Our final offshore passage

Big Seas

It was early Sunday and we headed to the fuel dock to fill up.  We had finished the final provisioning and gone over all the safety measures with the crew.  It was a nice and sunny but windless day.  Everything started out fine but there continued to be no wind throughout the day so we were a motor boat.  As we were approaching the tip of Sao Miquel and evening the engine died.  We received an error message that it had gone into "safe mode".  Still within cell phone range I sent a quick text to Emanual.  He said it was a fuel issue so Michael and Bill changed the Raycor filter.  The engine started right back up and we had no more issues so we decided to carry on.  Sadly, we had to motor for a couple more days before picking up the Portuguese trade winds.  All that time the motor ran fine.  On day three we picked up the trades.  The Portuguese trade winds blow consistently from the north but in that area there is also a south setting current.  So... between the north wind and the current we were being pushed south even though we were trying to go east.  By now we had the engine off and the sails up.  The wind was blowing consistently over 20 knots but due to the north wind and the south current we had to sail a course of around 40 degrees in order to actually sail 90 degrees.  That meant we were beating into the wind the whole time and going pretty slow.  The seas were rough and we had quite a few waves breaking in the cockpit.  It wasn't unsafe - just a bit uncomfortable.  And our slow progress was frustrating!  

Bill all harnessed in

 As we got closer to the mainland we did start receiving visits from dolphins which was very nice!

When we got very close to the mainland we approached the shipping lanes.  The wind had died off again and we started the motor.  And it died.  Same message - "safe mode".  Now we found air in fuel line that we bled off and the engine started back up without a problem.  Everything was fine for a bit- then it died again.  We bled off more air... Now the last thing you want is to be crossing a shipping lane with very large cargo ships and oil tankers all around and your engine quits!  Not good at all!  We did manage to get across the lanes but now the engine was dying every fifteen minutes or so.  We needed to make it in and get a mechanic to check things out.  

Mainland Portugal

 To add insult to injury as we were coming up the coast of Portugal there were fishing nets and bouys everywhere.  Great - now we get to bleed the fuel line every few minutes to keep the motor running and dodge fishing nets!  Just when you think it can't get any worse you remember that we have actually reached the mainland.  It could be worse, we could be way offshore still with no wind and no engine.  So... now we just focused on getting to Lagos.  We decided that we would call for a tow yet again to get in to the marina and get a mechanic in the morning.  But when we called the marina several other sailors heard us on the radio and reached out to let us know that we would run aground if we did not wait until high tide.  Thank you fellow sailors because the marina definitely did not give us that information.  Fortunately, there was a designated anchorage right outside of the entrance canal in front of the beach.  So we did the sensible thing and dropped anchor.  Time to pop open the champagne - we did it, we crossed from one side of the Atlantic to the other.  What an amazing sense of accomplishment.