The Adventures of Tintin

We are enjoying a relaxed time exploring St Lucia and Martinique, with Lizzie, James and Bridget who are with us for a few weeks before we set off on the next leg of our journey with the World Arc. We will be in the company of about 35 other yachts when we set sail in mid January bound for Columbia, then Panama. On board we will be joined by Nicki Murray and Richard Shaw. Meanwhile, there's plenty of time for fun! Swimming, snorkelling, messing about in the water, exploring ashore, hiking. It feels strange to be in the warm sun at Christmas 🎄 but we are coping!

Yes, that sleep last night was so good! Today we have been washing off seasalt, sail mending, finding a man to fix the fridge, meeting Mr Sparkle, and doing St Lucia arrival admin. Jimmy has jumped ship, having found a crew berth on a boat heading north - he is heading to the Virgin Islands to meet family. We have also been welcoming other boats in and reliving the moment from our arrival yesterday. We won't be blogging daily for a little while whilst we stay put in Rodney Bay. More news anon...

And on to the final challenge: docking in Rodney Bay Marina. Despite fishing line round our propeller and swirling winds, Rob managed to reverse Tintin into our berth, with brilliant help from the shorebased ARC team. Fenders, mooring lines - all done: then we stepped ashore - we had finished. Elation and relief, both in equal measure. Clapping and cheering from the welcoming party of ARC team,  other sailors, and the marina staff who were there to hand us all a glass of ice cold rum punch and a basket of fruit. We could hear snatches of kettledrums carried on the wind. We had arrived. I had enormous sense of thankfulness that we had managed this trip safely, and that the crew had worked so well together. Despite being such a long way from shore I had a sense that we were never alone. The emails we received from many of you helped with this so much. Thank you.

I will try to share what it felt like when we arrived at Rodney Bay yesterday. Approaching St Lucia in the morning, the island grew steadily larger and brighter before us. It was a beautiful, sparkly day to make landfall. Having seen no other ARC yachts for a few days, four others appeared over the horizon, to port and starboard, all converging together on the northern end of the island. The game was afoot! Latent competitive streaks emerged in the crew as tactics were discussed - take the corner wide or close? When, and exactly how, to change from the downwind sting ray sail to the mainsail and genoa (as the final stretch to reach Rodney Bay would be with the wind from our side and then pretty much on the nose)?  The sense of anticipation at landfall grew steadily, the reaslisation dawning that we really really have sailed across the Atlantic ocean. But with it I also felt a slight wistfulness for the finishing of this incredible time. After 3 weeks as a crew perf

We're bobbing around 150Nm short of St Lucia. The wind is about 10kn -just enough to keep us moving albeit not very fast. Air temperature 32.5 deg C; Water 25 deg C. We're all feeling hot! I can feel your sympathy from here. We're all looking forward to dry land tomorrow; although it will be slightly odd moving out of our own little world into life with more than 4 others around!

Apart from the famed rum punch of St Lucia hospitality Rob: an unbroken night's sleep Jimmy: meeting Mr Sparkle (who does laundry at Rodney Bay Marina, our destination in St Lucia). Not wetting his bed. Error, I mean not having a wet bed (James sleeps right next to the watermaker which apparently sometimes leaks a little when the end product is being tested) Ben: A bed without a food locker under it, so your bed doesn't need to be dismantled when foraging for supplies. Rum Mojitos. A cricket match, and a hair cut Fred: sleeping in a bed that doesn't try to roll you out of it at random intervals. A kitchen that doesn't move, with cupboards you can open and find exactly what you are looking for right at the front. Rum Mojitos, and a hair cut too , apparently Jo: A big green salad. A flushing loo. A long and still sleep. Things staying exactly where you out them, just for a bit. The colour green to look at (the seascape is very blue and grey, beau

You might think that we are a crew of 5, but actually we are 6. The hardest-working member of the crew is Wendy, our Windpilot self-steering mechanism. She needed a bit of training to start with, but from about day 2 onwards she steered the boat for at least 80% of the time, coping with big seas and strong winds with barely a complaint in 2500Nm. Yesterday, however, she suffered an injury that has put her off-duty until St Lucia. For a few days nows, we've been passing lumps of seaweed. Yesterday, the lumps became more and more common until we were regularly ploughing through fields of the stuff. Poor Wendy, innocently waving her rudder around at anything upto 10-11 knots must have hit one (or more) of these clumps. A sacrificial shear pin broke as designed saving major damage, but a push-rod has become bent requiring some minor land-based surgery. So, it's hand-steering and autopilot for the last couple of days of the trip.

While we are at sea we can post blog entries by email via our sat phone, but we are unable to view the blog and see any comments or questions that have been posted. So if you do post a comment, could you also email it to tintin@redholme.com ? This has just been brought to our attention, thanks Alice. The answer to the porridge club question is 1:3 (2 of water and one of milk) and a 5 minute simmer for the best ever result. When we arrive in St Lucia we hope we will get connected and will be able to respond to any questions. 302 miles to go...

We were thinking about life on Tintin, and discussing the luxuries that we have that we really appreciate. We're more easy-going that 'Desert Islands Discs, so allowed ourselves 3 each Jimmy (travelling light - so only one item): I couldn't survive without my spiky ball. The rest of the crew don't really know what its for, but the relief it gives me as I roll it around my bottom is immense. Like all good things on the boat it serves multiple uses and I enjoy cuddling up with it at night and using it as a stress ball after those rigging changes which didn't go quite as smoothly as they might. Rob: My 3 luxury items are: Jo's noise-canceling headphones. Lying in my bunk I constantly hear the noises of the boat; the creak of the halyard, the whine of the water pump, the low hum of the fridge -all above the whoosh of the waves. Occasionally it's really nice to turn all that noise off. Chocolate - some people may know I like chocolate.

we've been at sea 2 weeks now, December is well underway. We've a little set of Christmas lights and a tiny Christmas tree, but otherwise it feels most un-Christmasy here. Clear blue skies, 30deg C, gentle easterly - no drizzle, brexit votes or Christmas shopping. With 1000Nm to go, the crew started to think that we were almost across and thoughts moved to Rum Punches and watching West indies play cricket. Now with 600Nm to go, the reality has dawned on us that it's still a long way to go - albeit much less than before. However, we're making serene progress and morale remains very high. We're flying the double code-0 sail - now dubbed the stingray because of its shape. We've found that by only using 1 pole, it sets much better and provides better boat speed in moderate winds. Overnight some boats reported frustrating progress in light winds, but the big area of the stingray kept us moving nicely. The Angling Society reconvened this mor

It is beginning to feel a bit more tropical as we continue west towards St Lucia. The last few days have brought squally clouds with drenching rain in the darkness of the night, and today we have less wind and temperatures in the low 30s. As tempting as the cobalt blue waters are that surround us, a swim right now wouldn't be clever: it would be very difficult to stop the boat and the ocean swell would make climbing on board a tricky challenge (and I will admit that in my head there is always the thought of what might be lurking in the thousands of metres below us...) We have been visited by a group of 3 white longtailed tropic birds. Imagine a dove with a sleeker shape and one long feather in the middle of the fan of tailfeathers and you will get the picture. They circled us a few times, giving the impression they might land on the top of the mast but then thought the better of it. After some very elegant coordinated flying they squawked and continued on their way,

Tintin is an "outstanding" yacht. Its core curriculum, to get to St Lucia, is first rate and loved ones can have a high degree of confidence that this will be achieved. Compared with the rest of the fleet, Tintin has excellent facilities, first rate officers and a strong sense of teamwork; some other boats have been deemed "unsatisfactory" or "requires improvement" (at safety inspection) and a few have retired due to equipment failure. But what sets Tintin apart is our fine array of extra curricula activities. Tintin offers many clubs and societies which crew members can join. Crew members are encouraged to participate in as many as possible in order to fulfill their potential (and to maximise their chances of progressing their sailing careers at the highest level after their arrival at St Lucia). Bums & Tums Get those abs working to some banging tunes - the best way to start the day. We recommend harnesses are worn at all times a

The last 24 hours have been reasonably eventful I think it's fair to say with a milestone being passed and a new record for our books too. The story starts at 0600 TTT (Tintin Time) when I rose from my cabin to take over from Mr Captain Doug and commence my watch. When we handed over the general message was: everything is going fine, the wind is blowing us in the right direction, and as always just follow the arrow. Given we were over halfway and I had done enough night watches the know what's what I thought I had another dreamy, star gazing two hours ahead of me. Oh how wrong I was. The first half an hour went by without cause for anyone's eyebrows to be raised. After a while I started to get bored of just looking at the same constellations over and over again so I started to let my eyes wander further afield. Nothing to worry about on the port side, or the starboard side for that matter. So I cast my eyes behind me beyond the stern to see a wall of black

We've now past 1/2 way having about 1260nm to St Lucia and logged about 1590 nm since Gran Canaria. Last night we celebrated with a bottle of English Champagne (if that isn't an oxymoron) courtesy of Katherine Gurney. She had suggested that we drink it on our departure from Lisbon - which seems an ago now - but we were rather preoccupied with the sea and wind at the time, so it was appreciated much more last night. We opened a box of assorted goodies from Ferry Hill this morning. A fantastic assortment of treats. Fred was particularly keen on the anti-shine skin cream, and the individual portion of demerara sugar will surely be useful. Last night we took down the big double-headed sail - now christened 'stingray' because of its shape - and just used a pole-out genoa. We went a fair bit slower but it was a more gentle ride in the bows. Putting up the stingray this morning was not a slick operation with so many lines to get in the right place. It&#

We're now entering the 9th day at sea and have settled into a steady rhythm. We decided in Las Palmas to have a fixed watch pattern, so that we don't need to change waking and sleeping times each day. We've also decided to stick with UTC as we cross westwards, meaning that each day sunrise and sunset move about 10 minutes later. The day's shape is determined by the sun and sea and our changing position across the ocean. My day starts at 3:50 when I drag myself out of bed for the 4:00 to 6:00am watch. For the first few days, this watch was lit by a bright moon - now however the moon is thin and doesn't get up until nearly the end of my watch. In another couple of days it'll be black all night. We try to set the sails so that there's little or no active sail management required at night - and thus far this watch has been event-free, which is just how I like it. By this time of night, the great bear is visible to the north, pointing the way

After our initial kit check and foray into the boats tackle box (there are lots of nasty looking hooks and lures), we convened the first meeting of the angling society today to prepare our assault on the mid-Atlantic fishing stocks. Having lost one lure the previous night, we replaced the line on one reel and selected 2 of the ugliest lure and hook combos, and deployed the lines - one on a rod, one on a hand reel. With expectations high, we sat back, watched and waited, with visions of endless battles with a fish - a test of cunning and nerve, skill and technique, etc.... What actually happened depends on how you like to digest your news. In this post-modern world, we have the new concept of alternative facts to help us to make sense of the confusion around us, and so, here is my take on what happened next. To say that we were not successful, is a gross over-simplification of the reality. We never stated explicitly that we wanted to land a fish on the boat....ins

Dear reader, I am happy to tell you that Tintin is now looking suitably seasonal. 2 advent gifts were produced yesterday by Fred - from Kathryn, thank you! We now have a mini Christmas tree which is in pride of place on the saloon table and a garland of LED Christmas lights hanging up above, which lend the boat a festive ambience. Together with Ben's Xmas songs playlist the spirit of Christmas on board Tintin is growing. Yesterday was a day when we solved quite a few problems - all very satisfying - and we then had quite a bouncy night with winds gusting 30 knots for a while. We agreed that it would be Ok to have a more relaxing Sunday and so far we are. We are making wonderful progress with a very steady 18-20 knots of ENE behind us and the blue water runner hoisted and poled out both sides in the bow. The sun is shining, and the sky is blue with a few fluffy cumulus scattered about. An hour ago we had a visit from our first pod of dolphins for days and they wer

From Jimmy.... Yesterday evening a spinnaker halyard broke, which I'll let those more qualified than me explain elsewhere, except to say that it felt as if the potential consequences were going to make reaching St Lucia a whole lot more challenging. Until then I'd been wholly confident of a more or less incident free cruise across the Atlantic in the capable hands of Rob and Jo. But equipment failure like this really brings it home how far from land we are and how vulnerable we could be. We had some good advice at one of the excellent seminars laid on pre-start that when something goes wrong, it's probably not as bad as it seems - have a cup of tea, discuss the problem and come up with a plan to sort it out. Our plan required climbing the mast to feed a new halyard through a block fixed at the very top. Last time I climbed Tintin's mast was a year ago on a windless day in the safe surroundings of the Bag at Salcombe. That was in Rob's "

And a few more than 2000 miles to go. Already I'm thinking that this voyage will seem to fly by. Yesterday we reached the first waypoint on our simple passage plan (the second one is St Lucia). The idea of heading in a more southerly direction initially is to pick up the favourable west going current (thanks for the help tracking it, Steve) and the ENE tradewinds. So we duly altered course by 15 degrees, changing from a run to a very broad reach. The wind is keeping up at 20-28 knots so we are making steady progress, despite the large swell with a slightly confused sea which is making the boat corkscrew around a fair bit at the moment. Tricky when pouring tea! It is now a rarity to see another boat on the horizon, although last night we passed within a mile of a Norwegian yacht and had a brief chat with them on the VHF radio. A highlight of yesterday was the freshly baked loaf of saucepan bread made by Ben. Perfect! Wildlife update: last night we had our f

It's 0230 and half an hour into my two hour watch. There's 4/8 cloud cover so the constellations aren't as easy to spot as they have been over the last few nights. We work on a 24 cycle of two watches each, always at the same times apparently to avoid jet lag, which wasn't something I was expecting to get on a 21 day sea crossing. But it means the sky looks very familiar every night and we're getting to know what is above our heads. The boat is on a steady course, there's just one other boat, a red dot on the horizon, and I'm pretty confident I can write uninterrupted for a while. We're a happy crew below decks. The three of us share a scrubbing rota (we excuse the skipper and his mate from swabbing out the heads). But the mate joins us for cooking duties and every fourth day we cook an evening meal - last night Jo gave us "dirty rice", a Withers staple which tastes a lot better than it sounds. Our rations are plenty, and

As we pass over the Tropic of Cancer and begin to bear down on the trade winds we are all starting to settle into the rhythm of our daily life on Tintin. Dictated by our regular watch pattern we have found ourselves slinking off to the foredeck or our cabins for a post lunch siesta. This is a completely new way of life for me, as this passage is easily the longest spent at sea, and I am loving it. It seems as though the repetitive swell of the sea and the continuous groan of the spinnaker halyard is almost infectious, causing us to follow similar patterns. So far all watches have been a treat with Wendy the windpilot taking almost all of the work off our hands leaving me to either marvel at the sunset in my afternoon watch, or study the stars, planets and constellations (and how on earth the jumble of stars depict the image they are named for.) Being on a boat captained by Mr Rob Withers, food is a very important thing and am delighted to report that after 3 meals,

We can't quite believe the steady NE breeze of 12-20 knots that is gently pushing us on our way. Last night our wind pilot (Wendy) did almost all the helming for us, allowing the person on watch to indulge in a bit of stargazing until the big moon rose and lit up the night. Today dawned bright and clear, and now there are fluffy cumulus clouds dotted around. We can see about 4 boats on the horizon around us now, as the fleet fans out. I've just come off watch, having done 8-11am. It's a perfect watch to do, starting just after sunrise, and it feels as though it is just me and the big wide ocean. As the rest of the crew gradually emerge from their bunks I am offered tea, then porridge, then coffee - and all I am doing is steering with an occasional tweak to the sail. Hand steering in these conditions is a complete joy, as the boat is well trimmed and the sea state is pretty smooth. It's allowing us to make about 7 knots. It's admin "hour"

we're now about 100nm or so south-west of Gran Canaria blowing gently downwind. I hope that we got a blog entry sent after the start yesterday giving a flavour of the colour and excitement of 200 boats starting a transatlantic trip together. We can't actually check the blog from here - it's more "fire and forget", so please tell us if the latest blog entry didn't make it online. Soon after the start we took down the main and genoa and deployed our secret weapon - the 'bluewater ruuner'. This is 2 generously-cut genoas joined together down the luff on a roller-furling unit which pole-out on both sides. It gives a big, stable slab of sail to take downwind. We made progress through the fleet during the evening although this stalled in the early hours as wind subsided for a couple of hours. During the night the fleet spread out so that we can now see only 2 yachts clearly out the original 200. Where have they all gone? It's now

The Spanish naval ship fired our starting gun at 1pm. Perfect downwind sailing weather has turned up for us today and we are sailing south around Gran Canaria. It's a beautiful start to the trip.

Today we went shopping. The set up in Las Palmas is well honed for sailors: at the check out we ask for our stores to be delivered to Tintin on pontoon G, berth 32, and an hour or so later they are delivered by very cheerful delivery men. Within a couple of hours today we received our butchers delivery - including a leg of dry cured "jamon", the fruit and veg that we had chosen earlier this morning at Hyper Dino, and dry stores from our trip to El Corte Ingles.                                      By the time Rob and Jimmy Heath had returned from the skippers briefing, the fruit and veg were washed (to remove any stowaway bugs) dried, and stowed, the fridge had been filled, and dry stores were all packed away in lockers.  A calm and sunny day has made our last preparations much easier. We've rehearsed our downwind sailing rig - including rigging the spinnaker poles on the mast at the foredeck. Fred and Jimmy  have checked out the fishing gear - taking advic

We've had requests for more details about Tintin and what the boat is like, so we've had fun this morning producing this video: A higher resolution version of this can been seen  here Director; Jimmy Heath Starring: Jo Withers With David Gurney and Ben Gurney Editor: Rob Withers

It was lovely to have a visit today from Rob's niece Laura, husband Rob and daughter Grace, who made it across Gran Canaria despite the teeming rain to visit us on Tintin. Grace charmed us all.  

I was warned to learn to love lists as we run up to departure, and certainly there have been many. Here is this week's main to do list. I think we are winning!

There are still 3 more days to prepare for the crossing, but we are much closer to being ready than we were.  Yesterday felt as tough all the lists - and there are several - got longer rather than shorter.  Today was better and I think all the crew think we're pretty close to being ready.   A manifold valve had broken in the watermaker, so we've rigged up a work-around and tested it.  It produces sweet-tasting water even from the unpromising raw material of Las Palmas marina.  We completed servicing the engine.  It was slightly disappointing to find that the fuel filters that I had bought in bulk were just the wrong size, but we've found one of the correct size - so the engine is in tip-top shape. Most importantly, however, is that the bulk of the provisioning has been done.  A drinks delivery in the morning and a huge grocery shop in the afternoon by Jo, James and Ben means that the bulk of the food is now onboard - crammed into any available hole.  Meat will arrive on

We have a week to prepare Tintin for the Atlantic crossing, and at times it feels as though we are creating lists faster than crossing things off them! But we welcomed Fred (aka David, my brother) and Ben back on board yesterday so now we have many hands on deck. We have inspected our rig at deck level and up the mast - looking to make sure that any things that should be able to move, can do so, and checking that things that shouldn't move, don't. We feel the shrouds (the guy lines that hold up the mast) to find if any wires have snapped (all good so far) and we check that no cracks can be seen on the mast or boom. We check that shackles are done up tightly and that ropes are not showing signs of chafe. This is something we will need to check for on a daily basis when we sail, trying to make sure that ropes don't constantly rub on things that will make them wear out. At the top of the mast it was quite windy but at least the boat wasn't moving much. It is

On Thursday evening we had a great meal at a Tapas bar in Santa Cruz.  Run by a couple of old(ish) men, it was as Spanish in atmosphere as could be.  It specialised in ham with several dozen legs of Bellota Iberico ham hanging behind the bar - we had several delicious dishes and too much red wine before staggering back to the boat.   We had decided to leave a day early as the winds looked slightly more favourable to sail on Friday rather than Saturday, so we'll have to leave our exploration on the interior of Tenerife and cycling up the volcano for another time.  The wind started off well, and we had several hours going downwind towards Gran Canaria.  It then died a little and whilst we could sail, we wouldn' t have reached Las Palmas before dark - so we put the engine on.  James and I (Rob) both felt slightly queasy in the rolling sea - could be just 1st day at sea, too much red win or the effects of a jab the day before. Hauling up the mainsail - James v concerned D

We're now back onboard in Tenerife, having had a tremendous send-off. Everybody seemed very happy to see us finally set off for the longest stretch of our trip. It was slightly strange leaving the house at 4:00am yesterday- dark, deserted and shut-up. Our plan is not to be back until July although there will be people coming and going and looking after the place fairly frequently. We (Rob, Jo & James) will have a couple of days here in Tenerife before heading across to Gran Canaria where David and Ben will be joining us on Sunday. The ARC people have started sending our emails every evening telling us of all the events we're missing out on by no being in Las Palmas already - which mostly seems to be drinks parties. Apparently, "almost everybody" had arrived by yesterday. We'll just be fashionably late. Our routine has started already - James is currently leading the "Bums and Tums" session at the end of the pontoon for everybody who is keen

We're currently getting ready to return to Tintin next week, prior to setting off across the Atlantic. As a reminder of last year's trip to Norway via Scotland, and also to try my skills at video-editing and vlogging, here's a brief compilation of drone footage from 2017: Viewers should be aware that the weather was not always like this!

We arrived in Marina Santa Cruz at about 5:00am this morning, having motored almost all of the previous day.  In all, the trip from Madeira was a pleasant contrast from the passage from Cascais.  The sun shone, the waves were gentle and we could relax on board.  Whilst it's really important to know that the boat, equipment and people can cope in a blow, it's really nice not to have to do it very often! So, it's a slow day today - doing washing and domestic chores to get the boat ready for leaving for 3 weeks.  We're returning to the UK - returning in mid-November. Washing day in marina Santa Cruz

Having said goodbye to David and Ben in Madeira, we set off from Quinta Do Lorde yesterday morning for the 260Nm south to Tenerife. The position of the marina - at the base of a 100m vertical cliff at the very narrow eastern end of the island - means that alarming katabatic winds form in the marina as the wind climbs over the ridge before plunging vertically downwards. Although not violent, the noise of these gust running through the rigging was enough to give the skipper a fretful night wondering how to extricate ourselves from our berth safely. When the moment came, RYA training worked and it absolutely fine and we motored out to a flat sea and lovely northerly wind. Yesterday, we bowled along either goose-winged our broad reaching making good time in great conditions. The wind died in the evening and the engine went on at 10pm. We're still puttering along now with barely a breath of wind - hope to be in Tenerife tonight - probably 4am or similar again1

We arrived in Madeira at at about 4:00am yesterday morning.  David is claiming  victory in the arrival time sweepstake because his guess was almost spot on.  However, James is also claiming victory because we didn't actually arrive in Funchal, we stopped just up the coast at Quinta do Lorde.  Having said the latest time, he reasoned, he was therefore closest.  We stopped at Quinta Do Lorde because, as we picked up phone signal nearing the islands, an email arrived saying that Funchal marina had, as of that day, stopped taking non-local boats.  Really not helpful to get that at midnight after a 500Nm sail.  Anyway, it was fortunate that we could go to Quinta Do Lorde easily - it was nearer and has plenty of room. Safely arrived The last few hours of the passage we pretty memorable. As night started to fall, the wind picked from Force 4/5 to Force 7 gusting 8. We went from full sail to 2nd reef main and no genoa in 15mins and started a moonlit sleigh-ride past the island of Por

After the trying first couple of days, the weather has settled down and is atoning for its histrionics last week. We've had a good 24 hour run on a nice broad reach making between 6-8knots. It's overcast and the under the occasional shower the wind gets up a bit. We think that we're also getting some assistance from the Canaries current, which flows south down the coast of Africa. At supper last night, the sweepstake on arrival times varied between midnight and 5:00am tommorrow morning. With 125Nm to run, I still fancy my entry of 3:06am

Well, if the past week has told us anything, it is that weather forecasts are not necessarily accurate! After the days of plotting and predicting the track of ex-hurricane Leslie the various grib models still couldn't quite agree where (s)he would make landfall - and they were all wrong anyway! Landfall was earlier than most models predicted and a bit further north - saving us from the worst of it. It was fun watching 'Life of Brian' while also keeping any eye of the weather. The wind (inside the marina) peaked at F9 then abruptly dropped to about 15kn before going back up to gale force from the other direction. The pressure, meanwhile, dropped to 1004 then rose back up to 1008 during the film! Since our departure the forecasts haven't been great either. As we left there was the predictable swell but whereas the forecast had the wind moving to the west F5 - What we got was steady F7 gusting 9 with us trying to get as close to the wind was we cou

Last night was a bit blowy, as the remains of Hurricane Leslie whistled by. The epicentre was, luckily for us, a little further north. Yesterday afternoon was calm and sunny, and here in Cascais marina you could see people methodically preparing their moored boats for a big blow. Checking and doubling up mooring lines, lashing furled sails, and tidying up anything that might fly away.  We witnessed the weather changing in textbook style. As the afternoon progressed, it became hazy and cloudy but still warm. The wind gradually rose in strength as the barometer dropped. A walk along the shore road demonstrated to us what a great job the marina sea wall does. Waves were crashing against it and being forced to do a 180 turn. in the photos, Tintin is the third boat along the pontoon from the sea wall end, but by evening we were getting regular showers from the spume of the waves. Down below deck we were very warm and dry, enjoying a film night while gale force winds blew. This morning it is

It's lovely to be back on board Tintin for this second leg of the trip: Lisbon to the Canaries, about 750 miles. We have our Atlantic crew assembled. Joining us are James Heath, Jo's brother David Gurney and his son Ben. We plan to sail to Madeira and then on to Tenerife. The weather forecast has been changing daily, and the cut off low pressure system that we have been tracking is still causing us to pause. We are following 4 different forecasts and between them they seem sure that this low pressure will move steadily east or north east, but their predictions for its track vary significantly. One has it passing through Cascais Marina (that's where we are now) tomorrow night with peak wind speeds of around 60 knots (75mph) at midnight. Another forecast reckons it will be 700 miles further south. We intend to wait and see, with mooring lines nice and tight. So we have been treated to a few days here in Cascais. Time to explore Lisbon and surrounds and develop a taste for cus

We're starting to think about our return to Portugal on Wednesday, and the sail down to the Canaries.  For the last 2-3 months there has been a consistent F3-5 NNE down the Portuguese and African coast that would have provided great sailing.  Now, however, autumn has arrived and the weather pattern is more disrupted.  The grib file for next week shows a nasty looking low pressure area splitting away from Hurricane Leslie and making its way across the Atlantic beneath the rather squashed Azores high.  The screenshot below shows the current prediction for next weekend - when we would be approaching Madiera.  Winds of 60kn plus - probably with waves from different directions as the low passes. We really do not want to be in the way of that storm - I'm sure the boat and crew would be fine, but it would be no fun at all. The grib prediction has changed a lot since yesterday - so it's almost certain that the path and speed of the low will not be as currently predicted.  we