So time for changes.  Good by Spain, Canary islands and welcome open Ocean again!...We are leaving. Or we are comming back…. TO SAIL.!  750 miles towards Cape Verde Islands. First stop-Sal.
Now checking weather forecast and deciding which day to leave.  Even if its sounds exiting we are little bit nervous and  impatient,  but happy to be able to continue traveling. We enjoyed more than a lot all Canary islands and specially Hierro…..but its time to leave. Here we feel  like at home already,  what is so great , but curiosity for traveling is calling us . Also Grain needs to sail:)  Finally that,s why we live on boat- to continue sailing and traveling.  

When you live in house it seems there are so few people who lives on boats, but here in Restinga harbour seems that there are few who don,t.  To tell the true is a really nice place to stop and stay longer (like we did too) till you relax, charge your energy and get ready for long trip. Is cheap (around 10 euros per day), you have electricity and wáter on pantoons, good protection and small quiet town near. There is no shower , but is sunny everyday and open air shower from the host pipe fix everything. (ok sometimes cold in the mornings, but can,t be all perfect:))

So harbour is full and mostly all boats are french. Its amazing how many frech boats and sailors in Canary islands can be!!! And mostly all from Bretñia.  We were joking that soon Canary islands will become one more French colony. But from other side of view is great to meet them all.  Can you imagine that here we had even a sailing CIRCUS! One french family with two young kids on boat Dominao sail and make circus where ever they stop!...Another french couple with boat from  Sete were  baking and selling bread for sailors. Also here is a french girl who lives and travels on boat alone fixing  sails for others on her own boat….Nice .Italian young famyly Paolo, Sandra and Nila on boat Asikel. Our friends Nouri and Gigi (she teach me and the one who wants yoga!) and little sweedish boat Darya. And of course our best neighbours ever Katy and Jean Mary with cats CAPSULE( she has 20 years!!!!) and MIET from Orange bleue¡!! They make little wooden boats and sell them in France after……We will miss them all!!!

Now we need just to fish a lot (we hope) and not to be too tired to cook all that:)  It will be our first so long non stop ocean sailing trip alone (just two of us). Lots of sailors we met do that for many years, so its normal. But when its first time is first time. And we wanted to sail alone..  It was our dream since we sailed around the world with RagaineII and saw so many sailors couples enjoying traveling by boat alone. Now its our time  Winds in this área use to be north easterlies 15-20 knots constantly, but this year they are not so stable so forecast checking is very important. For example here in Canary islands this winter blows too much south easterlies what is not very common for this time of the year. Also its warmer than normal ( what we love) and almost no rain.

For communication we signed  for SAILMAIL service  for one year again.   250 dollars per years for 90 minutes per week and  with the help of SSB radio and Pactor we will be able to write and receive mails. Also we will be able to get  Grib files with weather forecast.  Is amazing the technology of our days!

We will need to say good by for free WIFI all day too. In Hierro it was amazing! We were able to surf and check mails every day.  And the free WIFI is  not just in harbour but in all island.  From now it will be- computer in the bag and dinghy landing to nearest bar or wifi café:)
Last year we bought long distance wireless connection device TP LINk, but we still didn`t manage to make it work properly. We are not the computers guru, really, but come on!!! Why is not working????.....Anyway we will have lot of time in the future to continue fighting with it and will make it work!...hope so

​

 …and we forgot one more thing !

We have a  third crew member again- cat BIMBACHE! He is from Hierro and his name is also from Hierro. Long time ago the same were called Hierro Aborigens 

NOw with Bimbache and all ready on board time to start moving and checking again whats is waiting us in the other side of the horizont...
We will try to update our position , so it will be able to see where we are on FIND US HERE

Ok. ​Stop. Lets write. 

After leaving our Grain alone and sad in Lanzarote we both flew to the mainland and spend all summer trying our accounts to grow - in other words,  we went to work:) And of course, on sailing boats again. Just this time not on the same one. Egoi spend all summer in Barcelona working on beautiful Sparkman and Stephens classic sailing yacht...and me in Corfu enjoying greek waters and Greece on South African Catamaran Francis 50. All perfect. But really perfect. We call it to be lucky, because same me as Egoi we could not imagine finding a better job.

But job is job ...and sailing on your own boat is another story:) 

So after finishing the season in October we came back to our home- sweet home- Grain:) Full of dust, sand and grease (some stupid guy decided to paint our cockpit in black and throw in old diesel filter) but still HOME. 

Preparations, cleaning, more cleaning and sailing !!!!!!!!! This time our goal was to reach El Hierro. Everyone we met before and knew Hierro told us it will become our favorite...so it was time to check it (and they didnt lie!!!)

Little by little......if there are islands on the way, why not to stop and visit them again. First we sailed down all Lanzarote and Fuerteventura. Stopped in a cosy village Gran Tarajal, where we hauled up the Grain for cleaning and painting the bottom with antifoulling paints. Here we also found that our forestay is not safe to use any more.. It was starting to be difficult to un roll and roll in the genoa so after inspecting all furling system we discoveder that the problem was in the forestay.  In some places the wires were dangerously damaged (in this moment you understand how good is to have extra stay (jib stay) and extra sail. Otherwise we were not able to sail to Gran Canaria where we could order a new stay and replace the old one with new.
But not all is so bad. For example in Gran Tarajal we had a super nice visit of our friend Amaya!!!! 

So next - relaxed and beautiful night sailing to south of Gran Canaria. Few nights in Pasito Blanco ( where another great friend Jullita came on board!!!)and then Puerto Mogan. We wanted to sail to Las Palmas, but because of Arc 2015 it was totally full and no way to find a place neither in marina neither in the bay on anchor!!!.
​In Mogan we had a visit of parents of Egoi and after installing new stay sailed with them all the way with short stops in Tenerife and La Gomera till Hierro!

And here we are!!! In the end of the world. Thats how we felt when after night sailing from la Gomera early morning we entered small but well protected harbor of La Restinga. In the very south of the island and the very south of all Canary islands this harbor is perfect for those who want to relax and make the last small preparations before sailing south to Cabo Verde or crossing Atlantic. Is little, but here you have small but good supermarket, some restaurants, bars, lot of diving schools, friendly people and everyday guaga,s service to the  island capital Valverde. 

​And the island itself is great- wIld, so natural, diverse and impressive, clean, friendly, energetically auto sufficient, serviced by free wifi in all parts, perfect for snorkeling and diving and so so nice.  Our original idea was  to stay here all December and after leave towards Cabo Verde , after Gambia...and than Brazil. But after realizing  how special this place is now our idea is to stay here some days longer...Somehow after sailing around the World in just two years now that we have all time we want to enjoy all places on our way and try to leave as little as possible unseen.  Even if is still so hard to realize that there is no hurry to run....