FINALLY THE WIND ALLOWS US TO LEAVE SANDY PALMEIRA!
Carrying  kilos and kilos of sand we are leaving for sailing towards MINDELO IN THE ISLAND OF SAN VICENTE. If we like some island on the way we will stop, if not- directly to Mindelo. Little by little.
Our friends Adrian and Christof from sailboat boat VOYAGE left towards Tobago today ...and soon we will start our trip across Atlantic too.

 
This is too crazy! You should see our boat!...Grain de Sable is not a grain of sand but all DUNE!!!.

And we are still in Sal, Cape Verde.

11 days passed , but we didn,t move anywhere. We wanted... OF COURSE!  But straight after our arrival to Cape Verde wind started blowing very strong and did it till now. .(Canary Islands had worse times....it started snowing there!!!)

We had to put a second anchor for feeling safe and relaxed. Weather forecast was showing strong winds for more than a week. Luckily the bay here in Palmeira is well protected and there is no swell at all.  With a strong winds around inside the boat was quiet and calm. 
But outside ....sand sand and sand!. We managed to keep clean our boat cockpit (buckets of salty water everyday), but the rest of the deck? Forget! Till we not start sailing again or strong rain will come there is no chance to take it out.  

But now is clear- we are in AFRICA:)

Little vilage of Palmeira is cozy and very welcome. Locals are relaxed and friendly. Its not dificult to feel confortable here. There are not too many things on shore, .but the basic you may need you.ll find it. Few little supermarkets where the food is expensive and vegetables and fruits are real luxury ( ATTENTION! Any one who plan to sail here , .bUy alll ,,,but allllll you can in Canary islands,,,You will not regret ..believe!!!!)
Also there are some restaurants and bars...and every sunday evening a party in the street where local people from all island come.  There are public showers (o,5euro per person), cybercafe where you can buy a local sim card with 2 or 5 gb of internet , fresh water tap to fill cans  ( we still have lot of fresh water on board so didnt need to use it yet)  and friendly fishermans selling fish near dinghy landing dock. 

 When we came here we found in the same bay on anchor our friends Rebecca and Arnol with there childs . They were in Cape Verde more than a month already,  So next day they showed us thel vilage and introduced us to some locals friends.

Almost every evening we were joining together with other sailors and some locals in a Bar Arminda for a local beer ( 1 e.) or cortado( glass of local rum-0,5 e). 
Is not so bad here no?:) 
 Sleeep a lot, eat a lot...swim..go to shore for a small walk,,,take a cold beer in local bar .make some dinner and invite friends on board or go to other boat......check weather forecast...check weather forecast ..and check weather forecast.....

AND CHECK WEATHER FORECAST!!!


And change the plans constantly  (we are already used to that).

After seeing local weather and winds here we decided that we will not sail to Gambia. We want to cross Atlantic, so we calculated that we do not have so much time anymore. Little bit pitty of course, but there will be another countries and another places instead. 

We decided we will not sail to Brazil as well. Acording our most recient plans (which of course can change again:))our next destination will be SURINAME!.
​Long time ago we wanted to visit this country, so now its the time.

But before we hope we will visit another islands of Cape Verde. Maybe Sao Nicolao?.
It must be really nice and green island. Till the anchor place in bay of Tarafal is just 80 miles, but everybody says here that with a strong winds there are crazy strong gust of winds blowing down the mountain..... You have to put lot of chain and if it is blowing too strong, you cant leave your boat alone.

We will see.  Somehow we are tired of all these local winds...wind acceleration zones...and etc..and probably of vulcanoes too... SO if its possible we,ll stop and if not than straight to Mindelo...buy more fresh food...fill the water...and GO!!!!!

You see? we are planning again:)

Anyway here in Sal we are Ok.. Grain is safe and we have fiends around. Day before yesterday after 9 days of very hard sailing arrived our friend Adrian with his friend from Lanzarote! Now is our time to show them a place and  make them feel like at home here.
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So why to hurry....lets wait for calmer days for leaving....

EGOI:

It was a long time since we were not sailing long distances. It was the first time 
that we had to make more than 700NM and somehow I was a bit worried on how we will be able to manage this trip. Too much thinking....
But finally the most complicated thing was to decide when to leave a place because  for sailing we make a really good team.

First 48 hours were hard, we had to get use to night watches, not completely full sleeps, our cat (Bimbache) first sailing, wind changes...
But after that we started feeling better, enjoyed  sailing and the winds from NE, ENE, E (established Aliseos), tried different sailing options, played with front sails and booms, using mainsail boom like a front boom for keeping the Genoa open, dealed with strong winds from the back (more than 30Knots peaks)... 

But when we were 250NM from Sal, the PACTOR III send us a not really nice weather prediction.  Grib files showed ENE 25Knots constant (in the reality the meaning of this is much much more than 25usually). So we start sailing faster and we start planning how to arrive in daytime in Palmeira, Sal..
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At the end we arrived with daytime. We sailed hard, fast and safe,  but not everything was so perfect. We broke our engine bildge pump (already changed), didn’t see too much sun (clouds and wind with sand from Mauritania) and were not able to fish..... 

WE NEED TO IMPROVE FISHING!!!! 

Bimbache and we need that.