Greetings!
I just got a phone call from Rosi and Jim. They arrived in Isla Graciosa, a small island north of Lanzarote (one of the larger islands in the Canaries). They are in a small harbor across the channel from Lanzarote. They had some stormy weather as they were heading out of Gibralter and tore part of the jib as they were trying to roll it in. They made slow progress for the next day and a half with the smaller jib while Rosi sewed up the tear. Once they got the larger jib back up, they made good progress but spent a lot of time tacking because the wind was right no their nose. The whole trip took about 6 days. They said that they have strong winds on Graciosa right now, but no swell. They plan to stay where they are right now and head down to Puerto Calero in about 2-3 days when they have recovered, and cleaned up a bit. There are 2 sailmakers in Puerto Calero, so they will be able to get the jib repaired properly for the next (big) leg across the pond.
Rosi said that the eastern islands in the Canaries tend to be quite dry and barren, but this is by far the most barren volcanic island they have ever visited. She said it looks like a moonscape and there is no speck of green, except for what people plant and water. Despite that fact, there are still a lot of tourists and backpackers from all over the world. They are also running into a lot of people they met at Horta (Azores).
They sounded very good and are looking forward to their time tooling around the Canaries.
That's all for now. I'll have the web page updates soon with new maps (once I find some!). Until next time,
Alles Gouda,
Yvonne
