LinoCat

It was a beautiful day with blue sky and it was warm and the boat was clean and shiny. What best than trying to let Lani mess up all the place. We put her naked in her chair which was mounted outside so we could use the garden hose to wash the boat. She had her favourite mashed fruit and i guess she was eating 20% while the rest was spread out everywhere. Of course she had to have a shower afterwards and we have to wash the seat also. But it was fun!

T his is how it looks on the Raymarine Chartplotter when you approach Teneriffe from the north. The pink strip to the right is a traffic separation zone where special rules apply. This is usual where there is a lot of ship traffic. The red cross above that area was one of the waypoints we have used to stay out of that area. Then we changed course in a southerly direction. The yellow arrow pointing to the boat (which is black) is the winddirection. The two lines going out from our boat is the heading and the course over ground (which is the way we actually travel). The pink triangles are other big ships. There is a lot of traffic in front of Santa Cruz de Tenerife. This is also the reason why you should contact port control in this area when crossing the harbour or entering it. Then they know your intention and callsign and can contact you. This is also for your own safety. The red cross with the white square around is our current destination in the course computer. The autopilot will s...

In Portugal you can get an OPTIMUS SIM CARD for your mobile and you can use it as a local telephone or a modem for the internet. if it is a modern one then even HSPA will work. The SIM card costs 10EUR and the only issue is, that as a foreigner you can not recharge the card at the ATM but you need to go to an optimus store. They are often in bigger shopping malls. These card dont do roaming so can only be used in Portugal and Madeira(of course). In spain i bought a YOIGO prepaid SIM card for 20EUR. They ask you for a local adress but accept the boatname and marina adress. When using this for internet access you need to define an APN: internet (no capital letters!) and no username or password. The PHONEHOUSE is a chain often found in spanish cities and they have all kinds of cards. The costs for internet with YOIGO is 3EUR per day. If you do not use it, then nothing of course. It is flat but after 100MB i read that it will slow down the connection to 64kb/s. I have not encountered this ...

Here are some snaps from the drive to Taganana via la Mercedes and then some pictures of Las Teresitas beach. It contains Sahara sand and they also have a wave breaker which means it a kind of perfect lagoon and i was astonished to see so many fishes. I tried out the new Pentax W80 but i would say it is average besides the capability to be used under water down to 4m.

of course NOT! But usually i do not post these pictures. But here are some with her crying because she is sad, angry and furious because she was not allowed to do something.

There is a lot of debate about this marina. When i talked to other sailors there were always confusing and conflicting messages about this place. Also more questions than answers. Even in the Imray pilot books the information was outdated. This information is from 24th September 2009 when we were here with our Lagoon 380S2 catamaran. I called them the day we arrived in Tenerife as soon as i had cell coverage. They speak english and were very friendly. Without asking they gave me the information that we have to pay port and light tax for the first night and that this would make the first night expensive. 100EUR is a lot of money for a 38feet boat. From then onwards it was only 34EUR which is OK. This still seems to be the only marina in the canaries asking for this tax. But when you keep the receipt it should be valid for one year. The approach during daytime is easy, you should call Santa Cruz port control on VHF12 before you are close to the harbour. I suggest doing it when already 2-...

We saw the lights of Tenerife already at night and in the morning we could see the mountains. We apporached the island from north with the direction towards Santa Cruz, the second biggest city of the Canary Islands with around a quarter million people. We came into a so called "acceleration zone" where the wind was up to 25knots. When approaching the commercial harbour you need to call port control on VHF channel 12 and ask for permission. The Marina Atlantico is then at the end of the south bassin and is well protected besides wind from the south. Since we had northerly winds it was perfect. In the marina the wind was calm with 8 knots. Once you are close to the Marina you call the Marinero on channel 9 and they directly guide you to a berth. There is no reception pontoon which is unusual. I will write a special report about this Marina since it is often discussed. We then did a small walk into the center which is only around 5-10Minutes away and has a pedestrian area with ...

For Lani it is sometimes tricky that she is not allowed to walk alone when we are at sea. But the good thing about a catamaran is that the boat issailing upright and not heeling, so she can play sitting outside or inside. We just need to male sure that she is not directly sitting in the sunlight. When it is too windy we do not let her play with water, which is her absolute favorite. She loves to guess what people are drawing, she enjoys songs and kids lyrics and typical childpay things. Whenever we reach a Marina we make sure that she gets enough opportunity to walk.

inoCat sailed the night and the Wind went down from 20 knots to 7knots. The night was uneventful besides a ship "not under command" floating in exactly our course. So we had to change the course for a while. Another freighter passed us 0,2 NM (1 NM= 1,852km)away. I watched a DVD on the Laptop (Rescue Dawn with Christian Bale)and in the morning we had breakfast like always. The we changed course after passing a traffic separation zone and we brought up our Parasailor, the big blue sail for downwind courses. We noticed that the sail has a small hole at the lower end and so we brought it down again. We now only have 25Miles to go. We want to enter the Marina in Santa Cruz called Marina del Atlantico. We have heard a lot of mixed things so i am curious how it will be. Be sure to read about it later :-)

We caught a nice Mahi Mahi, maybe around half a meter long. It would have been a nice addition to the menu and we just had it reeled in. I already grabbed the fish and then we gave him some Gin. We always do that before it gets killed. But then he literally jumped off the hook and he was gone. So be carefuel, somewhere in the Atlantic there is a drunken fish swimming around. We hope he can make it....

This morning i brought the rental car back and paid the marina fees. It was only 81 EUR for the monster large berth we had. This was the cheapest price for 3 nights so far and due to the fact that this marina is huge and even has a swimming pool this was a cheap stay. Food at Lani´s Grill was good. Yes that´s right, that was the name of a restaurant there. I bought a new broom to clean the boat but even the new one still needs a person to use it. I am disappointed. When do they invent one that can do it on its own? Then we visited Andy and Kate on board their Leopard 46 Tulliana and had a chat and a look at their boat. Very nice and some smart ideas. A lot more space than our small 38 foot boat. Then at 13.00 we went to the fuel dock and put 126 liter diesel in the tank. The liter only costs 68cent here. So that was also cheap. We left the marina and had almost no wind the first 30 Minutes and then a southerly with 8 knots. Knowing that this must still be a local wind we wait...

Hi, we have rented a car (Opel Astra 5doors, Diesel for 30EUR) and drove to the Timanfaya National parc. It is a volcanic parc where you have to leave your car at a certain place and you are only allowed to do guided tours from there. The landscape is really surrealistic. You think you are on the moon. What a contrast to Madeira but very nice. The volcanic parc is more than 170 square km while the proteced area around 50 square kilometer. You pay 8EUR per person to enter the parc and it is worth doing it. You then parc the car and might take a free bus tour (45 minutes) through the volcanic parc. It was just sad that you have to take pictures through the windows of the bus. At the central parking place there is also a restaurant. They grill chicken over a natural volcanic opening. The park rangers also pour water into openings and show the geysir effect. In other holes they throw a dry bush and you see it ignite and burning. It is impressive that after the eruptions in 1870 and the com...

Lani will help you! Well, the sugar will be everywhere but some might also land in your coffee. Maybe together with the paper bag and maybe your coffee will then land on the floor or your legs. But i promise you will have some sugar at least near to your coffee and Lani lots of fun!

When ever possible we try to eat outside. This can be be for breakfast, lunch or dinner. Usually lunch is a light meal like tomatos or leftovers from the previous day while we are really breakfast fans. Currently our oven is not really making us happy since the gasflame often just goes out and we have not found the root cause. Maybe it is the bimetal security mechanism. I need to explore that in the next days, weeks or months :-) Yes you guessed right, it is number 239587 on the to do list!

When they allocated a space in the Marina yesterday they either got our measurements wrong or they thought i am not able to dock the boat in. Check out this picture!

It is raining cats and dogs here. Lanzarote is in sight. It is the island of the Canaries with the least rain. Well most likely not today :-) Or did our Indian colleagues send the monsoon over to Spain? Wind was coming from the south east, where we are heading to with up to 20 knots. This slowed us down to 4 knots. Now the wind has turned and is coming from N-NE but only with 8 knots. The sea is rough because the wind sea is coming from another direction than the Atlantic swell adding up to a strange pattern. A fish bit on the lure again and reeled of probably 50m and then spit it out again. So no Sushi today.

We had an unreal sunset with strange colors.

Today a fish grabbed my lure and i reeled in. We then slowed down the boat and that must have given him the chance to spit out the hook. It was a triple hook and i heard that the twin hooks are much better so i might convert that lure as soon as i get twinhooks. I was trying to by them in Canical Madeira but the shop did not have them. So lets wait until Lanzarote.... Tomorrow i will catch one for sure.... damned the one i lost looked nice it might have been a Makarel or Small Tuna, maybe around 40-50cm.

After a nice sunrise we were wondering what strange objects were floating in the water. After one floating by closely we saw it disappearing and so we new that it was an animal. Well, maybe a Scubadiver 100miles off shore? :-) It was a sea turtle. We saw several swimming by and slowed down to show it to Lani. She even poked her head out and was looking at us. It was a nice experience and Lani said "Turtle" since she only knows the english word for it. Breakfast was outside with the very tasty breadrolls from the marina Quinta do Lorde. The breadrolls which are baked in the local bar are fabolous but with 80cent also not too cheap. But to be fair, they are substantially bigger than the usual ones from the supermarket and still warm when you pick them up. They open at 9 so they are nice for those who get up late! We are still motoring with 6knots now and around 2500rpm. We should arrive in Lanzarote at the south tip of the island tomorrow evening. But we still hope for some win...

Well when you are not sailing it is easy to just stop the engines and then jump in. We saw at least 30 turtles aleready and so we thought we might have a short swim as well. It is 4000m deep according to the map and the water is as blue and crystal clear as it can get. Thermometer shows 27 Celcius and so we had a jump in before it put the coffee water in the kettle. So the next really important thing is a coffee around 17.00. No luck with the fishing so far....

The wireless in the marina is so slow that i feel it like a flashback to my commodore 64 times with a 300baud acoustic coupler. So i rather continue with the Optimus prepaid data card and HSPA even though that is totally unreliable here. Today we used the rental car to explore some areas of Madeira. The airport is built like a bridge on concrete pillars and very impressive. You can stand very close to where the jets land or take off, depending on the wind direction. A car with around 40BHP is tooooo weak to climb up the mountains and having fun. I think the last time i had such a car was my mums old VW beetle built 1965 (my age yeaaaahh) and that was around 30BHP i think. We visited one of the flower gardens and walked around there. With some rainshowers in between it was nice that they had a tea house. Then we drove to Funchal. The marina their looks ugly but is in the heart of the city and the main streets near by have free WIFI and the speed is good there. I downloaded a news webcas...

Marina Quinta do Lorde is new compared to the crowdy marina of Funchal. Especially bigger boats or catamarans might use this marina as an alternative. Trans-Ocean members or ARC participants get 10-20% discount. The staff is young and very friendly. They can organize rental cars and will give tips on where to go. Also the marina has a washer and a dryer. Do not believe the dryer that for 2 Euro it would dry your clothes. If you just insert 3 it might work out :-) The bar and restaurant seems to be good and we will check this out tonight. Again we are also waiting for a parcel with spareparts but not because things are broken but just to stack up our supplies. Too sad that Dieter with the Trimaran Flying Kefi had to return to Portimao since a part of his Hydrovane broke right after the left the marina. I would have loved to sail with him a few hours here in the bay to check out his Dragonfly 1200 Trimaran. He is a nice and helpful guy and we had some dinners together. Maybe he will catc...

Hi, we arrived at 22.00 in Marina Quinta do Lorde. After some Campari orange and playing cards we went to bed. 544NM was the sailed distance.

Yesterday i dove and checked the propeller. Looks like whatever we caught has gone and the motor sounded as usual. The left engine vibrates a little bit more since the beginning anyway. This was good news because entering the marina tonight with only one engine in wind would have been unpleasant. The water here in the middle of the atlantic is much warmer than in Portugal. My computer showed 25 Celcius. A fish bit on the lure at the fishing rod yesterday and this morning but spit it out again and the hooks did not catch. The stars tonight were stunning. We could see the milkyway and the seawater was sparkling also. It is a bioluminiscence (spelling??) that occurs and it looks great in breaking waves and also the propeller wash. We had a trail of sparkling green behind us. The sea is smooth now with waves of around 1m but its a pleasant long swell. Around 100 nautical miles to go and so we will reach Madeira tonight.

Hi, it looks like the pictures are not transferred via HF radio. Maybe i have to change things in the LinoCat blogger account. Yesterday was rough sailing with 2 different seas crossing each other producing nasty waves. Not high but nasty. The was between Force 4 and 6 and we had the parasailor out. Highest speed was around 10 knots but i could notice that the boat i a lot heavier now. The main swell we are crossing at around 45 degrees angle and the wind angle is around 170 degrees. Before the night we decided to bring the parasailor down. That was not easy. Only have the sock which slides over the sail closing it came down. We then had to lower the sail with the spinaker halyard and packed it away. If the wind is around force 2 we will bring it up and sort it out. Right no thats not an option. We did not catch anything but the lures we almost at the surface and we were maybe to fast. I added a 200gram lead weight and that entangled everything. Not nice :-) Weather is mostly clouded a...

Uneventful night. The wind had died down and we motored. The Parasailor is now up and pulling us with 6knots. Since i did not send any dolphin picture yesterday, here is one. Positionreport has been updated, check on the link list to the right.

Often there are dolphins swimming with the boat for a while. You have the feeling they are observing you and they really like it. But if the boat is too slow they will not stay long. They like it from 5 to 10knots or even more. There were now around 20 swimming with Linocat for about 20Minutes. It was too rough and wet to get the Nikon out so i only did some snaps. Regards from 36°13,1N 010°07,2W COG 185W SOG 5kn

At 18.40 today we started to Madeira. Until 1800 they were working on the new trampoline. Course is currently 204 and Speed over ground 3.5kn. There was heavy wind this morning up to 32knots but i died down. The swell is still noticeable so lets see how we all cope with it. Soon we will be out of cell phone coverage and then i can only send emails via HF radio. Roughly every 24h i will try to update out Positionreport on this website. I might not be able to send pictures. In 20Minutes the sun will go down, then we switch radar and lights on since we are crossing the shipping lane which starts in Gibraltar. We have to keep outside the so called traffic seperation zone and therefor we are currently going a little be more south and then in 12hours we will turn a little more south west.

We have to think about Wind, temperature, waves and currents. So we need different information sources. The easiest is the internet where you can find maps like this to the left. There are current maps and predicted ones for up to 72hours and some even up to 90 hours. We also download GRIB data, which is then used to calculate wind strength and direction in 3 hour steps. The Software for this is free at www.grib.usw so you can play around with it. Seastate and winds should be OK and so we might leave if the work on the trampoline is finished today.