Heron: North Atlantic passage days 16, 17 and 18 - Ponta Delgada, Sao Miguel, Azores

Monday, June 3, 2013

North Atlantic passage days 16, 17 and 18 - Ponta Delgada, Sao Miguel, Azores

After spending Saturday in Lajes on island Flores we lifted our anchor in late afternoon and sailed off towards Horta on island Faial. That's what we thought at least. Throughout the evening and whole night wind refused to turn south enough that we would be able to sail in the right direction, we were forced to sail much more to the North. So in the late morning we were 20 miles N from Faial and changed our plan - instead of motoring 20 miles S to Horta we continued towards Ponta Delgada on Sao Miguel. This meant another day and night on the sea and getting to marina one day later than we thought, but also 150 more miles made and less to go to Gibraltar. We passed N of Sao Jorge and S of Terceira and reached Sao Miguel this morning, after sailing for 44 hours and 285 miles. In the morning Tadey caught a nice tuna and later on we saw some whales. We tied Heron to the marina pontoon at 13.30. We spent afternoon on internet (of course :-) and walking around the town. Except for couple of new high buildings that hurt the eyes the town is very pretty, lots of historical buildings and very clean. We had a nice dinner in local restaurant, we'll eat tuna tomorrow. And the day after.

Tomorrow we need to change the halyard for the main sail, do a little bit of shopping, mainly fruit and vegetables, and we're set to go. We will probably leave for Gibraltar tomorrow afternoon, unless the weather forecast changes by then. At the moment it looks like we will be able to ride on a lower edge of a Cyclon (low pressure area) all the way to Gibraltar.

Here are some unedited photos from the passage, stories will follow.

First sunset