Tuesday, we arrive in Horta after 13 days and 1861 NM at sea. 1374 Nm by sail and 487 by engine.

At the beginning we had wind well forward of the beam occasionally exceeding 20 knots and sometimes close to 30 kn , resulting in good progress, our hydrogenator gave good contribution to our batteries but after a day or two in service I noticed that it looked strange, shit it was falling apart. I brought it quickly aboard and concluded it was not reparable by me. I was really upset about this but after a while I calmed down.

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I thought I bought a high-quality product, but obviously not. Will be interesting to see how the manufacturer SWI-Tec handle this complaint. I mailed them and said I lost confidence in the product and wanted to be refunded, reply so fare, they want me to send it in for inspection. I have to wait and see. Anyhow I cannot recommend investing in a hydrogenator even if the quality is good, to limited use, only useful on very long passages. Need to be stored when not in use, I guess a wind generator gives much more value for money, it has the potential to generate Amps to your batteries any days the wind is blowing at around 14 knots or higher (number one is of course solar as much as can be fitted).

 

A sorrow seldom came alone, one afternoon I saw a tear in the head sail, not good at all, we furled it in so the tear was not exposed and sailed so during the night. The day after we took it down and unfurled the stay sail that had never worked well before. I had made some changes to the sheeting attachments but not really believed in it so never bothered to try it out, not until now, and it worked rather well, very important now when the head sail was down.

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Taking the sail down we also discover that the sail maker who fixed our sail in Bermuda had made a very bad job, as the sail was tear just close to the repair. So not only the new tear to be repaired

Katy working hard to repair with a piece of Sunbrella which we had aboard.

I’m looking whith great interest.

And Kerstin assist after Kat showed how to use the speedy stitcher. It was a full day work and we conclude this sail is beyond repai,r the cloth is in very bad conditions, so from now, only to be used in very light conditions.

The forecast was not showing any light conditions, on the contrary the weather threatening to be rather rough during the last part of our passage.

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Forecast threatening with gusts close to 50 knots and waves up to 15 feet with occasional waves at 25 feet, but we did not see anything close to that. We had a few squalls that had +40 kn wind, we were conservative and during nights with risk for squalls we had the main reefed to be on the safe side. Else nothing special.

The seas were sometimes a bit confused and to sleep during this conditions was not always easy.

Kerstin try to sleep on the salon sofa which is a rather good place with less motion than many other places aboard.

Our crew

Kate and Jerry just before we leave, they do not know what is waiting a mean Captain and an uncomfortable passage.

Jerry looks a bit tiered but all in all I think they enjoyed the trip, it was good for us to have someone to share the watches with.

At the end of the trip it become much colder especially at nights

Try to protect me with a cushion, but soon it is very cold

Still freezing

But finally, we saw Horta a grey and rainy day.

After almost exact 13 days we where outside the customs jetty, we had to wait for maybe 20 minutes but all in all the procedure was rather fast and we could

Tie up outside another boat.

Of course, a glass champaign to celebrate

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Then admire this harbour with historical and ironical status among sailors

Where many sailors have painted their bookmarks

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And beautifully overlooking the neighbouring island Pico with its volcanic mountain top

Of course, we need to visit

 

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Peters Café

Where third generation Peter (Jose) showing his exhibition of scrimshaw carvings