Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutesAfter 7 weeks in Queensway Marina Gibraltar while we got upgrades added to Dreams we’d started to feel like we were putting down roots. We’d become very familiar with the town and got to know a number of other people staying in the marina. So much so, our evenings were filled with happy hour gatherings…
Category: Sea
Adeus Portugal, Hola España
Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutesWe’ve arrived in Rota in the Andalusian region of Spain after a 22 hour passage from Lagos in Portugal. For most of the passage we were able to sail with a pleasant downwind breeze keeping us moving between 5 and 7 knots, a real treat after all of the motoring we have had to do. …
A Caruña, Spain
Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutesWe had a very civilized arrival in A Caruña. Nice calm seas which meant I could prepare the boat for marina docking with ease as opposed to the ungraceful crawling around the deck I’ve had to do on some other approaches. By the time we were secure at the dock we realized we were melting…
Bilbao
Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutesAside from being a good spot to take a break, we’d decided to stop at Bilbao in order to see the Guggenheim museum. Back in the 90’s Bilbao was struggling with increased poverty and social economic problems due to the decline in mining and industry. Then along came the Guggenheim’s who wanted a museum presence in…
Maiden Voyage
Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutesJust as dawn was breaking on February 1st we slipped away from the dock in La Rochelle and set sail for our first port of call, Bilbao in Northern Spain. The forecast was for light winds on our nose so we anticipated motoring this first leg, all 30 plus hours of it. We’d also been encouraged…
Adjusting to our new life aboard
Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutesWe’ve been living aboard Dreams of Infinity for a couple of weeks now and she already feels like home. The freezing cold temperatures are becoming a distant memory and we even had to dig out our sunglasses one day this week. We are so glad we gave ourselves this time in La Rochelle. In retrospect it…
The handover
Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutesThe day we’ve been dreaming of for years arrived and there were tears of joy. The only problem being that it was so cold, my tears almost froze as they fell. Our boat handover coincided with a particularly brutal cold snap that gripped La Rochelle for a week which meant rather than celebrating with champagne in…
A dream coming true
Estimated Reading Time: 2 minutesAfter more than a year of false starts in our quest to buy a Fountaine Pajot Astrea 42 sailing catamaran the opportunity to buy a new boat presented itself at the end of September. The original buyer ordered the boat 2 years ago and worked with the broker through the painstaking and time consuming process…
Blogging – finally jumping in (splash!)
Estimated Reading Time: < 1 minuteDuring the summer of 2016 I crewed on a 40ft sailboat in the Pacific Cup which is a 2,070 mile Pacific Ocean crossing from San Francisco to Hawaii. I’m not sure why Greg and Susan were so keen to have me aboard; it certainly wasn’t for my limited sailing skills. I suspect it was for…
Captain’s hour
Estimated Reading Time: < 1 minuteBecause of the way the watch schedule works, you relieve or are relieved by the same people on every watch so it’s actually very easy for 5 people to be together on a 40ft yacht for a couple of weeks and only see other crew members in passing, like ships that pass in the night…