7:30 Monday morning. Irina and Peter wanted to go to Funchal market, while Anton & I started to get things ready for departure. Even a couple of days in the marina without sailing ends up spreading things around the boat and we don’t want all those things to be flying around when the boat is heeling.

Officers from Guardia National Republicana were supposed to show up at 10:30. I thought I saw a car pull up, so I sent Peter to inquire whether we should come to them. Turned out, that the guys were not there. In fact, just before noon, when Irina was supposed to drive to the airport, I got a call from the marina. Because I talked to GNR on Porto Santo and only talked to the marina people when I came back, GNR cancelled the appointment on Madeira, thinking that we were still on the other island. Luckily, they found a time and showed up right as we were about to sit down for lunch.

This time there were no loud stamps or customs, but in addition to the 2 officers in GNR uniform, there was a woman with a title “Document Expert” on her shirt. The guys would look at our passports, pass them to the woman and she would do additional document check looking at pages with visas through a special magnifying glass. The small room into which the 7 of us fit initially was very hot. The guys acknowledged it and said that we could wait outside if we wanted. And the AC on the wall is just for show, as we found out. Presumably because they don’t come to this office that frequently. All the equipment for digital scanning of documents was brought by the mobile crew.

Marina office was closed for lunch from 1 till 2pm. We got our act together and went to get diesel. The guy at the gas station was done with his lunch at 1. The funny dance one has to do on island time. Finally just after 2:30 we were ready to depart and the days for the rest of the story are counted from about 3pm.

Day 1

We set the waypoint to the river mouth at Rabat. Exactly 500 miles. Having cleaned up the dock lines and fenders, the mainsail and then the jib were unrolled, the engine shut off and we could point our bow directly at the waypoint after clearing the easternmost tip of Madeira. The wind was strong but manageable, and Salty Ginger was merrily hopping over the waves leftover from the 20+ knot winds that were outside the island for the past few days.

Merrily hopping over waves does not necessarily agree with all stomachs. First I saw Leo falling asleep with a gaze that is too familiar. Within the next half hour he fed his lunch to the fish. Anton started to feel queazy as well, and his lunch followed Leo’s as well. Our biggest worry was that Leo just couldn’t stop barfing. It seemed like he has already given up everything he had in his stomach, but the bout of seasickness would come on again and again. Needless to say, Peter and I were the only ones to have dinner.

Anton managed to get Leo to sleep in the cabin, which is great — a lot less worry for people on the night shift. He and Peter stood the watch till midnight, when I relieved them. Not that I got a lot of sleep though: it was quite bouncy in the forward berth. But I wanted to leave the possibility for Peter to go to bed before midnight.

I was pleasantly surprised that both of them were mostly awake, and Peter proudly reported that when the wind picked up and James, our wind vane, could not keep up with the imbalanced boat, they shortened the jib and the boat continued to sail well. Nicely done! The kids grow up so fast! 

The full moon illuminated everything around. Not a great night for star gazing, but having lots of light is nice on the shift. The wind was slowly decreasing and our 6+ knot speed went down to 2.5 knots. I was glad that it didn’t last long — I would not have wanted to wake everyone up with the engine sound. There was an advantage to the decreasing wind though: the waves were slowly calming down.

Given that there was absolutely no traffic around, I took a few 20 minute naps, waking up to check our course. At 6am it was pitch black since the moon just set, but Anton woke up to relieve me. He overcame the seasickness, and even if he was not ready to eat, he could stand watch. Peter asked not to be woken up, so I stayed with my cousin until dawn and then went down for a better quality sleep. The tossing of the V-berth was nothing compared to what it was 8 hours prior.

By late morning I was very much relieved to see Leo in much better spirits than the night before. He slept for more than 12 hours and looked somewhat rested. And even better: his stomach could hold pieces of apple and crackers. We got lucky with this weather window: these conditions are supposed to hold for another 24 hours.

Peter did a local noon shot. There was one snag: we started an hour earlier than necessary and were surprised by constantly climbing values when their increments were supposed to diminish. Daylight savings time… It seems that we got lucky with a sextant reading error, since his shots suddenly jumped by 40 minutes of arc, but with that, the estimated position was off by only 5 miles from the GPS reading. We’ll have to practice more tomorrow.

We made a decent 129 miles in 24 hours towards our goal, so this should end up being a 4 day passage. I’m trying to hold a more northerly course than necessary since Thursday the wind is supposed to build up to 20 knots and may shift to have a bit of an easterly component, which would not be great. If we don’t have to be close-hauled in those conditions, that’d be much better for the crew happiness.

Day 2

Everyone had chili for dinner! Yay! It’s always worrying when a crew member is incapacitated, so now that everyone can consume liquids and solids, it’s a huge relief for me.

When I came up for my shift at midnight, Anton & Peter reported that we just passed a cargo ship within 2 miles, but nothing to worry about, and there are a few more ships on the horizon. Indeed, within the next hour and a half it looked like we were surrounded by ships. At some point I had visual on 3 ships and 5 more were registered by the instruments. Some of them display their ports of departure and destination. I was surprised to see quite a few ships originating or heading to Singapore. Perhaps the international situation has something to do with that. The second half of my shift I saw absolutely nobody and it was not until 11am or so that we saw a French sailboat pass within 300 meters of us. We waved, but didn’t see them wave back.

The chili that I reheated for lunch had to wait. We put in fishing rods an hour earlier, and as I started to cut up veggies for salad, we heard one of the rods getting pulled. Peter stopped it, and in haste turned the handle of the reel in the wrong direction and then couldn’t easily put it back. I pulled on the line, but it didn’t seem to jerk. I got impatient waiting for Peter to fix the reel handle and started to pull the line in by hand, making a bit of a mess. On a crest of a wave, still far away from the boat, the was a splash. That’s encouraging — the lure was way too far to jump out of the water. By now the line was a big mess, but then it was clear that we had a fish! Peter got the net out and hauled the pretty grey & yellow creature out of its habitat.

It was quite hard to get the hook out of the jaw, and the fish tried to escape, thus making a bloody mess in the cockpit. Ugh. Peter wanted to clean it, and by the time he was done with the job, he was a big mess as well. Cabin was washed, Peter took a shower and then we could proceed finishing the chili.

Our plan to try to head north has not been helped by the shifting wind. During the day the best course we could hold at time was 100 true, 20 degrees south of where we want to go. The wind is slowly starting to build, so this night is likely to be less pleasant than the previous 2, but we only have 239 miles left to go after a nice 131 mile day.

Day 3

With help from Mark and independently from Catherine, we are quite convinced that the fish we caught is a mahi mahi. I fried the filets that Peter made and then he added garlic butter to season the fish on top. It was served with sautéed zucchini. The fish was very tender and the whole meal could have been served at a fancy restaurant. Well, our view of the ocean beat the views of most restaurants. The only drawback was that one had to hold the plates so that they wouldn't run away.

The wind kept building so even after we shortened both the jib and then the main, we were still somewhat overpowered. Peter shortened the main further all on his own, while telling me the next step that he was doing. Needless to say, I was very pleased to see that he understood the procedure end to end!

For the first time since we boarded in Ponta Delgada, I opted to sleep in Peter’s cabin before my shift. The bow was being thrown up and down, so it would have been hard to get rest in a matter of 3.5 hours. In the aft cabin I could hear the thumping noise, but at least I was being gently rocked rather than thrown up and down.

Within an hour after taking the shift from Anton & Peter, I had to shorten sail yet again. It was solid 17 knots and we had to be as close to the wind as possible. Salty Ginger continued to hop over the waves at 5.5 knots under 2 rather small sails, but the crew comfort was drastically increased.

It got a lot more humid than in the past two days. When I went in for the morning nap, my sheets felt damp even though not a drop of water landed on them.

The rest of the day we were busy observing traffic, whose density went drastically up compared to the day before. Big ships are passing us within a mile, and while it felt ok during the day when we have a visual, it would have been a bit more disconcerting at night.

We had another 131 mile day, which puts us only 108 miles away from Rabat, and the African coast is only 60 miles off to our starboard.

Day 4

Given how bumpy it was, for dinner we opted to cook pasta with meat “po flotski” (a la flotilla). It was relatively simple to do and it was filling in just the right way.

I was woken up around 9pm by the conversation that Anton & Peter were having about the fact that the boat was way off course and was pointing towards Casablanca rather than Rabat. Peter even considered turning on the engine. I suggested we use the best of the wind that we have before resorting to the loud propulsion mode. With James steering, I knew we would be as close as reasonably possible to the wind and it seemed like the best tactical move. The course that the boat drew was so crooked! I’ve only seen something like this on the Charles river in Boston where one can turn 30 degrees or more while always staying close hauled.

When I took over, it was quiet. There were city lights on the horizon, but very few boats around us, and most importantly, I didn’t see any late fishing boats, which do not have AIS as we confirmed while it was still daylight. And then I heard a familiar splash! Dolphins! A small pod came around a couple of times, as if to check us into the territorial waters, and then they left on their dolphin business. Amazingly enough, that was our first sighting since we left Madeira.

The wind was still shifting back and forth, but it was clear that at some point we will have to tack to avoid running ashore in Casablanca. My main concern was that I would have to wake up Anton, who was sleeping in the salon. The kids would just roll over to the other side of their cabins, but Anton would roll under the dining table. So, I waited and waited until the wind started to do even funnier things, indicating that it was time. Then I woke him up, told him to go into my cabin and tacked. We were on a better course to our destination and we were not in danger of getting mingled with the large ships at anchor outside of Casablanca port.

Anton “paid in kind”: he woke me up 45 minutes after I fell asleep because Salty Ginger was not just pointing north, but even northwest, so we had to tack back. The kids had no choice but to roll back to their original positions in their cabins. They didn’t complain about that inconvenience in the morning.

Around 10am we finally got internet connection and I could call the Rabat-Sale marina. After 10 minutes they said that they will take us! Very good news indeed! We were on a direct course to Rabat-Sale under full sails, admittedly a bit overpowered, expecting to reach it almost exactly 4 days after we left Quinta do Lorde marina.

Entertainment

Alice sent us daily nautical-themed riddles. Peter enjoyed working them out, and even though we may have only gotten the “right” answer for one of them, Alice liked our responses.

On a few occasions we sang songs. Russian, English, French — whatever we could remember or Peter had saved on his phone. Both he and I played the guitar and boosted the mood of the crew.

Siesta doesn’t quite count as entertainment, but it was happening every day after lunch. James was the only one who kept steering and steering. We only relieved him off his duty with 5 miles to go to the entrance of the river.

Arrival

We got lucky with timing, since we arrived at high tide and there was no current. The marina manager told me that the access is straightforward “tout droit”. That may be true, but with beaches on both sides of the river we encountered an unexpected obstacle: swimmers. I yelled to the crew who were on the bow: “tell me what to do so that these idiots don’t end up headless!” People were crossing the river despite boat and jet ski traffic. They mostly didn’t look around, making it quite stressful. I understand that they are used to boats all around, but I am not used to motoring past people some 5 meters off my bow.

The rest of it was quite painless. We tied up to the quarantine dock, the officials arrived within 15 minutes, giving me just enough time to take a quick shower. They first asked if I had drones. Not that I had one to begin with, but I knew that they are illegal in Morocco. They walked through the boat, peeked into a few cabinets asking what I have where, checked the passports of the crew and asked me to come with them to fill out papers. I forgot to print out the new insurance policy, but they were perfectly happy having me send it to them through WhatsApp. After I filled out 3 sheets of paper with the same details (for police, gendarmerie, and some other office), we were legally admitted and to the pleasant surprise of the marina manager and the officials, we raised the Moroccan courtesy flag.

“Where are you from originally?” asked the manager. Having found out that my cousin and I were born in Russia, he said “I’ve never met a Russian who spoke French! Bienvenue au Maroc!”