I´ve been in the company of some famous vessels recently.  On the passage south to Isla Graciosa from Lagos, the AIS reported that Mirabella V, the 70m carbon fibre sloop, the  world´s largest, built by Vosper Thorneycroft, was 15nm away at one point, though even with her tall mast she was beyond sight.

At Playa Francesca on the south coast of Isla Graciosa, I was anchored outside of an unusual, unpainted aluminium power boat, about 80ft. l.o.a., with a large wheelhouse featuring allround tinted glass panels.  U.S. flagged.  In the morning as I set about leaving the anchorage in a rising onshore wind, she also started to weigh.  The skipper indicated from the fly bridge, with a stabbing, outstretched arm, that he intended moving close alongside CHENG FENG to complete his weighing.  This was unnecessarily hazardous so I, quickly throwing out the fenders, asked if, perhaps, I should leave first.  He called out, ´Well come on!  I wanna get outta here!´  As I left for Las Palmas I saw him re-anchor a little further offshore but still on a dangerous lee shore.  When in Las Palmas, I discovered, to my surprise, that the powerboat was Wind Horse, operated by Steve and Linda Dashew the famous, multi-circumnavigating super cruisers, designers of many cruising yachts and authors of several books on aspects of cruising including a handbook on marine weather.  So, from his behaviour, I assume the conditions at Isla Graciosa that morning must have been extremely threatening.  Confidence in his Rocna pattern anchor cannot have been too great.

Conditions at Valle Gran Rey on the SW coast of La Gomera were excellent for the week I spent at anchor there, under the dramatic volcanic cliffs of alternating layers of lava and ash.  Much of the Canary Islands is favoured by Germans and nowhere more so than Valle Gran Rey.  It´s a very pleasant, peaceful village with pebble beaches and with various kinds of therapeutic activity available.  Some tourists go there to experience a sub-Guanche existence by living naked in the caves in the hillsides.  The Guanches actually had finely made clothes and shoes, fashioned only with fishbone needles.  There are two excellent museums, in Las Palmas and in Santa Cruz de Tenerife with exhibits of Guanche culture and religion and featuring startling displays of skulls and complete, very well preserved, mummified remains.  These people, discovered living in the Canary Islands by Spanish explorers, are thought to have originated in North Africa.

After another two weeks in the crowded, foul anchorage at Las Palmas I moved into the marina to complete preparations for the passage to Brazil.  A very active cold front passed through whilst still anchored and a sleepless night was passed with the wind from all directions, a steep, pitching chop from the SE and for several hours, lightning.  There were so many discharges that the sky appeared lit by a giant fluorescent tube with a bad starter.  Fortunately most of the action was cloud to cloud but I did see some ground strokes over the island.  The detectors at the airports across the islands measured 10,000 discharges that night.  Extraordinary.

For the passage to Salvador de Bahia, Brazil, being tired of my own culinary skills, I chose to embark three cooks who would also share duties as watch keepers and entertainers, all of them talented musicians.  There were two young Finns, both female and a young Brazilian,  returning home after three years on the road.

Conditions were not favourable for the passage south to Brazil until 22nd December when, with a high pressure cell to the west south west, we departed in a fresh NW breeze, giving a fast start down the Jandia channel between Gran Canaria and Lanzarote.  A blocking pattern in the North Atlantic in November and December had led to a series of depressions tracking south of it, producing SW´lies.  Initially, I was impressed with the fortitude of my new companions, as we careered along downwind in the 2-3m swell, but soon the Finns led the way in visits to the windward rail and had to be excused their first night watch.  Yes, the windward rail is messier but also a lot safer for the inexperienced.  The Brazilian also succumbed, but was able to struggle on through the night, alternating watches three hours on, three off, with me.  Then, as the wind fell light in the lee of Gran Canaria and equal swells from orthogonal directions produced a mogul field, the appalling motion prolonged the agony and we drifted south in a world of vomit and bile.  Eventually, on the 24th, a breeze filled in from the NE and we gathered way, heading towards Ilha Sal in the Cabo Verdes.  Research had led to a decision to avoid the islands and make direct for Salvador in Brazil, but it was prudent to allow for a stop at Ilha Sal with a new, mixed group on board, together for the first time at sea.  The wind increased and when we entered the tropics on the 26th we had a good 18/20kt NE´ly which held at 15 to 20kts from the NNE till the 2nd Jan.  Despite the slow start we were at the latitude of Ilha Sal after seven days.  Nobody was interested in stopping, so we charged on south towards the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ).

A few days into the voyage, with the boat settling into a routine, I was in the galley with two of the chattering crew when I became transfixed by new sounds from the bow.  A female voice.  High, clear tones ringing out on the wind.  Rising above but part of the wind, flowing with the waves, resonating with the sheer, glorious joy of existence.  Not words, but pure sounds, full of the deepest meaning, essential sounds welling up from the very core of her being.  She sat on the bowsprit facing ahead, riding meters above the ocean, surging on the swells, the sun dazzling, brilliant white on the surface.  I was pulled to the foredeck where I lay down.  I closed my eyes and surrendered to the song of life as it suffused me, entirely, irresistibly.  I was moved beyond all previous experience.  I was enraptured.  Bewitched.  We had on board a siren.

In the warmer latitudes, with a complement of four, saltwater deck showers became de rigeur, inspired by the Siren, who despite her youth and long, blonde hair, was very frugal with the freshwater supplies.  The first time she wore brief clothing.  For the second of her foredeck cleansing ceremonies, the Siren asked that the male contingent remain below decks to afford her privacy.  As CHENG FENG has a wheelhouse with large forward windows, I´m afraid this was not very effective.  A few days later, I bowed to relentless pressure and allowed a stop for swimming in the afternoon.  The Finns undressed and sat nervously on the foredeck, clutching their knees to their chests.  Once sails were squared away and a safety line streamed, we all took to the warm, blue  water.  The girls repeatedly jumped and dived into their own reflections, drawn by the rays of sunlight glinting down into the blue depths, laughing and screaming with the childlike excitement of it.  At the end of this first session in their birthday suits, the Siren declared, ´From now on we don´t wear clothes.  So get used to it!´  I said I didn´t know what took them so long.  Actually, the declaration was not followed religiously, but often and of course, during the manic deck showers we took in the heavy rain of the doldrums region.  When no freshwater rinse was forthcoming, the girls used wheat germ oil on their skin to alleviate the drying effects of the salt.

This became a regular p.m. interlude until the fourth day, when the girls emerged from an extra long ocean bathe, screaming in unison, in Finnish.  Once on deck, they explained their screams this time, were those of pain from some jellyfish stings, which raised small red welts on their skin.  I offered a bottle of Vinagre de Jerez as first aid and this relieved the burning sensation quickly.  We all noticed the surface to be full of eddies of very warm water mixing with cooler.  The next day we motored for an hour to reach the equator in time for a daylight swim.  I checked with a mask for jellyfish and found two small pink ones with short tentacles, drifting by and also saw some clear tape-formed organisms about 20cm long, which may have been the stingers.  Still, three of us enjoyed a swim.  Later in the passage we saw Portuguese Men of War too, though they were rare.

Returning to the weather, on the 1st Jan we suffered a minor invasion of small, brown flying insects similar to cockroaches, but easy to catch and liberate, presumably blown hundreds of miles from the west of Africa.  By the 2nd Jan, the usual white haze from the desert had thickened with moisture, bringing down the visibility.  When I woke, at 0900, I instinctively  checked the AIS and found the Tianshunhai, a fully laden VLCC, head on at 5nm range.  It was not visible.  We called on vhf to check they were aware of the imminent collision, which they didn´t appear to be.  Though we confirmed our status as a sailing vessel, they still enquired as to our intention and finally altered to starboard but passed only 0.25nm down our port (windward) side.  There were many other ships seen during the passage and several were called to ease the tension.  In the early hours of the 3rd, at about N06o 30´ we saw the first lightning, which was to remain a feature of the nights till the 7th Jan.  On the night of the 3rd/4th the flashes were frequent, though the sky was starlit, the quiet discharges from within small cumulus clouds.  Squalls with heavy rain started to appear, blocking out the stars at night and giving large radar returns.  The background trade wind now was down to 10/12 kts.  A school of small tuna surrounded the boat on the 4th, jumping out like dolphin and in the evening, after a shower gave relief from the heat and sluiced off the salt from swimming, it fell calm, so the engine was started.  The Siren seized her first chance to hand steer a boat, in the dark, with flashes of lightning all around, still wet from the rain and dressed modestly in her panties.  She suddenly asked, tangentially, what my life´s most pleasant surprise had been.  All I could think of to say was, ´This!`  I soon received a most unpleasant surprise when a sea discharge was observed to the west.  I swiftly isolated all electronic systems, unplugged antennas, turned off the engine and cut the batteries.  We drifted, ´black ship´, for 90 minutes, avoiding metal objects as far as possible as the storm passed overhead, reaching its peak intensity when right above us.  We were then able to continue, but this tiring night was spent dodging a gang of thunderous squalls.  By morning we were surrounded by heavy rain showers, one of which gave the entire crew a thorough douching.  The following evening we were up on deck again, dancing in the rain and the party mood continued into the galley, where the cooks had baked gourmet bread and a pan of dark chocolate cookie, practising our samba moves to the music.  Life can be great fun down in the doldrums, in the right company.  We planned an equator party too,  which almost didn´t happen when the Siren took on a depression, but we were fortunately able to ease her mood and later, after sunset, some quite unique and spectacular dance moves were performed around the cockpit and aft deck, one of the ship´s company wearing the split halves of a coconut shell and the Siren´s skirt.  Then we had dinner in the wheelhouse, where, being rather warm, the declaration was observed.

Food quality on CHENG FENG rose to a completely new level during this passage.  The three cooks excelled themselves with every meal, bar one bizarre event involving spaghetti and canned vegetables, quickly mastering the art of cooking at sea.  All contributed but once again, the Siren, who brought along her own bag of herbs and spices as well as an espresso pot, revealed her remarkable range of talents, in the galley.  Even the hot drinks she prepared were truly delicious, with secret ingredients like cardamom, broken cocoa beans and fresh vanilla pod in her coffees

We caught a lot of fish using octopus skirt lures in various colours on two rods at the stern.  There were skipjack tunas, including a very fat one of about 3kg, many small dorados, sometimes two at once and near the equator, we hooked two wahoo together and boated one of about 15kg.  Though we saw great flights of flying fish deep in the tropics, we found just two of eating size on the decks, though one ricocheted off the forehead of one of the girls on night watch.  All of this fresh fish protein was turned into mouthwatering dishes and here I contributed, in a very minor way, by slicing up some chilled raw meat into sashimi, though the wasabi was, as usual, lacking that sinus clearing astringency.  The Brazilian had experience baking bread for large groups and used his knowledge to the full, producing nutritious, staple food which never lasted long and had us all begging for more.  I learned the benefit of a rye flour mix which doesn´t require kneeding, saving much time and effort.  With chopped dates and walnuts and hazelnuts, with garlic and figs and raisins and topped with toasted sunflower and sesame seeds you can imagine the flavours and aromas coming out of the CHENG FENG ocean bakery.

Only the catching and processing of the fish was increasingly traumatic for some, particularly the killing.  Who can be unaffected by the sadness of the hunter and this was exaggerated by the presence of sensitive people who wailed at the sight of simple, poikilothermic food being clubbed with winch handles and stabbed with knives, read poems to the dead fish and quietly felt the last beats of the heart through their fingertips.  I aim to despatch fish instantly with a knife through the brain and then bleed them by making the special cuts and trailing them astern for a few minutes, whilst the heart is still beating, which removes some of the lactic acid from the struggle and blood and helps maintain the quality of the flesh in cold storage.

Back to the weather again, the engine was used for 40 hours continuously from about 5 degrees north down to about 1 degree.  It was rarely truly calm, but I wanted to get clear of the lightning threat as soon as possible.  On the 7th we motored again after sailing for 8 hours, till a patch of showers passed.  Then around N000 30´, the SE trades appeared at 10kts with a swell from ESE, though they often had an identity crisis and blew from north of east and even NNE in the days ahead.  In the early hours of the 9,th near 2 degrees south, a group of birds turned up, two of them perching on the rail looking exhausted, but another lay dead already in the starboard scuppers.  Strangely, they appeared to be seabirds, grey with white crests, pointed beaks, like large terns in form.  When the two live birds left us, before dawn, the wind increased in squalls and progress was good under sail, though attention to trim was continuous.  One of the birds returned the next night and almost perched on the Siren´s proffered arm, brushing it lightly with it´s feet.  Finally, on the 10th, at about 4 degrees south, we were free of the overcast conditions at last and sailing in the blue once more with a wind from E or EbS at 10-18kts till the 15th Jan.  The water closer to the Brazilian coast was full of plankton and one afternoon I remember diving through a surface covered with a film of red particles, the upper layer being a soup of life, with jellyfish of different species and even small insects buzzing over the water, fifty miles offshore.  When swimming I saw a school of small fish under the boat, apparently riding along with us.  A pod of dolphin arrived amongst all this other life and played at the bow for a long time.  I noticed they seemed to breathe less than other dolphins which had visited us, though they were no less active.  The Finns pleaded with me to stop so they could swim with the dolphins, but of course, the moment we did stop, they left, a drifting yacht being of no interest whatsoever.  It was a beautiful, clear afternoon though and light from the brilliant, tropical star overhead made the golden, flowing tresses and softly gilded skin of the young mermaids glisten, as they floated in turquoise.

There were some large bioluminescent life forms in this area too, some apparently a metre across as they flashed and not only in the wake, but all around the boat including ahead of the bow.
 
On the second to last day the wind dropped in a patch of showers and we ran the engine again to maintain progress.  The current was now pushing south at up to 1.5kts.  By the evening we were sailing again, in clear air and had to slow down to avoid arriving before sunrise.  We had seen the glow from coastal towns the previous night and now the lights of Itapuã and Salvador came up over the horizon.  We motored into the port in a calm and tried to find a berth in the Terminal Nautico but were turned away.  There was insufficient swinging room to anchor in the harbour and there was general mayhem, it being a Sunday morning, with many people heading out to Ilha Itaparica and other parts of the Baia de Todos os Santos for the day, on ferries, so we made for the quiet Yacht Clube da Bahia moorings.

Here we sit off the club, which is a large, upmarket social club with a bit of sailing interest.  They have a 50m swimming pool, gym and sauna, restaurants and bars and we are very welcome to stay without charge for three nights.  It´s common practice for the Brazilian and Argentinean clubs to offer free stays to visitors but few are this luxurious.  A good place to wind down after another successful crossing and make plans for the way south to Rio de Janeiro.

Salvador to Ilheus

We stayed 10 nights on a courtesy mooring at the Yacht Clube da Bahia, in Salvador whilst acclimatising.  The Brazilian hospitality continued when I filled the water tanks with filtered,  potable water at the Bahia Marina and wasn´t charged.  Then the Finns left and soon after, the Brazilian crew went home.  He had been encouraged by his father to stay on and enjoy some of the passage south, but I think his mother won.

There´s a good anchorage at the north of Ilha Itaparica, across the bay, which I used for the first stop, together with 20 other boats, mostly French.  I was invited for coffee twice on Spraydust, owned by the Morgans, authors of the RCC Pilotage Foundation South Atlantic Circuit and the companion Havens and Anchorages, which was enjoyable and informative.  Itaparica is a popular beach holiday island and a very relaxed, safe place, in complete contrast to the city of Salvador, only 10 miles away.  Though busy at weekends with people escaping the city, during the week it´s a sea of tranquility with fishermen working from dugout canoes, some with sails. 

The Saturday of my visit, there was a festa celebrating the day of the year when slaves were allowed off the plantations, but only to clean streets and churches!  Brazil was the last country to abolish slavery, about 100 years ago.  Great carnaval music trucks turned up, playing music at earthquaking volume and though there was a huge amount of alcohol being consumed by the young crowd, it was a happy, pacific affair.  On Sunday afternoon there was a jam session in the square from a group of drummers and vocalists which was very mellow and well patronised by the weekend crowd, though tainted, to my view, by the small, ridiculous, cavorting group of transvestites/transsexuals, desperate for attention.

I topped up on water at the small marina and then sailed over to anchor north of the Bahia Marina, to spilt the passage to Morro de São Paulo, an unmarked, tidal river entrance which I wanted to make in daylight.  The in-mast mainsail jammed whilst unfurling, for the second time in four years, requiring a climb to the second spreader to sort out.  About 35 miles south of Salvador, Morro is a beautiful peninsular with sandy beaches, a former haven for pirates and now completely turned over to tourism, many from Israel, of all places.  There`s a R$10 fine just for entering the village though this is a multiple entry ticket.  I chose to anchor off the village of Gamboa at the first bend in the river,  which required crossing a section of the chart marked, ´não hidrografada´, unsurveyed.  Using the two cruising guides, eyeball navigation and the depth sounder we managed to avoid the reefs and sandbanks, none of which are marked.  There are no navigation marks of any kind upriver of the lighthouse at Morro.  The tropical scenery was worth the tension of the entry though and five enjoyable days were passed there.  The powdery, white sand beach at Gamboa can be walked to Morro at low tide, past the crumbling, coloured cliffs and the old, defunct Iate Clube, but it is more of a deep wade back at high tide.  Morro has numerous nightclubs, another alternative if the tides don´t work out.  The ones featuring foam parties could double as bath houses.  There are ferry boats, scores of them, plying the river between the various villages, but I was advised not to use the land route, due to threat of robbery.  The main problem I found was the number of flies which spoiled the enjoyment of meals ashore during the day and filled the boat if I cooked there, before sunset.

For the next passage, to Camamu, another tidal, unmarked, river entrance with rocks and reefs to avoid, I prepared by anchoring at the Morro Iate Clube for a few hours, so as to be past the worrying section of that river before sunset and be at the entrance of Camamu at low water, hoping to see the reefs breaking.  Leaving at midnight, the first hazard to avoid was a gas production platform.  A patch of showers disturbed the wind after sunrise but we managed to make the Camamu bar on LW, but the reefs did not show at all and the river was too coloured to discern the depths.  Lateral buoyage has been removed from this entry so navigation is down to GPS waypoints and blind faith in that and the Brazilian chart.  Faith led the way and we anchored off Ilha Campinho.  Both cruising guides speak of this large bay, with many islands being populated by most generous people, happy in their simple existence, fishing and growing their own food and with a culture of giving.  Exploring the shore of Campinho, I found a line of very upmarket pousadas with names like Vila Sansara and Vida Viva Eco Life and large private houses, each with their own boat pier.  I moved to a very calm anchorage between two islands off the village of Sapinho.  Here the people were friendly and fishing for crabs, prawns and fish and collecting mangrove oysters were the main activiites, not for subsistence though, but to feed the many tourists visiting in boats daily from the town of Camamu.  Give they did, but only in exchange for Reais.  The houses were simple block walls and corrugated roofs but many had giant parabolic antennas for satellite TV reception. 

The morning´s first coffee, one day, was interrupted when two young men rattled the anchor chain whilst diving for fish with Hawaiian slings (a harpoon launched by hand from a stretched length of surgical rubber).  Their dugout was steadily filling with their catch, despite the primitive technique.  We exchanged greetings and they fished on, leaving me slightly nervous of an errant harpoon through the hull.

I took a ferry to Camamu up winding, shallow, mangrove lined channels to visit the Saturday market.  The small town of Camamu is one of Brazil´s oldest, previously a sugar exporting port.  I stocked up on fruit and vegetables.  I was surprised to see the meat, some of it sun dried and all hanging in the open, was not swarming with flies, though the anchorages were plagued like the one at Gamboa.  Turkey vultures lurked on the roof of the meat section, waiting for scraps.  This is the Costa do Dendê after the ubiquitous palm oil used in the local cooking.  Blocks of dendê were on sale at the market.  The food of the region is heavily influenced by the African population, heavy and often deep fried but the seafood from these rich waters can be very good.  Cocada, a sweet of various recipes, based on coconut and sugar is also a Bahian speciality sold on the roadside.

Replenished, we motored between the invisible rocks again and sailed on to Ilheus, making port before sunrise, after 64nm.  The Brazil Current was flowing down the coast at 1-2 knots but we needed the cruising chute to keep speed up.  This is a port and a simple entry, though a shallow anchorage off the friendly Yacht Club Ilheus and open to the swell.  The fishing harbour, which formerly gave good protection has been closed for some years.  This town was based on cocoa production but has switched to manufacturing of cars and computer equipment.  Cruise ships call regularly.  The town has some fine buildings such as the Palacio de Paranaguá and the Cathedral de São Sebastião, alluding to its former glory.  The security guard at the club invited me to his home one evening, where I met most of his immediate family.  Though a simple dwelling, I noticed they were replete with large screen TVs and internet.  We passed fishermen selling large, fresh fish off the seawall on the way and were entertained by a drum group, practising for the forthcoming carnaval.  Walking back to the club, escorted by the guard thankfully, we were propositioned by three transvestite prostitutes.  There´s a lot of it about, apparently.

Today the anchorage is filling with yachts completing a race from Salvador so we had to move to regain safe swinging room.  I saw one boat lay its cable before the anchor, before dragging it to the position it felt happy with.

The passage from Ilheus, Bahia to Vitoria in the small state of Espirito Santo, involved some varied sailing, much of it in perfect conditions, but not nearly enough sleep.  We started with the engine for five hours, then were close hauled on port for a while, in light winds, to gain some offing from the fishing fleets near the coast.  As they tend to concentrate in soundings less than 50m this involved avoiding the bank 60nm off the town of Belmonte and also the Abrolhos Archipelago the reefs of which extend out more than 100nm.  Wind and current pushed us over the outer Belmonte bank but without incident.  The wind then backed slowly to the north, on our port quarter, then on the stern.  I chose a route through the outer channel in the Abrolhos Arch., about 60nm offshore.  There was a lot of shipping traffic, north and south and several cruiseships seen plying between the ports of Brazil and they also used this channel.  However, they are easily avoided with AIS and radar.  It´s the small fishing vessels which show just one bright white light and are difficult to resolve with radar in any sea or rain, which leave me nervous.

I caught, or rather hooked, three big fish, all dorados, I think.  The last certainly was as, with a larger hook on the octopus lure, I was able to fight her to the boat after a long battle, but she still escaped before I could get a gaff into her.  Dorados can easily be sexed as the males have a pronounced upper head shape.  I also passed through great, thick drifts of tiny yellow organisms, matching Melville´s description ´brit´ in Moby Dick, floating on the surface.  I caught some in a bucket.  They were like the hairs left in the sink after a shave, but yellow.  I think they may be the larvae of a crustacean.  There is a migration of Right Whales between the coast of Brazil and South Georgia and the Abrolhos Arch. is a gathering point in August and September. 
 
Beyond the Abrolhos Arch. the course put the still backing wind on the starboard quarter until it fell light and shifted to the south so we were close hauled on starboard, approaching Vitoria.  A thunderstorm interrupted progress early the last morning and shipping traffic held us outside the port until near midnight on the third day.  The Baia de Espirito Santo houses the old port of Vitoria and the relatively new one of Tubarão, one of the largest ore handling ports in the world.  I counted 33 ships anchored off the bay, upto 14nm offshore.  I find AIS very useful in such situations as I could watch the pilot boats and tugs attending to ship manoevres, both in and out, even behind the breakwater, when still well off the port.  Here, the pilot boats use the Iate Clube as their base so I could also observe their route past the islands, shoals and the shallow bar deep inside the bay and have greater confidence in the chart.  I´m always very tentative entering new harbours, knowing that updates to charts can take many years to occur.  I remember once, working to a brand new Malaysian chart, corrected by the navy on purchase, sailing close to an area in Singapore marked as ´Works in Progress´, but with charted depths of 25m and found myself approaching a sandbank 3m above the surface, part of a major land reclamation project!  There are also new wrecks, lost cargoes and other such hazards to worry about.

Unfortunately, both of the cruising guides I´m working with carry information which is in need of updating and one (Brazil Cruising Guide by Michel Balette (IMRAY)) was only published in English in April last year.  Of course I´m in the progress of doing so.  I meet many cruising yachtsmen who complain about the need for updating of pilot books and guides, but then move on to another area and do nothing to help those who follow in their wake.

However, apart from the major light on the Ponta da Santa Luzia lighthouse not working, one buoy which had different light characteristics to that published (south cardinal not a starboard hand mark) and the discovery of a large extension to the Iate Clube marina (completed in July 2008, 20 months before publication of the Balette book), night pilotage went very well.  The berthing is bow or stern-to in the marina and not very secure, so I chose to anchor off in good holding.

I´m most impressed by Vitoria.  It´s obviously part of the rising economy of Brazil and the city planners have not been overwhelmed by the developers.  Whilst the old part of the city is a bit dilapidated, the Iate Clube is in a small bay in a very upmarket area with pleasant city beaches, tennis courts and jogging tracks adjacent.  The Ilha da Frade, to the SE, is developed with attractive houses and the main island of Vitoria with new apartment blocks and hotels.  Typical of such areas, there are fitness centres and gyms on every block and if that doesn´t work, here there are a plethora of plastic surgeons busily improving the appearance of the wealthy.

The head of the bay holds another long beach, Praia Camburi, the road adjacent lined with new, apparently well constructed apartment blocks, a good road and a cycle track.  Behind this is a residential area, with small parks and backed by the state university.  In this area, I found the first european standard supermarket I´ve seen in Brazil and prices are no higher than the others, but they clearly have a more discerning clientele.

We are at the threshold of the carnaval weekend here so there may be some lively photos to follow.

As it turned out, carnaval in Vitoria seems to be no more than a long weekend.  There were processions in the old part of town, I think, but as it rained continuously over the carnaval weekend I stayed close to the yacht club.

The weather was inclement in Vitoria most of the time, due to a front line extending up from the southeast and low pressure coming off the continent just to the south.  When I saw a weakening in the weeklong southerly airflow, I departed, bound for Buzios.  I was able to sail the first five hours to gain some offing to clear the fishing fleets on the coast but then motored the rest of the passage. 

Despite motoring, I wrote four pages of log for the 20 hour run, as we passed between the Banco de São Tomé and the offshore oil/gas field.  There was a lot of ship traffic in and out of the field and heavy through traffic, using the same narrow route.  Off Cabo São Tomé the weather was squally and visibility was often down to 0.25 nm in the showers.

The through traffic organised itself in two lanes until one rogue heading SW, the M/V Ocean Royal, decided to break the ranks.  She was called by a male voice on the Nordic Rio, head on, NE bound, but did not reply to three vhf calls.  A female voice on Nordic Rio then called Ocean Royal using the Nordic Rio radio callsign, in phonetic.  A Chinese accent on Ocean Royal then responded, asking for the name of the station calling them.  They were about 7nm apart at this stage, closing at 25 knots.  Nordic Royal repeated their callsign several times and Ocean Royal, in a voice rising in anxiety, demanded, ´Ship name!  Ship name! SHIP NAME!´  Nordic Rio did not reply again, but took her own avoiding action and the ships passed starboard to starboard.  This was all of great interest to me as the Ocean Royal now had her bows lined up on the starboard quarter of CHENG FENG.  At four miles, the Ocean Royal called us as, ´The sailing yacht on my port bow´, advised us of her approach and instructed us to, ´Keep clear.´  `But you are overtaking!´ I thought.  Not wishing to add to the confusion, I replied in acknowledgement and altered course 20 degrees to increase the distance she would pass.   When she did, I could see very little paint left on the hull of the Ocean Royal, clearly not the best kept ship afloat.

I was very glad to anchor in flat water off the beach at Buzios in the early hours and turn in,  after a tiring run.

Buzios is an attractive peninsular with several anchorages and beaches.  Formerly a fishing village, it´s popularity grew after Brigitte Bardot began to stay there with a Brazilian boyfriend.  Now it´s completely developed as a tourist destination and being fairly close to Rio de Janeiro, busy on the weekends.  Several cruiseships anchored in the bay during my few days there, ferrying their passengers ashore.  It does have a French Riviera feel about it, with designer boutiques, bars and cafes and tree lined streets.  There are several sculptures on the Orla Bardot waterfront including Trés Pescadores, a realist work by a female artist which sits in the tide and a bronze of the woman herself, in her younger days.  I used a mooring off the Iate Club Armação de Buzios but had to patronize the restaurant to the tune of R$25 per day for the privilege.  This was the first place I visited in Brazil where the water was fairly clear, encouraging a thorough session on the hull barnacles which, I found, had run amok.

After Buzios, I motored overnight in light wind but an ocean swell to Charitas, which is in the Baia de Guanabara and opposite the rather more famous place of Rio de Janeiro.  With a favourable current I made better time than I had planned and entered the bay through the 0.5nm entrance in the dark, anchoring in the pre-dawn off the Clube Naval Charitas.  Apart from the swell and some ship traffic to avoid near the port,  it had been a pleasant, starlit passage, albeit under engine.  From the east, the city is hidden behind the coastal islands and hills and appears dark, but the statue of Christ the Redeemer was very bright and appeared to be floating in the clouds around the Corcovado, but his outstretched arms didn´t help with navigation.

Charitas is a small, residential suburb, served by fast ferries to Rio.  The Clube charges visiting boats, even for anchoring but provided you don´t stay long, it´s a fairly cheap place to go and they have a good pool.  I visited Rio to check in and out with the authorities.  It manages to maintain a profile as one of the world´s great destinations, but for me it´s best viewed from the air.  At street level it´s quite a dirty, rundown place.

The motor yacht Octopus was anchored off, obviously there for the carnaval.  At 126m, with diesel electric propulsion and with hangar space for a gaggle of helicopters and a diving submersible, she´s a go anywhere, fun boat for the adventurous billionaire.  Owned by Paul Allen of Microsoft.

Then it was on to the best cruising ground in Brazil, the Baia de Ilha Grande, another long overnight motor to the west.  Once through the anchored ships to the SE of the island we made the first anchorage in the pre-dawn again, settling in for some sleep, before exploring the island.  This large bay has hundreds of islands and anchorages and is generally blessed with light winds.  We had two days of sunshine at the island enjoying calm anchorages and healthy walks through the forests, before the rain and overcast conditions returned for another week.

Now in Angra dos Reis, having extended my immigration visa and the temporary importation paperwork for the boat, I´m preparing to head back north towards the Caribbean, something which gets easier as the year progresses with more southerly winds and a reduction in the strength of the Brazil Current.

Bureaucracy

Brazil still has a heavy bureaucratic burden for the cruising yachtsman.  The cruising guides recommend, at each port, a visit to the Policia Federal, the Capitania dos Portos (a navy department) and the Receita Federal (Alfândega) at the first and last port.  The offices are often located some distance apart and operate different opening times.  The latest IMRAY guide (by Michel Balette) also states a visit must be paid to the Department of Health at each port.  Brazil thus has a very tight control over its coastal border and over the movement of small vessels.  Or does it?

We entered Brazil at Salvador, discovering that the first stage, Policia Federal, for immigration, is not open at the weekend.  We all walked there from the yacht club, through Brazil, to find this out.  The following day, I and the talkative Brazilian crew I had, entered the Policia Federal offices and the feisty, female duty officer firmly indicated a seat for me and then physically ejected the Brazilian, still talking and closed the door on him.  Perhaps she didn´t appreciate his wearing shorts in a public office, though none of the Policia Federal officers I saw wore uniform.  The two Finnish crew waited outside and the foreign passports were processed and stamped for the day after we arrived, with only myself in the office.  I then cleared the boat with the Receita Federal receiving a three month temporary importation in line with the immigration stamp.  We visited the Department of Health at the port but were met only with blank expressions and were told that yachts are not processed by them in Salvador.  At the Marinha do Brasil, I stepped over a 15cm high fence into the grounds to avoid a long walk in the hot sun to the entrance road and was met promptly with a grunt from a guard carrying a semi-automatic rifle.  I carefully retraced my step back over the fence onto the pavement.  I queued at the gatehouse of the Marinha do Brasil for an entry permit.  Here my ID and dresscode were checked and I finally proceeded to the Capitania.  Inside I was assisted to find the correct desk, out of fifteen, by a French delivery skipper in his beachwear and flip flops complaining that he had been waiting for an hour and saying they definitely didn´t like his shorts.  A uniformed naval ´suboficial´ then processed our entries, which was an exercise in photocopying the other documents thus far generated and the completion of a Declaration of Port Entry/Departure of Foreign Boat of Sport and/or Recreation including a cruise route plan.  At each port the Capitania makes an entry and an exit comment and applies a stamp.

It´s basically an honesty system, though the Yacht Club da Bahia had faxed the Capitania to inform them we were berthed there.  There was no customs inspection.  I´ve recently heard from the Brazilian that the Policia Federal failed to stamp his passport (perhaps because it was out of date) and he now has problems proving that he is in Brazil!

Before leaving Salvador I had to revisit both the Policia Federal and the Capitania for an exit pass for the boat.  The Capitania told me I didn´t have to check in at the next port, Morro de Sao Paulo or at Camamu because they don´t have offices there.  The Brazilian control system is designed on the colander principle.

At Ilheus, a ship port, I asked at the Iate Clube about checking in with the Capitania and was told this was not necessary in Ilheus, ´..maybe in other places, it is, not here.´

At the Iate Clube Espirito Santo in Vitoria, Espirto Santo state, the club office photocopied everything and I thought they would send copies to the authorities, but it turned out they didn´t.  So I didn´t check in there either.  I was later told that yachts should clear in and out, but in practice this doesn´t happen.

Same story at the Iate Clube Armacao de Buzios, in Rio de Janeiro state, but without the photocopying.

Next stop was the Clube Naval Charitas who gave me instructions to visit the authorities in Rio de Janeiro across the bay.  The Policia Federal first, to enter the boat to Rio de Janeiro state, then the Capitania to enter the boat with them.  By now, the time was drawing near for either trying for an extension to the immigration and temporary importation stamps or a rapid departure south to Uruguay.  The latter became more unpalatable the more I studied the weather conditions on that route and in Uruguay itself.  So I hoped I could get extensions to allow time to sail north up the coast of Brazil and out to the Caribbean.  I´d been told that the authorities at Angra dos Reis, my planned next stop, were close together, English speaking and friendly so decided to apply for the extensions there.  Preoccupied with vaguely applied procedures and with a rare tropical storm, Arani off Cabo Frio, I regretfully left Charitas without checking out of Rio.  My next port was in the same state.  I just forgot.

On the way to Angra dos Reis, I spent 3 nights anchored off Ilha Grande in two of the many bays, which didn´t require any checking in or out.

In Angra, I applied for and was granted the 3 month extension to my immigration stamp and the temporary importation on the boat.  All routine, friendly and done the same day.  However, an unusually vigilant uniform at the Capitania doe Portos noticed I had not checked out of Rio and said I must return to Rio and check out with them, before checking out of Angra.  So, I spent the following day on the bus to and from Rio, a 5 hour round trip.

In Rio, the Policia Federal were extremely understanding and helpful and simply gave me a back dated exit pass for the 16th, the day I left.  Armed with this proof that I had checked out with the Policia, per procedure, I tried the Capitania.  There I waited 90 minutes for a uniform to appear from the back office with the Declaration of Port Entry/Departure duly completed and stamped.  But, for the 23rd, the day of my visit.  This would not compute back in Angra where I checked in on the 22nd, so I pointed out my error in not checking out earlier, on the 16th and asked that the paperwork be dated the 16th.  The uniform exploded before my eyes.  He heavily voided his exit stamp on the Declaration and told me to bring the boat back to Rio (a 80nm passage), enter normally and then he would complete the exit procedure!  I told him that in Angra, they insisted I must check out of Rio before I could leave Angra.  He consulted a senior uniform who agreed that the problem was for Angra to resolve.  Just then, someone in an engineer´s boiler suit came by and he was consulted and he definitely was the most clued up of all of them.  However, he immediately suggested checking my customs paperwork which I thought was going to lead to an expensive afternoon.  They all disappeared into the back office and 10 minutes later the original uniform reappeared.  He was still seething and he slapped the Declaration down on the counter and read out the true story of my error he´d written on it, but with a stamp and signature.  I hoped this would be enough in Angra, thanked him insincerely and left.

When I checked out with the Capitania in Angra, a different man did the photocopying and nothing was said,  except by me when the clot left my passport in the photocopier.  At the Policia Federal we noticed I had forgotten to check-in the boat, so preoccupied had I been with getting the immigration extension.  But the officer didn´t make an issue of it.

The only other port I visited was Cabadelo in the NE which I used to split the long passage to the Caribbean.  There, though I was checking out of the country as well as the state, all went well, especially so at the Capitania on checking out, as the photocopier had burnt out, leaving them with little to do.  Before that, at the Policia Federal, I asked how to get to Cabadelo town to find the Capitania dos Portos.  I was advised to flag down an ´independent´ car when it flashed it´s headlights.  These are illegal, unlicensed taxis and common around João Pessoa and Cabadelo.  I thought it amusing that the Policia Federal recommended them to tourists but then, that was Brazil.

With such relaxed attitudes and such a system, it´s not surprising that cruising yachts work around it.  I met people who said they had been in the country for several years, occasionally checking out of Brazil, anchoring in a quiet spot for a while, then suddenly reappearing, ´Fresh back from French Guyana´.

So, Brazil, your system doesn´t work.  It certainly provides work for photocopiers and photocopier repair technicians but it doesn´t control small foreign vessels unless they want to be controlled.  The navy, particularly, could be spending their time policing the local small vessels and correcting their navigation lights to the international regulations.  Most motor cruisers I saw used white strobes in lieu of masthead lights and I never saw anything but a white, all round light on a Brazilian fishing vessel.  Given the bad visibility on the coasts of Brazil, an insistence on the use of radar reflectors would also be useful.

Angra dos Reis to Cabadelo

Whilst berthed at the Clube Naval Charitas opposite Rio de Janeiro in the Baia de Guanabara,  chatting to a Brazilian yachtsman I became aware of an unusual weather event off Cabo Frio, 60nm to the east.  Though I had checked the output of the U.S. GFS model that morning for the coastal region of Rio de Janeiro state, there was no indication of the strong winds further offshore.

Viewing the Brazilian Navy pressure synoptic on the notice board at the club, I was surprised to find a small low pressure system E of Cabo Frio with a name!  It was labelled TST Arani though the text classified it as a sub-tropical storm with winds of F8/F9.  In the weeks prior to the formation of this storm, small non-frontal lows had been drifting off the coast N of Cabo Frio regularly.  On the 14th March such a system had developed a short cold front.  Another mid-latitude low to the south was trailing its cold front to the NE, per the normal pattern in the South Atlantic.  When the tip of its cold front met the small low off Cabo Frio the interaction seems to have caused the rapid intensification to storm strength.  The storm was fortunately short lived and it moved to the SE steered by the mid latitude low and the subsequent high system to the west of it.

Cruising guides and other sources for this region are misleadingly outdated in that they state that tropical cyclones do not form in the South Atlantic.  In 2004 a system developed hurricane force and impacted the coast at Santa Catalina causing much damage.  In 2010 a system designated 90Q was given tropical classification and we now have this storm, Arani, in 2011.  All three storms occurred at the end of summer, in March, perhaps when sea surface temperatures peak.  All three formed in the region south of Cabo Frio.

Having decided to head to the Caribbean again, I now had to pass through the area where Arani had suddenly developed four weeks earlier.  All advice when sailing north is to use the southerly winds behind cold fronts which sweep up the coast during the winter months.  However, before the front arrives the wind increases from the NE, then thunderous squalls with strong gusty winds from the S or SW announce the frontal boundary.  The average cruising boat could not remain with the post-frontal winds more than two or three days so would have to keep stopping and awaiting the next front or beat against the current up to the latitude of Vitoria, where the winds generally become more easterly.  When I had obtained immigration and customs extensions to enable an unhurried departure from Brazil and prepared for the long passage to Cabadelo, there were no cold fronts forecast, even if I had felt enticed to ride one, which I didn´t.  The situation was a large S Atlantic high system in mid ocean drifting slowly south.  This would produce 20/25kt northerlies past Cabo Frio which would enhance the Brazil Current which flows south.  Despite this I saw an opportunity here, as I wanted to head east until outside the oil field off Cabo Frio before turning NNE for Cabadelo.

It was a tired departure due to the nightly thunderstorms in Angra dos Reis, so I was glad the first day was mostly motoring with a favourable current of 1kt, then, we were close hauled on port tack for three days, being pushed ESE by the wind and current.  At one point I logged, `Ìt feels the most comfortable lying down.`  By the 4th day the wind had dropped to 10 kts or less and veered so I pointed her bow at Recife and found we could hold the course by  motorsailing.  I had to clean and reseal the sidelights due to the weather off the cape.  After motoring for 36 hours the wind veered S of E and we sailed in showers, though the wind was unsteady past the Abrolhos banks.  Here I saw the unusual data of a fishing vessel on the AIS display.  A Japanese vessel, the Chokyu Maru 11.   Good to see them appreciating the obvious benefits, whilst fishing, of the AIS.  A pity the Brazilians prefer a stealth approach, not to catching fish but to their visibility and collision avoidance.

Until the latitude of Caravelas I was worried about the possibility of another storm developing and as Brazil does not transmit weatherfax I was without a forecast after the first 5 days.  With so many ships on the route I tried asking some for a forecast.  The first, Cape Bastia, was happy to oblige, once some other paperwork had been completed.  I think we yachtsmen are often overcritical of ship deck officers for their watch keeping, not considering the fact that shipping companies overload them with other work, relying on the Automatic Radar Plotting Aid (ARPA) and AIS to warn them of collision risk.  The Swan Chacabuco struggled to read the forecast and at first gave NW/NE force 7, which gave some alarm until I realised he was reading a different sea area.  In the end the D.O. gave up.  Fortunately, the Forest Wave overtook soon after and was only too pleased to assist.  Wind SE/E F3/F4.  Isolated showers.
By the 20th April I felt the weather risk to be over, but as I spoke to the BW Prince to clarify a collision situation, I asked for a forecast.  The D.O. said he didn´t have one.  So, after my survey, I concluded that 50% of deck officers on the world´s ships have no idea what the weather is forecast to do in the waters ahead.

The rest of the passage, more than a week, was more or less squally, mostly of course at night.  Constant furling and unfurling of sails.  At one stage, we motored for 11 hours and 55 miles to clear a thick area of squalls which chopped the sea surface into utter carnage and departed, leaving the wind too light to gather enough way to push through it.  The squalls were stronger as we moved north, up to 25kts.  There were many ships on the outside route and with so much squall and shower  activity I often had to leave the radar off to allow any sleep at all.  The AIS, of course, doesn´t trigger on rain, as x band radar does and continued to keep an excellent collision avoidance watch, the range in these waters being around 30nm.  There was one ship, the Golden Fish, on the Panama registry, which was not transmitting AIS data as she passed 0.5nm to starboard, but all the others I saw and many beyond the horizon I didn´t see, were compliant.  Later that day, the Nonna Ulia, south bound, called us by name and asked our intention as we closed.  I said that as the sailing vessel we intended to hold our course and speed.  The Nonna Ulia sounded a little surprised at our status and gave way, altering to starboard to pass port to port.  Then, at 3nm she altered to port and passed 0.75nm ahead.  I observed two ships on AIS which were apparently going astern due to incorrect heading information from the gyrocompass into their AIS systems.  The second of them, the Taiho Maru, I called to inform them of the fault and received thanks from the deck officer who, I´m sure, was happy to make a note of it for the engineering department to attend to.

Two days from the end, when off Maceio, after eleven days with mostly foul current of about 1kt, we met the split in the South Equatorial Current and finally we started to be pushed to the NW.  The squalliness continued and we had the engine on again to get clear of another heavy area of rain before spending the rest of that miserable night over-reefed.  It was becoming exhausting by this time.

Finally, on the 24th we had the loom of João Pessoa to guide us in.  At 0400, having heard another ship call her to clear a collision situation, I had to call the African Orchid, S bound, to ask if she had seen us, 3.3nm on her port bow, collision course.  The deck officer replied, `Wait a minute.  I see something!  This means I should start to alter my course to port a little bit.´  Then did nothing.  The AIS gives heading data so it´s immediately apparent if a ship alters course.  At 2.5nm, I started the engine and furled the genoa before calling again to ask, `Ahead or astern?` She replied, `Astern´ and then altered and passed 0.5nm astern.

Soon after, at 17nm from the entrance to Cabadelo, the AIS located two ships anchored just to the north of the port channel, one cargo, one tanker and a large Chinese dredger, the Hang Jun was working the channel.  The Ecologico Segundo was anchored between the port hand marks nos.4 and 6.  All very useful information for safely entering this river harbour for the first time.  The tide was right, we should enter on the last of the flood.   As the sun rose, squalls were visible and the fishing fleet was motoring out.  The anchored cargoship, Elegant Sky, arranged to board the pilot at 0730, so we had to slow down to reach the channel after her.  One 20kt squall passed over, reducing visibility in the rain.  Once clear I could see Elegant Sky underway, at 2.4nm range.  Another squall was approaching but I hoped to make the channel before it hit.  I failed.  With the rain closing in, 0.5nm from the first buoy I attempted to start the engine.  Nothing.  I tried on the house battery.  Still nothing.  Having checked the situation on the AIS and radar, I tacked, furled the genoa and jogged offshore again on the reefed main.  I pulled up the sole boards to access the engine and check for loose connections with the rain hammering against the wheelhouse windows.  Visibility nil.  I rechecked the AIS and found the dredger now entering port and only 2 cables off.  I called her on vhf to advise of our position.  She should have seen us on AIS and radar but I wanted to be sure.  She answered the 4th or 5th call.  I possibly didn´t leave a full minute between transmissions.  I was able to get through our status and relative position.  The Hang Jun said she would call the port and arrange a pilot for us.  Somewhat exasperated, I told her I didn´t need a pilot but was only concerned about collision risk in the visibility.  I looked out of the main hatch then to see her looming over us, about 50m away.  She continued slowly into port, whilst we went out.  Crisis over, I checked we were going clear of the anchored tanker and then got out the engine start circuit schematics.  The answer leapt off the sheet.  The neutral switch!  The circuit has a safety switch on the transmission to prevent starting in gear.  That´s all it was, the cockpit Morse control was slightly away from centre.  I started the engine, turned around and ticked off the buoys on the pilotage plan as we passed them.  Ecologico Segundo had moved and in her place was a dredging barge, with no AIS, named by some joker, ´No Woman No Cry`.  It was painted on the side and I heard Hang Jun calling her.

So, finally, we motored the four miles upriver to the anchorage at Jacare, opposite Philippe´s marina and set the hook.  Without doubt the most tiring passage I have done with CHENG FENG.  The incident at the entrance was a clear indication of the level of exhaustion and a useful lesson learned.  If I didn´t have AIS it would have been much more hazardous.  We covered 1546nm in 13 days and motored for 72 hours.

Brazil to Trinidad

Jacaré is a village on the Rio Paraiba, the river after which the state is named.  A Frenchman, Philippe Feissard has established a two pontoon marina here and you can anchor in the river, as I did.  The tidal range is only about 1.5m on springs, the ebb is not too strong and the flood weak.

I spent the first week tidying up after the passage and giving the boat a thorough check, in preparation for the next 2,000 nm run.  The aim was to reach Trinidad before June and so  avoid being overtaken by tropical waves which occur more frequently as the summer progresses.  The waves contain heavy squalls and thunderstorms and move west along the ITCZ.  Some become organised and a surface circulation begins, which can lead to tropical cyclone development, though rarely before July.  We did experience one moderate tropical  wave with some heavy squalls but no lightning.

On the day after I arrived, moving to a safer position, with room to swing, I found the windlass control to be faulty.  The down direction worked O.K. so I quickly reversed the motor field connections to complete the manoeuvre.  The problem was, the control box in the chain locker had some water in it, causing an overload protection circuit to operate erroneously.  In a windlass application, you often need to overload the motor briefly to pull the anchor or chain free of the bottom or snags, particularly single handing, so I removed the entire circuit.  The water ingress happened because whoever fitted the system for the first owner, installed the control box upside down, with the cable entry at the top.

I drained off some fuel from the tank sumps to check for water there.  I checked the security of the stern gland, shaft coupling, transmission mounts and engine mounts.  I checked the bilge pumps, stripping the PAR pump to check the diaphragms.  The Life Seal was leaking on the starboard wheelhouse polycarbonate window, installed in Bermuda, so I cut it out and reapplied a bead.  I hand sewed the UV strip on the leech of the genoa, where the thread had broken.  Did the same on the main and stitched in the patch on the main foot, glued on at sea between Vitoria and Buzios.  The slight leak in the deck at one of the main aft shroud chainplates was investigated, by applying some silicone sealant to the heads of the screws on the trim plate.  I checked the steering cylinder trunion mounts for security and the hydraulic lines for leaks.  The rudder packing gland was dribbling, so I nipped that snug and pumped in some fresh grease.  I climbed the masts and checked the standing rigging.  The lower terminals and rigging screws are checked every day at sea.  I put some extra foam on the gasket of one of the deck hatches where it dripped sometimes, if a sea came over the deck.

I investigated the radar fault, which first occurred on the passage to Tobago in 2009.  This has been a very rare event until recently, when it has become troublesome, impacting the safety of navigation.  When the fault occurs, I have to leave the set off for several hours before it will reset.  Fortunately, I have a service manual for the system so, bypassing the troubleshooting advice and studying the circuit schematics, the bearing reset signal from the scanner appeared a likely cause.  I looked at the relevant circuit board in the display but all seemed good.  Inspecting the multiway connector on the display unit and cable revealed nothing.  When I found the cable carrying the bearing reset signal loose from the terminal block in the deckhead at the mizzen mast foot, which reproduced the fault, I thought perhaps that´s all it was, but it seemed too easy.

The second week was spent waiting for the wind.  We had low pressure over the NE corner of Brazil which brought heavy showers and blocked the trade winds.  One day I took the narrow gauge train to João Pessoa, the small capital city of Paraiba, to look around.
 
With a better forecast for the weekend, I checked out of Cabadelo and Brazil and prepared to leave.

I moved onto the pontoon to take water and fuel.  Philippe operates a fuelling service using his pickup to collect large quantities of clean, mineral fuel from the depot, which is then transferred to the boat in jerry cans and siphoned in.  For once I was happy to pay others to do that job in the heat.

I got into the dinghy and trimmed the weed skirt from the waterline.  The water was far too coloured to invite an underwater inspection and to clean the prop (look up the word jacaré!), but judging by a Frenchman´s Ovni, which he dried out to clean, marine growth was not rapid in this river.

As the route plan came out at 2,000 nm I provisioned for three weeks, expecting some light wind days.  What I didn´t expect was to have adverse currents for a third of the passage but this was the price I paid for an offshore route, avoiding the inshore fishing fleets.

The first few days we made good progress with favourable current, though there was a lot of cloud lightning the second night.  A veering wind started pushing us more to the north than the direct route, but as we had to get through the ITCZ and it was lying along the Brazilian coast, I decided to try to cross it on a NNW course and hope for NE trade winds north of five degrees.  I was receiving weather faxes giving the position of the ITCZ axis and satellite images of the clouds from New Orleans.  Reception was weak and noise levels high as, I think, is often the case in the ITCZ

The radar fault reappeared and some fault finding pointed to a magnetic proximity switch in the scanner which produces a pulse on each revolution of the antenna, used to check for rotation in case of a motor failure.  This was confirmed in Trinidad after taking the scanner off the mast.  A Raymarine dealer in Trinidad found a spare for this now obsolete component at Raymarine U.S:A. and quoted US$75 for it.  I found that an equivalent is still produced and retails for under US$3.  The difference is shipping and markup.  Luckily, another Trinidad dealer had an old scanner which he gave to me to take the part from.

Just north of the equator we were in a counter current of ½ knot, flowing east.  The following day this was up to 1 knot, NE going.  We used the engine a lot over the five days it took to find the north easterlies, but sailed when possible between the showers and squalls.  Once in the NE trades the wind was still disturbed by showers and squalls and remained so till we reached a point near the border with French Guyana and always with a component of the current against us.  Near 50 degrees west and 150 nm offshore, we crossed water flowing north at up to 4 knots, though this rate was only a few miles wide.  When the sun rose that day I could see the ocean surface was a dark green/brown, obviously flow from the Amazon to the south.  I now steered a course to close the continental shelf off the Guyanas and hopefully be pushed towards my intended destination, rather than Antigua.  The current did turn to the NNW and ran strongly, at up to 3 knots off Suriname, before reducing to less than a knot to Trinidad.

The oversimplified diagrams and information on ocean currents on charts, in cruising guides and admiralty pilot books I´ve found to be of little use.  The pilot charts with current roses don´t present the information in a practical form to produce a course to steer.  Fortunately, I´d done some research on the currents and had a detailed oceanographic description of the North Brazil and Guiana Currents which explained what was happening.  The northern part of the North Brazil Current eddies back on itself, forming rings which detach from the main flow  and migrate towards the Lesser Antilles.  When I plotted the currents I measured, it was clear that I was travelling along the upper section of one of these rings from 43W to 50W.  The very strong north going flow at 50W was the start of this eddy process.

Once off French Guyana we enjoyed three days of fine trade wind sailing, without a single squall to disturb the restful nights.  The water was still a dark green, obviously some of the Amazon flow forming part of the Guiana Current.  I´d seen very large rafts of sargasso weed before we entered the river water, when they disappeared completely, returning when the water turned ocean blue again.

One afternoon, enjoying some ginger tea in the cockpit I noticed a parted strand in one section of the main backstay, above the insulator.  The wind was not strong so I first checked around the other stays and shrouds but found no other problems.  To take the load off the backstay, I furled the genoa and used the staysail with the running backstays set up.  This was less efficient and needed the sheet led down to the toerail but we didn´t lose too much speed.  The main was kept reefed below the runners and I set all the mizzen to assist with drive.  I ran the spare main halyard aft to a strong point and set it up on a winch.  I also took the main topping lift off the boom, as this is mostly wire and set that up on the other side.

Once well offshore, our route took us out of the main shipping traffic but there were crossing ships to look out for and some odd events too.  I write much of the AIS and its usefulness as an aid to safety and to navigation.  Knowledge of another ship´s name alone seems to prompt and guarantee communication.  Before I had the system, I would sometimes try to call a ship using an approximate position for them, as they used to do with each other, but none of them ever answered.  Now, perhaps because you know who they are and where they live, in terms of the name, registration, mmsi and IMO numbers and they know that you know, they feel bound to answer a vhf call.   However, some of the answers I have received were surprising and did little to relieve the anxiety of that or subsequent encounters.  One example was the conversation with the general cargoship, Olga as she approached on the starboard bow with a close cpa, bound for Cabadelo.  This was the first day of fine trade wind weather with good visibility.  I called the Olga at 6nm to check she had seen us.  I have an AIS transponder and radar reflector and was sailing.  The deck officer seemed surprised to hear from us and said he would like to pass ahead as the Olga was in ballast condition so she couldn´t turn to port due to the swell.  I don´t remember anything about that in Rule 18, Responsibilities between vessels.  I´ve checked.  There is no mention of ballast condition or anything else and, I thought, `What swell?´  It was a beautiful sailing day, the wind, force 5 on the port quarter and a 2m swell.  At 3nm, the Olga called to advise of a change of plan and altered to port to pass astern saying that he could now see we could not turn to port.  Well, actually, it would have been easy for us to turn to port but as the sailing vessel, I felt obliged to stand on.  As in the situation with the Nonna Ulia on the last passage, I think many deck officers have little or no experience dealing with small sailing vessels and even with unlimited searoom they behave with indecision.

Near sunset on the 19th May I was monitoring a fast, U.S.A. registered vessel, the Mako, which was overtaking.  She was a 55m oil Industry service vessel and was not visible till quite close.  Then I noticed she suddenly altered course to close us, still making 20 knots.  Without all the data from the AIS, this would have been a very worrying situation with darkness descending.  I called the Mako and said I assumed they were just coming over to have a look at us.  This was the case.  `I just love sailing`, I was told, as she shot past on the windward side within spitting distance.  We exchanged pleasantries, as they were also bound for Trinidad and they provided a good wind forecast and apologised for alarming us.

I was feeling recovered from a fairly gruelling passage before the last day and the long coastal run into Chaguaramus Bay, Trinidad.

Traffic was thick as we neared the Galleons Passage between Trinidad and Tobago and the current was up to 3 knots north going, off Galera Point.  I spoke with three vessels to clarify  situations and passed a tug with its tow unlit, except for a flashing white light.  I spoke with the overtaking Tobago car ferry, Warrior Spirit, mostly to check my AIS transmission as another ship said they were not receiving.  That ship also had trouble with their vhf reception.

The route was quieter as we neared the entrance to the Boca de Monos and I was relaxed, approaching a familiar harbour under engine in light wind and flat sea, though it was now very dark at about 0500.  I was tired, having been awake all night along the north coast.  Suddenly a small vessel appeared three points on the starboard bow, head on aspect, but with the green light going on and off.  I thought it probably a fishing vessel and decided for some reason, to alter to port, perhaps because I wanted to close the coast anyway.  Her aspect didn´t change and she still seemed intent on closing, so I altered to starboard, crossed her bows and started to head east, away from my destination.  Watching the other vessel as I turned, she altered immediately and followed.  This was now a bit worrying.  There are pirates operating in these waters, but not at night and they wouldn´t be showing lights, but nevertheless, worrying.  I increased speed, selected the autopilot and called the Trinidad coastguard.  They answered immediately, so quickly that I assumed the other vessel was the coastguard but it soon became clear it wasn´t.  We then went through the completion of the incident report form with many ´please repeats´ on both sides as we struggled with each other´s accent.  Whilst we did so the other vessel caught up and then matched speeds about a cable on the beam.  Line by line the incident form was filled, whilst the range was closed to about 100m or less.  I could see a white strobe on the after part, clearly a longline marker, so she was a fishing vessel and properly lit, but very suspicious.  Finally, they broke away and moved ahead and towards the coast, leaving us heading east and pondering our next move.  When they were about 0.75nm ahead I turned and headed back towards the Boca and was relieved to still see a stern light in the distance.  The coastguard was excellent and kept checking back for an update on the situation, ready to despatch a boat to assist.  Their base is nearby my position.  They were a bit confused over an EPIRB signal in my area as well, but I assured them it wasn´t mine.  Having spoken to several yachtsmen in Trinidad, some of whom have lived here many years, I´m still no wiser as to the actions of those fishermen.

Soon the sun rose and we motored through the Boca and picked up a courtesy mooring in Chaguaramus Bay admiring the surroundings at the best part of the day, happy to have reached Trinidad a week before June.

Trinidad

First job was to get quotes for the backstay replacement and a full rig inspection.  There are two good rigging shops in the Chaguaramus Bay area and I chose to use Trinidad Rigging, run by a Swede who has been in business for sixteen years and is very familiar with the Swedish Selden equipment, as my rig is.  I´ve been getting worried about the standing rigging for a while, as it´s nearly ten years old now and some of that time has been in the tropics where the higher temperature leads to accelerated corrosion.  The time spent in the Canary Islands was also bad for the exterior metals because of the very low rainfall, so they rarely got flushed with freshwater, particularly above the spreaders.  The fresh winds, bringing salt spray, even in a marina and the hot sun, combine to form conditions like an environmental test chamber.  Magnifier inspection revealed several wire terminals on the main rigging with hairline cracks so I decided to replace it all, including the rigging screws or turnbuckles, which I´m upgrading from all stainless to chromed aluminium bronze bodied versions.  Quite a large invoice to swallow but with the long ocean passages CHENG FENG now does, I don´t want the inconvenience or the embarrassment of a dismasting.

It was about a month before the standing rigging was all replaced and a gap in the weather appeared, inviting a short, three day sail to Bonaire.  Since Brazil I´ve been plotting to spend the 2011 hurricane season in the ABC islands, mostly in Curacao.  Chaguaramus in Trinidad is more sheltered and an excellent place to purchase marine supplies and carry out engineering work, but the almost incessant rain gets tiresome.  In the summer, as the Atlantic ITCZ oscillates north and south it wafts warm, humid air over the island and the northern mountain range condenses it to drop on Chaguaramus.  The crime wave has yet to be controlled by the new government, under the Indian female prime minister, elected in 2010.  During my stay, two or three people were being shot dead per day.  The Chaguaramus area is free of this sort of activity but not from theft and it deterred me from roaming aimlessly about the island.

I anchored in Scotland Bay for a few hours to check the underwater hull and prepare for the passage.  As suspected, the prop was very foul so I gave it a good cleaning with a scraper and stainless wool.  There had been a tense moment leaving the berth at the marina, which was bows to with two pilings for stern lines.  She had lost her prop walk and I had to use a lot of RPM to give any steerage, telltale clouds of exhaust smoke further indicating the prop was not biting.  Then stopping became an issue before we hit the mega yacht astern.  Normally, I would have dived the boat at her berth but the water is always oily there.

I departed at sunset primarily because of the threat from Venezuelan pirates operating from the Paria Peninsular, the tip of which lies just ten miles west, within stolen binocular range.  It should also have us arrive in Bonaire in daylight.  There were no recent reports of piracy but I doubt they have all obtained an education and taken up posts with the civil service just yet.  Advice from yachtsmen living in Trinidad was that they generally operate close to shore in daylight from their fast open pirogues which are limited in use as attack vessels, in conditions above force 4.  In 2009, in Trinidad, I saw a Fisher 37 owned by an Englishman who lived in Venezuela, which had been fired on by pirates on the way to Trinidad.  Some of the wheelhouse windows were pierced and the report was of a frenzied attack with shotguns and AK47s, repelled only by the conditions.

The evening I left was almost calm and we shot out of the Boca de Monos on a 3 knot current, heading north for a turning point near some offshore oil installations.  A tropical wave had gone through two days before, but left a trail of thunderstorms and light winds behind it.  Five miles off Trinidad, a light easterly breeze came up but not enough to get well offshore before sunrise. 

However, we didn´t get there before encountering a new oil platform called PetroSaudi Saturn in position N 110 03´.8 W 0610 48´.1 with AIS and with several ships around it.  One, the Turquoise, was patrolling around it and came quite close to CHENG FENG and shone a spotlight first south, then at me.  What does that mean?  I was about 1.5nm from the platform and the IMRAY charts and other information I have state that 500m clearance should be given.  The Turquoise answered my vhf calls eventually and said that the guard area is 2nm radius.  I transmit AIS so why didn´t she call and tell me what the hell she was doing?

The PetroSaudi Saturn comes up on AIS as ´A ship according to RR resolution No 18 (Mob - 83)´ - great!  Crystal clear to anyone who has to hand a copy of all the latest regulations on absolutely everything.

By now we had another ship on AIS to the west, the PetroSaudi Discoverer, in position N 110 02´.9 W 0620 01´.3 which is another platform, with its own guard vessel, but I was able to go between the platforms easily and avoid the guarded areas.  The current started to turn NW going and built up, peaking at 3.3 knots outside the 100m contour, about 20nm north of Los Testigos, the first of a set of Venezuelan islands and reefs on the route.  I tracked south of the other outer islands, going between Margarita and the unlit Islas Los Hermanos.  I saw a Venezuelan fishing vessel during the day, NE of Margarita.  Wooden, painted white, with a full length deck above the main deck, about 45 foot.  I´d seen some in Chaguaramus so knew the type.  I was slightly worried when she turned and stopped close to me, but then she carried on, obviously attending to a line of pots or baited hooks.  There were other fishermen south of La Blanquilla showing an allround white light and a white strobe on the other end of their net.  The current went light and variable after Los Testigos before building to 1-1.5 kts W to NW going.  Generally.  Currents are currents.

You need to stay 5nm away from La Orchilla which is a military base.  They don´t want us to see what they´re doing out there.  Actually you need to stay about 8nm off as there´s a firing range around it.

I´ve read that most of those islands are actually, using WGS84 datum, 0.45nm at 200 degrees from their charted positions though this is not official, another cruiser´s research so, as in all such  coral areas, you need a high sun on your back and a good man in the spreaders with polarized glasses if you´re planning to visit any with competence.

The presence of fishermen in wooden boats with no radar return meant sleep was limited to 30 minutes per session.  They were working at anchor so, with our speed at 6 knots and a visible horizon of 3 miles, a half hour period seemed to give a fair chance of avoiding collision.  If they refuse to use AIS, or even radar reflectors, the simplest things to make from any scrap sheet metal, I´m afraid they can only expect trouble.  From conversations I´ve had, I believe I keep a better watch singlehanding than many cruising boats, particularly those with just a couple on board, the wife or internet date usually being far less experienced.  One chap I met in the Azores admitted he routinely falls asleep on watch.  Another I spoke to recently almost hit a Brazilian fisherman when his watchkeeper wife delayed waking him till the last minute.
 
The favourable current and good breeze, after the first night, threw out my timing, but I managed to get to the moorings off the west coast of Bonaire at Kralendijk, just before sunset, which was vital.  Anchoring is not allowed and there´s only a 3 boat length ledge of dead reef near the shore, before the drop off to 130m, on which to anchor anyway.  You have to pay US$10 per night for the moorings to the marina up the coast which owns them.  There are 42 and they could have all been taken.  The fallback was a very careful motor up to the marina which has only a fixed light to mark it or failing that, continue to Curacao and arrive there in daylight.  The radar worked faultlessly on the passage.  Close to Bonaire we fell in with a large tanker on a SE course but with it´s AIS data showing a heading of NE.  So the icon on my AIS display appeared to be going sideways at 12 knots.  I called them and a German voice said they would check their, ´Eck-vip-ment´.  He called back after resetting the eckvipment, when all was well.  This is CHENG FENG, making the seas a safer place.

Bonaire is a very pleasant island with clean, clear waters and is fairly quiet at this low season, before the cruiseships begin their stops.  The sailing weather was excellent after the first night in a relatively dry airmass with no squalls.  This has continued in Bonaire which is in a peculiarity known as the Southern Caribbean Dry Zone.  We did get a heavy shower the first day, which was welcome to wash the salt off the rigging and decks.  I hired a scooter to tour the island one day.  The northern half has hills and saline lakes and rock outcrops and the south is completely flat, much of it turned over to solar salt production.  This is on a large scale and some of the condensing lakes are bright pink with flamingo food.  There are cactii everywhere.  Here we are, three days downwind of the permanently sodden Chaguaramus and we´re on a desert island!  Apart from salt, the economy seems to be based on diving tourism plus a recent building boom, to cater to those who wish to have their fourth or fifth home in the Caribbean.  Politically, when the Netherlands Antilles broke up last year, Bonaire returned to the Kingdom of the Netherlands as a municipality.  As with Martinique and French Guyana, recently voting against independence from France, it seems the people of Bonaire prefer government from Europe.  However, because almost everything is imported and goods are still following old supply routes through Curacao, now a different country, Bonaire is being hit with double taxation, though moves are afoot to correct this.  The indigenous people are obviously South American in origin and speak a bastardized Spanish called Papiamento, but also Dutch and English and are friendly and welcoming with none of the sullenness and undercurrent of violence one finds, all too often, in Trinidad and the Lesser Antilles.

Bonaire, though pleasant, is only of interest to diving addicts and the moorings are exposed to westerly winds such as those from tropical systems passing to the north or thunderstorms.  There is a marina but Bonaire doesn´t have all the infrastucture for refitting a yacht.  So, as planned, I moved on to Curacao and at first found an anchorage in Kabrietenberg Bay, within Spanish Waters.  This is an enclosed bay with a narrow entrance and several inlets, islands and a lot of shoals.  Anchoring is over popular in the hurricane season so is restricted to four areas to allow local water users access to the bay.  I was not comfortable there due to lack of room to anchor adequately in case a tropical storm or hurricane tracked close or over the island.  The threat of other boats dragging on was very real too.  Good sense prevailed and I moved into the very reasonably priced Seru Boca Marina within the Santa Barbara Plantation, which seems to own about half the long shoreline of Spanish Waters.  It´s not a plantation at all, but a hotel, golf course and villa development, set in the more scenic side of the bay overlooked by the Talenberg.  The marina has finger berths and has been safe for sixteen years through winds to 45 knots.  There are houses under construction to the SE and the SW which could cause problems for us with airborne debris.  Few tropical cyclones track this far south but occasionally one does, such as tropical storms Joan in 1988 and Bret in 1993 which passed south of the island.  T.S. Cesar formed in the waters between Bonaire and Curacao in 1996.  Systems passing within 100nm to the north in recent years were hurricanes Ivan (2004), Emily (2005), Felix (2007), T.S. Omar (2008) and hurricane Tomas (2010).  The damaging wind strengths within tropical cyclones tend to be confined to the small centres and it is the rainfall and swells which cause most damage.

Checking the output from the U.S. National Hurricane Center is an interesting daily activity as well as studying the fascinating, detailed reports published on previous systems.  Some of them develop and track in very unusual areas such as the 55kt tropical storm Grace (October 2009) which evolved from an occluded front about 100nm west of Lajes in the Azores and tracked through the Azores and then towards SW Ireland.  Vince also evolved from an occluded low and was initially classified as a cold core sub-tropical storm in October 2005 when 500nm SE of Lajes.  Within 36 hours she was a hurricane, 135nm NW of Funchal and having weakened, she tracked just south of Faro as a tropical depression on the 11th Oct, before making landfall in Huelva.  CHENG FENG was berthed at Olhao at that time under the previous owner.  Another system which formed and tracked in the far east of the Atlantic was hurricane Lisa in September 2010.  She formed from a tropical wave, 400nm west of the Cabo Verdes and due to unusual conditions in the N Atlantic tracked generally E then N reaching 75kts when 240nm NW of the Cabo Verdes, before weakening to a tropical depression about 10 degrees WSW of the Canary Islands.

There are a few boats occupied but not at all enough to feel  closed in.  Unfortunately, it was conceived as storage for boats owned by the villa owners and lacks even a café, the nearest being in the Hyatt golf hotel about 2 km distant.  Luckily a local supermarket runs free shuttles twice a week and they offer free coffee.  The fresh food though, is mostly imported from the U.S.A., as it is in Trinidad supermarkets and doesn´t keep long.  In Trinidad they are controlled by the Syrian/Lebanese business community so it´s common to see Chilean apples in bags meant for shops in Saudi Arabia, on the shelves next to McVities Ginger Nuts, Cadbury´s Dairy Milk and other remnants of the colonial past.  Here in Curacao, the snacks, bread and cheese are Dutch style but Cadbury´s manage to find some shelf space.  The supermarket here has a large selection of USDA labelled ´organic´ food which appears to be a growth industry.  Great attention is paid to packaging to appeal to the trendy market in ´organic´ food.  One company trading under some ´organic´ name like Sustainable Earth Farms or something, has an attractive display rack of extremely expensive dried fruit and seeds (in small plastic packets).  I read with amusement in tiny print on the back; Product of China, Product of Vietnam, etc.  Profit margins must be truly enormous.  This word ´organic´ seems to be becoming the new ´cool´.  When I was at school, organic merely referred to chemical compounds containing that now most insidious and deadly atom, carbon.

Curacao was the capital of the Netherlands Antilles till last year, when Bonaire, Saba, St.Eustatius and St. Maarten left the group.  Now, as I understand it, they are all independent members of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, a status Aruba has held since 1986.  Curacao has an oil refinery and service facilities for the oil industry, a large enclosed port inside an opening  pontoon bridge and a high road bridge, offshore finance, tourist infrastructure and in Willemstad, an old city with many well preserved buildings dating from the Dutch colonial period, earning an entry on the UNESCO World Heritage List.  Personally, I find the collection of buildings on the Punda waterfront with their different styles and bright colours to resemble a film set from Walt Disney.  Judge for yourself.  Nowadays they are mostly shops for jewellery, watches, perfume, etc. to cater to the cruiseship visitors, which adds to the sense of unreality.  There is a Venezuelan fresh produce market on the waterside supplied by small, heavily laden boats which cross the short distance to the South American continent and there is a Venezuelan community here large enough to have its own radio station.  The arid climate in Curacao is not conducive to natural agriculture but with the tropical sun hours and fresh trade winds, which seem to blow all year, investment in infrastructure could bring unlimited desalinated water from solar and windpower.

The pontoon bridge is pedestrian only and rides on the ocean swells, as it´s near the coast.  It pivots at the Otrobanda side and has an engine at the other end which, I think, drives a prop to push the bridge open or closed.

Otrobanda means other side and is literally the other side of the bridges over the entrance to the Schottegat port, from the Punda district.  There are historic parts here too, but the centrepiece is the Kura Hulanda Hotel which is unusual and interesting.  In 1999, imaginative Dutch entrepreneur Jacob Gelt Dekker purchased a dilapidated part of the old Otrobanda district and converted it into a hotel with the old houses being turned into hotel rooms.  He added restaurants, courtyards, a shady tropical pool, a casino and a museum tracing the history of the African population.

There are casinos everywhere here, large and small.  Some are tourist oriented but the smaller ones must be focussed on the local population being strategically situated like convenience stores.  Happy hours seem to be in vogue too and a slightly overused sales ploy for local restaurants, bars and possibly filling stations.

The roads are not in a great state of repair and many locals drive large 4WD cars and pickups, as they do in Sint Maarten.  Use of the horn here is particularly noticeable.  Out on the folding bike, I usually get one short blast from all the taxi and bus drivers and quite a few of the others, before they overtake.  It´s a courtesy signal.  Occasionally, if someone´s in a hurry, I get one long blast.  However, all drivers tend to give one very short blast or a series of very short blasts to everyone they see who they know which, because this is a small, friendly island, is everybody.  So as you can imagine, the roads are a constant cacophony of car horns.  One of the supermarket shuttle buses has a fault with the horn button, so the driver has to give the wheel a flick to the left to sound the horn, then quickly flick right again to stay on the road.  He is very sociable and knows absolutely everybody.  Progress to and from the supermarket is like riding on an agitated snake.

I´m taking advantage of the dry climate and the lack of cafes, etc. to catch up with gelcoat repairs and interior varnishing and other general maintenance.  I plan to lift out at the end of the year at the Dutch run yard here, before moving on again.

Thanks Steve, another fascinating report, you have brought all the places that you have visited alive with your excellent descriptions and colourful photography. Just in case any of your readers have joined the accounts of your cruising with this one, they should also read about your single handed circuit of the Atlantic which they can do by clicking here. 

I have no idea as to where you are sailing to next year, but wish you enjoyable and safe sailing and look forward to adding your reports to my site. Martin.