Compliments of Lufthansa, the Queen and the King
June, nothing but likely the restriction would be lifted after the summer.
July, nothing but speculations that it was going to change soon.
August, nothing but definitely before the end of the year.
At that point, not wanting to risk it, I had called Lufthansa. After struggling for hours to find a number to call a physical person instead of a dumb AI that only gives you the choice between 1, 2 and 3, never understand your request and hangs up on you after wishing you a good day without having solved anything, I had found the number to the call centre. The person I had talked to was very nice and agreed that it was Lufthansa’s responsibility to find an alternative route for us as they should never have sold us a non usable ticket in the first place. 15 minutes later, we were re-booked on a route going via Singapore and even arriving 12 hours earlier than planned. Kim was over the moon.
Fast forward to the 17th of September and here we are, at the crack of dawn, outside the yard, being picked up by Mike, the owner of the chandlery, who kindly offered to drop us off at the bus station in the town next door. Carrying a truck load of clothes back to New Zealand after having spent a year in a vacuum bag in the back of the boat, we are happy to minimise the amount of walking we need to do.
A very long bus ride later and we are in Madrid where we will be staying a couple nights with our friends Stephan and Hande. That gives us just enough time to catch up, have an overview of the city and go out for dinner.
So here we are again, on the 19th of September, at the crack of dawn, on the side of the road, looking for a cab to take us to the airport. Everything is going according to plan and we can already taste the cheddar cheese and marmite, that is, until we reached the airline counter…
The employee starts typing and typing on her computer. For once, I have forgotten to do the online check-in the day before so I politely ask whether we can still get a window seat.
She nods and keeps on typing. Nothing out of the ordinary as they always appear to be trying to hack into the pentagon when you check in.
We wait while she hacks.
And we wait.
And we wait some more.
It is now taking an unusually long amount of time and we already joke that we might need to be upgraded to business. Except that she is typing and typing more frantically and obviously appears more and more nervous. Finally after an eternity:
“There is a problem with your booking”
“I beg your pardon?”
“You are not in the system”
“Wait, what?”
“Are you sure about your booking?”
“Yes I am and we have a confirmation email from Lufthansa”
I show her the email which stipulates that our booking is confirmed.
“We will have to put you on another flight”
“… Can’t you upgrade us?”
“Sorry, the flight is full and our next availability is in 5 days”
“?!? WHAT?”
“It’s all we have, do you want this?”
“No way, we don’t want this, we can’t leave 5 days later, we only have 12 days over there”
“Ok, come with me”
We follow her to the Lufthansa ticket and customer service booth where she basically hands us over to her colleague before running away, probably sensing problems ahead. However, her colleague is even sneakier and tells us that we need to call the Lufthansa call centre..
“Aren’t you the Lufthansa customer service in Madrid?”
“We can not do anything from here, you need to call this number”
I call the number.
“Hallo sirrr, how may I help you today?”
One thing is already dead obvious, I am not talking to Angela Mueller. I briefly explain the situation.
“Ok sirrr, wherrre arrre you?"
“.. at the airport”
“Ok sirrr, what time is it?”
… Fake Angela Mueller is obviously not in Germany either.
“When is yourrr flight?”
“It is in less than an hour”
“Verrry good sirrr, and you arrre at the airrrport?”
“Yes”
“Verrry good. And wherrre arrre you going today?”
“To Auckland”
“Verrry good, wait a moment please”
The next hour is spent trying to make her understand what the problem is and where we want to go. She usually gives me a bit of hope with sentences such as:
“We arrre making prrrogrrress, can you wait a couple morrre minutes”
Finally, she proudly announce that we have a solution:
“You will be flying frrrom Madrrrid to Munich, than Munich to Singaporrre and frrrom therrre you can find your own way to Auckland”
“Excuse me?!? We don’t want to go to Singapore, we want to go to Auckland”
“All the flights to Auckland arrre full, so you can go to Singaporrre”
“And take the risk to be stuck in Singapore ?!? No way”
“Ok sirrr, so you don’t want this flight?”
“Hell no”
“Verry good sirrr, can you wait a few more minutes?”
“Sure..”
After another 30 minutes or so:
“Ok sirrr, we have a solution”
“Great, thank you”
“So, you will be flying frrrom Madrrrid to Munich, than Munich to Singaporrre and frrrom Singaporrre to Brrrrisbane”
“And then?”
“Sorrry sirrr, but all the flights from Brisbane to Auckland arrre full”
“But, we don’t want to go to Brisbane, we want to go to Auckland”
“Ok sirrr, so you don’t want this flight?”
“Of course not!? We want to go to New Zealand, not Australia”
“Verry good sirrr, can you wait a few more minutes?”
After another hour or so and being asked to “wait a few more minutes” a couple times, she victoriously informs me that she has found a route to Auckland.
“That’s great news!”
“So, you will be flying frrrom Madrrrid to Munich, then Munich to Singaporrre and frrrom Singaporrre to Sydney and then frrrom Sydney to Auckland”
As she gives me the route, she also gives me the flight schedule. As I write down the last connection my brain clicked:
“Wait a second, did you just say we were landing in Sydney at 5.50pm and the next flight is at 5.55pm?!?”
“Yes sirrr, that is corrrect”
“… ?!? but that is just impossible, you can’t make a connection in 5 minutes?!?”
“What do you mean sirrr?”
“I mean, you can not have a transfer time of 5 minutes, that is just impossible”
“Arre you surrre? You can trrry”
“No mam, that is physically not possible”
“Sirrr, arrre you saying you don’t want this flight?”
“Of course not!”
I am slowly but surely getting on the edge, meanwhile she is slowly but surely getting more and more agitated and clearly distressed. As for Kim, with every fake solution, she gets more and more depressed.
We are now well within our 3rd hour on the phone with only limited progress made. The phone number which is meant to be free has triggered an alarm by my phone provider and I receive a text message informing me that I am already 300 euros over my budget. Not wanting to hang up to investigate the matter, I ignore it and “wait a few more minutes”. She comes back with another solution that includes a 15 minutes transfer in Brisbane. I have to explain to her that it is nonsense and that you can not have such a short transfer time. Fake Angela Mueller has obviously never taken a flight and doesn’t know how airports operate. We have a bit of an argument and she starts threatening me to simply cancel our booking. I ask her to look for an alternative route via the US, after all, it doesn’t make any difference from where we are whether we turn east or west. Many “few more minutes” later, she tells me that this time, we have a solution leaving in 48 hours:
Madrid - Munich
Munich - Singapore
Singapore - Frankfurt
Frankfurt - Los Angeles
Los Angeles - Auckland
“Stop, stop, stop. Just stop right there, sorry mam, but it doesn’t make any sense! Why don’t we just fly from Madrid to Frankfurt?”
“Sorrry sirrr, this is not possible”
“Then we can fly a day earlier and you put us in a hotel”
“Sorrry sirrr, this is not possible”
I quickly check on google and find a least a dozen flights from Lufthansa between Madrid and Frankfurt, with availabilities. So, not only fake Angela Mueller has no clue about airports, but she also has no clue about geography and she must be dumb as an empty coconut.
“But, you realise that you are not making any sense here? We can not transfer from Munich to Frankfurt via Singapore!?!”
“Sirrr, I have been verrry patient with you if you do not want this option we can cancel yourrr booking”
At this point, the phone call gets interrupted. I will never know whether she hang up on me or whether my phone provider decided it was enough as I was now allegedly 500 euros above my allowance… Almost defeated and not wanting to start again from scratch with fake Angela Mueller 2.0, we decide to go back to the ticket office. It is now a new person behind the desk and not only is she aware of our situation but suddenly they can help us apparently. She asks us whether we just want a refund and book a flight with another airline. While tempting as Oneworld has a flight leaving in the afternoon arriving in Auckland in 30 hours from now, the price is obviously not quite the same. When I point this out and ask whether Lufthansa will pay the difference, I am being laughed at. At this stage, it is important to highlight that at no point have we been offered any form of compensation or informed that by the law, we are entitled to a minimum of 600 euros each, right here, right now. Therefore we go back to the US route alternative, without transiting via Singapore. It leaves in 2 days from now but at least we can make it home. She gives me details of the route and the dates. Kim is not happy with this but at this point, she is emotionally depleted and accepts this option. Once the new tickets are printed, I have one last read through them and discover with horror that the woman messed up, we are arriving 3 days later due to the international date line!
“Mam, you made a mistake, on our last flight it says landing +2, so 2 days later”
“No that’s not possible”
“Yes it is, because of the International date line”
“It’s too late now”
“…. ok, aren’t we getting any compensations for the delay at least?”
“Here is a flyer, you can learn about your rights in there”
And she just walks away from the desk leaving us speechless.
Fortunately, Stephan and Hande can host us a couple more days during which we go rock climbing, slack lining, swimming and go out to eat some excellent sushi. And on the 20th of September, we find ourselves once again on the side of the road, this time even before the crack of dawn. The flight back is not particularly good or enjoyable and in the process Kim’s birthday disappears in the magic of time travel.
Once in New Zealand, we hardly have time to see the family, meet with a few friends and get over our jet lag before we need to fly back to Kujira who is hopefully patiently waiting for our return. I still manage to fit in Auckland’s best sailing race of the year, the one around Waiheke Island. The perfect occasion to catch up and share stories with our fellow sailing friends. All in all, it’s a bitter sweet trip that feels like a dream and on the 4th of November, we start our marathon journey back to Almerimar. First a flight to Singapore without any incident as it is operated by Air New Zealand and therefore you are dealing with friendly kiwis. Once in Singapore, it is a shocking contrast to just over a year ago, as we flew from Australia to Europe in the middle of the pandemic. Back then, the airport was a no man’s land with very strict security guards in full body haz-suits. After a short stop over, just long enough to visit the airport butterfly garden, we are back on our way to Frankfurt. This time the service is pretty lame, the food minimalist and bad and you need to pay extra for any snacks or drinks.Thank you Lufthansa. One more flight to Madrid, a subway ride to the bus station with just enough time for a picnic in the park and off we are on our 7 hours journey to El Ejido. From there, it is only a short “taxi” ride to the port of Almerimar. By the time we reach Kujira, it is almost midnight, nearly 48 hours after we left. The air is warm and dusty, the place is eerily quiet. With its yellow lights the boat yard feels more like a graveyard from a Michael Jackson video clip. But at the end of the yard, Kujira is patiently waiting for us while slowly being covered in dust and sand. Fortunately, the ladder is still attached at the back and all we have left to do is hoist our heavy bags containing among other things new Zealand yogurt powder to make over 20kg of yogurts, the equivalent of 32 litres of milk powder and a few jars of peanut butter.
We were meant to go back on the water today but with Mr. Perkins still not back together, we ask for a 24h extension on the hard. It is a full day of work, me in the cave, Kim inside the boat, I guess. As a matter of fact she could just as well have spent the day on Facebook I would not have known as I don’t get to see much of the daylight except for the usual trips to the chandlery, the sail maker and the crazy cat lady who still hasn’t picked up the foam we ordered 3 weeks ago. Accastillage Diffusion also messed up, once again. The warehouse never dispatched my order of a grab bag complementary items to turn our life raft from an under 24 hours raft into an over 24 hours. A requirement for the ARC.
“What do you mean you haven’t received it?”
“It is not my fault, it is the system”
“But I paid for it 3 weeks ago and it was said to be in stock?!?”
“You should complain to Accastillage Diffusion”
“But.. you are Accastillage Diffusion”
“We are franchises, we don’t know what they do on their website”
“.. Ok, so what do we do now? I can not go across the Atlantic without a proper grab bag and I already paid for it”
“We can have it in 3 days”
“We are leaving in 2, can you send it elsewhere?”
“In La Lina, near Gibraltar”
“Ok, that should work, we should be there on Monday”
“They are closed on Monday”
“ … You are really not helping me”
“So what do you want to do?”
Definitely not helping.
“Can you send it to the marina office?”
“Sure, no problem”
I leave really annoyed but fortunately, I have other business to attend to and no time to think about it. I need to collect the items I have ordered over the last couple weeks and which have been delivered to the port office.
As I enter the room, I go straight to the pile of packages and letters for the yachties.
Nothing for Kujira.
I have another look, a little sceptical as I did order a few items.
Nothing.
“Excuse me, senor, but I can not find our parcels?”
“What is the name of la barca?”
“Kujira”
“Aaah, Kujira, si, come with me”
I can not tell whether he is amused or annoyed but he takes me to another room and there, in the middle is an entire crate just for me. It looks like Christmas and surely feels like it too. I may have gone slightly overboard with my orders and despite having taken our biggest bag and unpacking everything, we have a hard time taking everything back to the boat.
All our friends being gone by now, we decide to have a pizza for dinner and call it a day., after all, tomorrow we need to be ready by 7.30am. Next morning, we are ready on time but the yard workers are not. In fact they don’t even show up before 8am only to discover that they have a problem with the crane. So we wait and watch the wind slowly picking up. I am definitely nervous. It has been 3 weeks since I last manoeuvred Kujira and I don’t know whether he is mad at us for leaving him in the dust for so long. And the previous time we left a yard it didn’t go particularly well. Also, having taken apart a good amount of the engine, I don’t know whether we are going to have water spilling everywhere once we start Mr. Perkins, that is, if he starts.
Once our turn arrives, the workers are trying to rush us, obviously trying to catch up the delay but I can not take the risk to have the stuffing box, which I restuffed, to be leaking. Everything seems to be fine and as we slowly motor out of the yard and back into the port, we can feel the excitement to be back on the water.
We need a couple more days to complete all the work we have left, including changing the diesel filters, which requires bleeding the engine afterwards, and discovering that we have diesel bug on board… to be added to the to-do list for our future self; or putting the Genoa back on the forestay, which requires a low in the wind which has been severely gusting from behind ever since we came back. Kim, our onboard weather frog, picks just the right window, we hardly have the time to hoist it that gusts start inflating it and send Kujira swaying from side to side. During the manoeuvre, it made a strange noise and I am afraid we may have damaged something, so I go up the mast, wait for another low to unfurl the sail again, go back up the mast, but everything appears to be alright. Worst case scenario, we damaged the forestay and with the first gust the mast will come down, not a good scenario.
Finally, on the 8th of October, we leave Almerimar in the early afternoon with a weather forecast for strong gusty winds. We can tell that it is not summer any more and the weather windows to exit the Med are getting more and more infrequent with strong winds coming from the Atlantic making it very difficult and uncomfortable to go west. This might be our best chance as once again, we are under time pressure.
It is great to be back out on the blue and with 150Nm to go to Gibraltar, we will have the joy of doing a night sail too, that is, if the wind finally shows up… and it does. Soon we find ourself in 27 knots of wind. Luckily it comes at a favourable angle and Kujira is steady, comfortable and flying. We see dolphins on multiple occasions. Even the increasing number of super tankers and cargos don’t seem to bother us as everyone is going in the same direction. It feels like we are taking part in some huge migration, like wildebeests, zebras and impalas in the Serengeti. The one thing which is bothering us however, is the temperature. It is getting nippy at night and a jacket and pants are required for the night watch. All in all, a great shake down sail to get us back into the groove and making sure that I haven’t done any bad jobs in Almerimar.
In the afternoon of our 2nd day, “the rock” finally appears on the horizon. It takes us many more hours to go around and reach the marina of La Lina but it is quite a site and the dolphins keep on entertaining us. We reach the marina just after dark. We have to dock in front of the office to check in with the security guard before going to our berth. Another sign that we are leaving the Med is the disappearance of the slime lines, under water ropes that you need to catch and attach to the front of your boat, usually covered in barnacles and slime, hence the name, which are being replaced by finger pontoons. As we are arriving late, no one at the marina is here to help us but the complete lack of wind and the friendly crew of 2 nearby catamarans make it relatively stress free and arguments free.
Next morning, as I go to the office to complete the check-in, I get yelled at by the local Karen for having received a parcel before having paid for our stay.
Karen, I had missed you..
I try to explain that it is not really my fault but the one of Accastillage Diffusion but she is not really interested and makes me swear never to do that again.
The afternoon is spent visiting Gibraltar which turns out to be a lot more interesting than expected. To start with, you have to cross a border control, thank you Brexit, then cross the airport runway, on foot, like it would be a regular road. Once inside, the place is packed with history. Gibraltar is basically a crossover between a gigantic bunker and a James Bond villain hideout. During WWII, the British dug out around 55 km of tunnels, in a piece of land of only 6.7km2. They had roads, warehouses, “villages”, hospitals and much more on multiple levels. It was a key infrastructure for the allies and was never taken over by the Germans even if U-boots managed to sneak by many times.
There are also some older fortifications, a natural park, a beautiful natural cave and finally the famous monkeys of Gibraltar. This resulted in a long and exciting day and we could have stayed for another one but the clock is ticking and we need to rush to our next and originally not planned stop: Tangier in Morocco. With Africa within sight, it feels like we need to go there. Also, all our friends have done a stopover there and Intrepid Kiwis is actually still there. Moreover, it actually makes a lot of sense to start our journey towards the canary islands a 5 to 7 days sail from the southern side of the straight and outside the Med.
As we leave in the early hours, we are first greeted by a gigantic pod of small dolphins. More than 100 individuals are jumping and swimming around the boats. It must be fairly exceptional as the coastguards are taking videos of the encounter. Hopefully, it will keep the orcas away as an attack has been reported no more than a week ago, right outside the bay and we don’t want to see our carbon fibre reinforced rudder being chewed to pieces by a bunch of swimming lunatics. Then, we are greeted by fog, which is not ideal when you are about to cross one of the world busiest shipping lanes. We can hear them, the radar can see them but we prefer to stick to the Spanish coast for as along as we can. In the end, it turns out to be a lot easier than crossing a motorway with closed eyes. Finally, once on the other side we are greeted by a thunderstorm, just our luck. We put all the sails away and close the cockpit before Kujira gets a rinse off. At about 3pm, the marina is in sight and I go down below to call them on the VHF.
“Tangier marina bay, Tangier marina bay, Tangier marina bay, ici Kujira, Kujira, Kujira, est ce que vous me recevez?”
Nothing.
“Tangier marina bay, Tangier marina bay, Tangier marina bay, ici Kujira, Kujira, Kujira, est ce que vous me recevez?”
Nothing.
As we slowly drift toward the entrance of the marina I keep on unsuccessfully calling them on the VHF. Having the reputation of being always full, I made a booking the day before which was confirmed this morning. So we wait and we call. And we call and we wait. Once we are basically blocking the entrance of the marina, we finally get a answer:
“Oui bijour, c’est vous qui êtes dans l’entrée dé la marina?”
“Oui”
“Villez patienter quelques minutes à l’extérieur”
We are asked to wait a moment outside the entrance of the port. Morocco has a very strict no anchoring policy meaning that we have no choice but to drift and go around in circles until we are allowed in. After an hour and still not having heard back from the marina, I decide to call them again on the VHF. This time, they respond right away only to tell me to wait a moment.
Another hour, another call on the VHF, another “wait a moment” … Is fake Angela Mueller a Moroccan employee also working at Tangier Marina?
Finally, after nearly 3 hours since the first contact attempt, we are invited to come in and dock alongside the customs pontoon.
We dock behind a German catamaran which has been waiting there for quite some time already. Apparently we need to wait on our boat until the captain is invited to the office to fill up the customs and immigration documents before being boarded by local authorities and having the boat searched. So we wait.
And we wait.
And we wait some more.
I start a conversation with our neighbours, we may not be allowed to step off the boat but nobody said anything about talking from the bow of my boat. Meanwhile Kim is chatting to the dock lad who keeps on apologising for making us wait. Finally, I am escorted to the office building and asked to wait some more in what appears to be a waiting room. One man in full military attire and big 1980’s American cop sunglasses is sitting behind what looks like a reception desk. He is obviously doing some very important work on his smartphone and pays no attention to me. After some time, a couple men in jeans and black leather jackets straight out of Grease show up, casually, as if entering the local pub. They start chatting to the receptionist and soon they are all watching what I can only assume to be highly classified information on one of the phones. Probably not allowed to use my phone in here, I just sit, watch and wait. After some time, I am invited into one of the offices. There I have the joy of filling in not one, not two but what feels like a gazillion forms all asking for the exact same information: details of the boat and passports of the crew. Once this non-sense is over, I am escorted back to Kujira and told to get ready to be boarded. We put all the bottles of alcohol on the table and the drone which needs to go into quarantine for the duration of our stay. We are ready just on time for the glorious arrival of “The general” and his two goons. The general is a short, thin man of a certain age. He obviously wears his military uniform with much pride and appears to have expected a red carpet leading to our boat. Instead, he is greeted with a rigid, non removable side rail. Unlike most boats, Kujira doesn’t have a gate on its side which can be opened for easier access on and off the boat from a pontoon or another boat. We don’t have a little ladder or staircase either, so here is the general, wondering what the hell to do next. We tell him that he needs to climb up if he wants to get on board. The goons appear offended and the general speechless. I can tell he is seriously considering giving our boat a miss but finally, with the help of the goons, he climbs onboard. We tell them right away that all the alcohol we have on board is on the table and I am secretly hoping that they are all going to be confiscated. But they seem to have very little interest in Kim’s bounty. The drone however is being taken away.
I don’t know what the general did next as I am too busy following goon number one who has a nosy look around. I have heard too many times stories of officials magically discovering drugs in someone’s belonging or property and asking for money to make it go away. But he is just useless, a look here, a look there and I keep on telling myself that he has no clue where to look and that I could have hidden the entire collection of playboy magazines and a tone of gold right in front of his nose. However, he has some serious questions for me:
“Have you got any weapons on board?”
“No sir”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes sir”
“Any ammunitions maybe?”
“Nope”
“Maybe a weapon somewhere?”
“Still nope”
“Just one?”
“Nope nope nope”
“So you don’t have a weapon?”
“Of course, now that you mention it, I have a couple AK-47 and a rocket launcher under the sofa, I didn’t realise you meant that kind of weapon!”
… Well, I may only have thought the last answer and instead gave another “No sir”
After this thorough inquiry and meticulous search, they disembark Kujira. Luckily, the general doesn’t fall over which would probably have gotten us in trouble. Now all we have to do, is wait for a receipt for the drone. I am a bit sceptical whether we will ever see it again and now regret not having hidden it with the rocket launcher.
By the time we finally leave the customs pontoon and go to our berth it is pitch black. Luckily, we have an entire committee of cruisers and a couple of marina workers waiting to catch our lines. It is a bit of a tricky manoeuvre but with no wind I slowly reverse Kujira in his berth. As soon as we are secured, we jump over to Intrepid Kiwi which is only a few boats down the pontoon for a cup of tea and a good catch up.
There is a “good” weather window for heading to the canaries which is closing soon. If we miss that one, we will likely be stuck in Morocco for at least a week. While Morocco totally deserves a lot more than a week, we are under time pressure and decide to stay only 2 nights.
We make the most out of our only full day in Tangier. First Donna and Ross come for a grand tour of Kujira before introducing us to some fellow Amel cruisers. Then we head to the old town, the bazaar where we buy some spices and worm-infested dates and two dozen “Cornes de gazelles”, Moroccan traditional cookies. The old man who is baking and selling them cries when I ask for a second dozen after trying one. We also do a very funny stop at the post office where an employee make us cut the line and then has no clue where New Zealand is and therefore how much we need to pay for 2 postcards. For dinner, we go to one of the local “tourist traps”, a fancy old looking building with an indoor patio. The food is not unforgettable and the live music is actually pretty bad but with only one night out in Morocco, we may as well go into full tourist mode.
On the 13th of October, after checking one more time with Ross that I read the weather properly and that we should be able to make it to the Canaries before a big low reaches the coast of Morocco, we set off for the customs pontoon. It is blowing 20 knots, at a 90 degrees angle from the pontoon, making for a very tricky parking. Moreover, I need to park in front of a very large and very fancy yacht. We will need to be quick, very quick and the lad on the pontoon will need to be helpful.. which he isn’t. As we arrive, he is on his phone and doesn’t catch our line. We try to bring Kujira under control but there is no way Kim can hold 13 tonnes in 20 knots of wind with one line. The lad finally takes another line but instead of pulling on it, he gives slack obviously not wanting to do any physical effort. It’s a complete failure and Kujira is out of control, we have to go for another round. The second time, a couple guys on the pontoon come to help and with great difficulties we bring Kujira under control like a mad stallion on a ranch.
Checking out would have been quick and easy if it hadn’t been for the drone which is in quarantine in a different building, in a different part of town. We have to wait 1 hour for it…
We leave the marina by 1.30pm and set off for our first Atlantic passage. We are a bit nervous and it feels like we are moving onto the next level. While we will be following the Moroccan coast to some degree, on our starboard side we will have nothing but water for thousand of kilometres. We will also be facing for the first time the Atlantic swell which is very different to the Med one. As we slowly move away from the coast, the wind picks up to 30 knots from behind and steep short breaking waves of a couple meters follow the boat. We have the mizzen out and a little bit of genoa, yet we are averaging 8 knots and even peaked at 11,6 knots. This is definitely a new game for us and for the first time I try to reef the mizzen, however the pressure is such that I physically can not do it. I decide to centre the boom in order to furl it completely but likewise, the pressure is simply too huge to be able to pull it in by hand. At this very moment, I regret following the advice of the rigger and having removed the pulley at this end of the mizzen boom. So, it is over sheeted that we set off for our first night sail on the Atlantic Ocean, in stormy conditions way above our comfort zone with Kim becoming greener by the minute. Hopefully, Kujira knows what he is doing…
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