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On our third day at sea we broke one curse and acquired another.
Tuesday afternoon saw beautiful and relaxed spinnaker sailing with winds in the mid teens gradually easing into the evening. We made some good progress towards our waypoint near the Cape Verde Islands while gathering weather information about a rather nasty trough making its way across the Atlantic Ocean and offering up adverse winds as far as 15 degrees north latitude.
The sky was cloudless and the horizon clear-ideal conditions for the elusive green flash. As the sun dropped toward the horizon we played some Café del Mar music, opened a bottle of Spanish rose and the crew lined up on the starboard rail, cameras poised, waiting for an encore of last evening’s performance. Conditions couldn’t have been better, or could they. The sun dropped and there was nada, nothing after.
At least we had Merima’s excellent dinner of beef in gravy, chunky mashed potatoes, corn on the cob and sautéed baby peppers to console us.
By midnight, the wind was down to less than five knots and the sails would no longer stay full, slatting in the gently rolling seas. Charles’ attempt to “hot up” got Moonshadow moving along at 1-2 knots, but put us on a course to Senegal-on the opposite side of the Atlantic from St. Lucia. Sailing on the opposite board would have steered us into the teeth of an oncoming gale. Nobody wanted to say the “m” word but with no good options and heavy hearts, we doused the kite, sheeted in the main and started the motor. We have been motor sailing directly to our waypoint since 0025 this morning and the weather forecasts suggest we may be cursed with light air for the next 2-3 days.
Sea life typically encountered on a blue water passage is slowly beginning to appear. We’re starting to see the occasional sea bird or two. Charles spotted the first flying fish of the passage and on his watch was visited by a pod of dolphins who came by for a quick hello and a surf in our bow wake.
I spotted a pod of dolphins heading north this morning just before a spectacular red sunrise but they were not so sociable with humans.
Later in the morning we hooked and landed a 12 pound mahi-mahi (a.k.a. dolphin fish or dorado). This was the first mahi-mahi, let alone decent fish, we’ve caught on our line since the Indian Ocean, finally breaking the Mediterranean fishing curse we’ve carried for the last four summers. We’re all looking forward to a fresh (and free) seafood meal.
With the Yanmar doing most of the work, there’s not been much for the MooCrew to do but gaze out across the mill pond of a sea, catching an occasional glimpse of another ARC boat, read, sleep, eat or listen to the daily ARC radio schedule. Today’s “sked” was quite entertaining, with everyone in the ARC complaining about the weather (but nobody doing anything about it), a trivia quiz, sharing stories of cooling off with a swim in the ocean and techniques for success at fishing.
Some diehards have yet to turn on the engine, hoping to make the passage under wind power alone. For them it looks like it will be a very long and frustrating passage. I say “first one to the club drinks more.”
It is the skipper’s birthday today, so rumor has it that there may be a party on board tonight. Drop on by if you are in the neighborhood.

Our noon position today was 20 deg. 59 min. north by 20 deg. 39 min. west and we’ve set the ship’s clocks to the Cape Verde time zone at GMT -1 hour. Our noon to noon run was 182 miles.
Cheers, George, Merima, Charles, Graham and Kurt

Monday afternoon kept the crew busy trying to keep the boat moving. As the breeze went down into single digits, our first move was to change up to our #1 spinnaker, a huge 1.5 oz. MPS (multi-purpose spinnaker).
The wind became very shifty and then went well forward from northeast to southeast. We were hoping to stay in a nice patch of forecast breeze running about 100 miles off the coast of Africa so didn’t want to get too far west just yet. The crew was trying all sorts of tricks to keep the speed up; adjusting spinnaker pole height and angle, trying the addition of the staysail, playing with sheeting angles, hand steering up and down, etc. in attempt to wring every tenth of a knot of boat speed out of what breeze we had.
When we had it as good as it would get, we took a break for beers at sunset and were rewarded with a magnificent green flash as the sun dipped below the horizon. The “flash” in the green flash actually looked a bit off color on a horizon reddened by the West Sahara dust suspended in the atmosphere. No worries; a green flash is always cool and it was a first for a couple of the crew.
Our snacktician Merima has definitely gotten both her sea and cooking legs. She served up a beautiful smoked salmon and shrimp risotto accompanied by a salad of baby lettuce leaves and a nice bottle of dry white Spanish wine. Dinner was a just reward for a not-so-hard day of messing about on the boat.
The breeze picked up again later in the evening and backed to the northeast. We squared the spinnaker pole and started chewing up the juice. By 2200 hours we had 15, gusting 20 and were getting surfs in the mid to high 11 knot range. This breeze carried on through noon Tuesday so we were making good progress towards our waypoint northwest of the Cape Verde Islands, where we hope the wind Gods will bless us with some decent trade winds.
After spending most of yesterday afternoon under cloud cover, the skies totally cleared last night in time for the rise of a full moon. The moon dipped below the horizon to starboard after the sun rose to port. What a way to enjoy one’s morning coffee!
The ride has been reasonably comfortable so most of us are getting plenty of sleep and enjoying our off-watch time reading, sleeping, chatting and listening to music.
Interestingly, even though we’ve covered nearly 400 miles since the start line, we usually have anywhere from one to five ARC boats in sight at any given time. Are we all going the right way by diving south, or getting it wrong? The next few days will be telling as grib files forecast lighter winds ahead.
Our fishing curse from the Med has carried over to the Atlantic. We’ve had no luck fishing yet, and not seen one dolphin of flying fish. Maybe this should be called the Sahara Sea.
The skies today are clear and the sailing continues to be superb. We crossed the Tropic of Capricorn early this morning and the mercury is rising. The only thing we need is for the wind to continue.
Our noon position on Tuesday 23 November was 23 deg. 04 min. north by 18 deg. 23 min. west. Our day’s run from noon Monday was 188 nautical miles.
Cheers, George, Merima, Charles, Graham and Kurt

The farewell from Las Palmas yesterday morning was overwhelming and like nothing we’d ever experienced. Hundreds of well wishers lined the docks, quays and breakwaters of the marina and waved goodbye to the ARC fleet while a marching band circled the marina and women danced to music blaring from the fuel dock. With 240 yachts trying to get out to the start line on time, and local spectator boats heading out to watch the spectacle of the rally start, the congestion in the marina was like morning rush hour in Los Angeles.
As each entrant slowly departed the marina, the yacht name and country was announced over a p.a. system and was met with cheers and waving flags from the enthusiastic spectators. Each yacht was photographed as it departed the marina. We all felt like rock stars! Or were they politely saying “thanks for coming to the Canary Islands and spending tonnes of Euros, now go home!”
As much as we have all enjoyed our time in Las Palmas and the Canary Islands, we were itching to put to sea and face the challenges and adventures that only an offshore passage can serve up. That said, we we had the jitters that always accompany a long ocean passage mixed with a dose of adrenaline one gets from a tight quarters race start.
We motored out to the start area with an hour up our sleeves, or so we thought. Plenty of time to tune up the boat, make last minute adjustments, and work on our strategy for the start. Yes, of course, until we unfurled our #1 Genoa, sheeted it home and it ripped in the middle of a panel on the leech. A veteran of the first ARC 24 years ago, the “genny” was apparently well past its useful life. Perhaps it will enjoy an easy life of retirement as an awning over a beach bar on some Caribbean island.
The boys and girl made a very snappy headsail change while the stressed-out skipper dodged spectator boats and ARC entrants in the cruising class who were unfamiliar with that silly starboard-tack-has-right-of-way rule.
The next challenge was to figure out exactly where the start line was for the cruising division. That was sorted by the ten minute warning gun and of course, it was ten minutes sailing distance from us. Perrrrrfect timing!
Our strategy for the start was to sail on starboard tack to the pin end of the start line, which happened to be to windward. Just before the start line, we would gybe onto port, set the spinnaker for the photo crew and then sail away from the rest of the fleet who would be to leeward in a huge pocket of disturbed air.
As you might expect, there were a few others who had similar delusions of grandeur. We got it mostly right, but a cowboy from Sweden on a lovely new yacht, which shall remain unnamed (except possibly to his insurance company), confused the translation of words “rally” with “race” and decided to play hardball with us as we approached the start line with the pin to windward and his yacht to leeward. “Up you go!” he called, hoping we would do the lemming/cliff thing and sail across the start line outside the outer distance mark. Clearly he did not have a clue that he was messing with a crew of surly Stewart 34 sailors, who have long been accustomed to yacht racing being a full contact sport. Add to that the fact that another yacht was running the line from right to left ahead of us, which we would have t-boned if we had been wimpish enough to go up, and there were also at least three boats to windward of us who were fully intent on barging in between us and the mark. Let’s just say it was getting very, very cozy.
I reminded him that this was a friendly rally and he, finally seeing the big picture and thinking better of it, decided to bear away and sail his proper course. What he failed to consider is that a boat steers from the stern, so when he turned right within a few millimeters of us, his stern turned left, passing underneath our long boom, which was eased well out to leeward. No problem-except for his shiny stainless steel antenna farm which had a line of aerials that popped under the end of our boom like a playing card on the spokes of a bicycle wheel. Thanks God his big-ass stern anchor didn’t put a hole in our hull or I might have been pissed off. In any event he came out second in the ordeal.
We managed to squeeze through the start line about 10-15 seconds after the starting gun and got the kite up seconds later when the distance between the boats increased to something greater than the the thickness of cigarette paper. Every second counts on a 2700 mile passage!
Annie and Liam had a group of cruising friends aboard “Gone With the Wind” out on the water to watch the start and cheer us on. Shortly after we got going, they motored by blaring the song “Moonshadow” on the stereo, wishing us well, cheering us on and waving us goodbye. Special moments and special friends like this are a few of the many rewards of cruising.
The rest of the afternoon was spent working our way up to windward to insure we had clear air and clawing our way ahead of most of the smaller boats in the cruising divisions. The sailing conditions were brilliant with moderate breezes and slight seas. Yesterdays sailing felt like riding in a Cadillac on ice.
As predicted, the breeze increased significantly in the wind acceleration zone between the Gran Canaria and Fuerteventura Islands and we got a nice slingshot ride south and stayed on a patch of breeze along the coast of Africa. We’re dropping south toward the Cape Verde Islands in order to avoid a weather system that will bring head winds to the great circle route to St. Lucia and to (hopefully) pick up the trade winds at a good angle to take us the rest of the way across the Atlantic Ocean.
Sailing was absolutely beautiful throughout the evening with the kite up, bright moonlight, warm breezes and excellent visibility.
Our noon position on Monday 22 November was 25 deg. 31 min. north by 16 deg. 25 min. west. Our 23 hour run from the 1300 GMT start time was approximately 180 nm for an average speed over the ground of 7.8 knots.
“Moonshadow” and crew are all well and quickly adjusting to the rigors of life at sea. Yes, it time for a beer!

After years of dreaming, almost a year in planning, months of organization and weeks of final preparations, Moonshadow and crew are ready for the 25th annual running of the ARC (Atlantic Rally for Cruisers). The course will take us approximately 2700 nautical miles from Las Palmas in the Canary Islands of Spain across the North Atlantic Ocean to St. Lucia in the West Indies.
This rally is significant for Moonshadow as it is where she began her westabout circumnavigation with first owner Mike Gluck after she was launched in Finland in 1986. It is significant for us as it is the last long ocean leg of our circumnavigation that started in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida in November of 1994.
Moonshadow has attracted a lot of attention since she arrived in Las Palmas two weeks ago as she is the only yacht in the 2010 ARC fleet of 240 yachts that sailed in the 1986 inaugural ARC, and was the first monohull to finish the passage (to Barbados that year), making the crossing in less than 14 days.
Our first crew, Charles Scoones, joined us in Lanzarote nearly a month ago after sailing down from the UK on a Swan 66. Charles is a fellow Stewart 34 sailor and owns Princess, the second one launched and has enjoyed years of successful racing and cruising aboard her in Auckland waters. This transatlantic will be Charles second. His first was more years ago than he will admit to, when he was the tender age of 19 years old. His lifetime of racing and cruising on waters all over the world will be an appreciated asset to the passage.
Our other two crew, Kurt “the Mad Monk” Boyle and Graham “Gollum” Jones, both of whom have been previous passage Moo-Crew, flew half way around the planet from Auckland and joined us early this week.
Graham, also a regular crew on Stewart 34’s, joins us for his seventh passage aboard Moonshadow. His sailing, mechanical, plumbing and general seamanship skills more than make up for his sick and twisted sense of humor. His quick thinking and calm head when all is going pear-shaped is always appreciated aboard.
Kurt is back for his second passage on Moonshadow. Kurt is also a Stewart 34 owner and has raced and cruised his yacht Pelagian in Auckland and Hauraki Gulf waters for 9 years and is shaping up as a competitive racing sailor. As a pastor, we hope he can pull a few strings with the guy above to influence the wind Gods. Otherwise, he’s the only guy that can come close to Graham’s sick humor.
The transatlantic passage will be the second longest for George and the longest for Merima to date. As “snacktician,” Merima has spent countless hours provisioning and planning meals to keep the crew fueled up for the demanding rigors of passage. George will take to the keyboard daily to keep you up to date on our progress and life on board during passage
In the two weeks we’ve been in Las Palmas our livers have endured a punishing schedule of happy hours, cocktail parties, dinner parties and fiestas. The Canarians have been most welcoming and helpful, making sure that we not only have fun, but we have all the skills and supplies to make the fleet of yachts ready for the journey ahead. As I write, yet another parade is marching to “Anchors Aweigh” on the quay astern of us.
We will be competing in the “Invitation Cruising” division o the ARC, which is comprised of cruising yachts 18 meters (about 60 feet) and larger. The largest yacht in the division is an 80 foot Swan which should be a real weapon if the breeze gets up. Mooonshadow is the oldest in the division and carries the smallest sail plan, so it will be interesting to see how we match up the larger, more modern and powerful yachts we’ll be sailing against.
It’s almost time for Kurt to bless the crew and then toss off the lines and head out to the start line off the Las Palmas waterfront so we’ll sign off for today.