Horta

 FIONA Rafted up the the Marina in Horta

07/09/02

    I have been delinquent in updating the log since we arrived in Horta.  It has been such a pleasure to be tied up at a dock, however precarious it was, and be able to come and go as I please.  We arrived about 1730 in the harbor.  TUAQ had contacted the harbormaster, who came out to meet us in his launch and took the tow rope from us. 

    When we arrived at the marina reception, there were ten or fifteen boats tied up along the concrete dock, waiting.  Eric went to find the customs office to clear in and find out where they wanted us to dock.  David and I stayed with the boat.  This was a massive marina, with a few hundred boats present.  The marina was surrounded with a concrete dock and seawall what was about 10 yards wide.  On the interior were a number of floating docks with fingers.  Boats were tied up along the concrete docks, rafted up to three abreast.  Every square inch of the concrete was covered with brilliantly painted signs from yachts that had passed through.  No doubt that one of the tasks during this stay would be to repaint the FIONA sign that had certainly disappeared since the last time Eric was here in 1986. 

    We were sent to raft up next to a boat occupied by two Frenchmen and a woman from Canada.  It took quite a bit of getting used to the maneuvering required to get on and off the French boat onto the dock.  They advised us that we were not to wear shoes while crossing the boat, so I kept my shoes on the dock.  At low tide, it was a good eight foot climb up the wall on a rusted steel ladder, hanging onto a tire at the top situated around a giant cleat.  The first few times I did it I was a little nervous, but I got better.  David and I went to take a shower.  We were informed by the attendant that it would cost 1.50 Euros for the shower (for that they provide soap and a towel), and they were closing in five minutes!!  We rushed back to the boat to get money, and came back in time to have our first real shower in almost a month.

    After that, David and I went to see if we could spot Juanona, as we still had their jerry cans to return.  We spotted them rafted a few rows away from us, then took a little walk, where we saw a sign for an internet café, which was a couple of blocks away.  We went to check that out, and I sent an e-mail to Sue informing her of my safe arrival.  We went back to the boat, but Eric was not there, so we decided to look for him at the Peter Café Sport, where we had talked about going.  David and I went in and had a beer and looked around.  It was quite crowded and there was no place to sit.  We didn’t see a sign of Eric. 

    After the beer, we went out to make phone calls.  I called Sue at home and her cousin Jeff from Arizona answered.  He and Natalie were visiting for the Fourth of July.  She sounded teary as we spoke.  I agreed to call again the next day at 2200, which is 1800 her time.  At that time Eric showed up and we went to Peter’s for dinner.  We had the grilled swordfish, which was cooked with garlic and lots of olive oil.  It was quite delicious.  Eric then went back to the boat and David and I wandered around a little, then stopped at the marina bar for a couple of beers.

    The next day we got started early.  We got all our laundry together, and I was put in charge of getting that done.  Eric and David set to work on the boat’s long to-do list.  We launched the dinghy and Eric went to the bow and disconnected the bobstay chain at the waterline, then we disconnected it at the top and measured it.  The total amount of chain we needed was 104”.  We also took the roller furler apart and saw that the extrusion was broken off in the drum, so we would need to get a new lower extrusion piece.  Eric went to Mid Atlantic Yacht Services, and found they didn’t have any chain available.  Also, to get parts for the Pro-Furl would be at least a week.  If we wanted to get out on schedule we would need to come up with alternatives.  For the bobstay chain, we would be able to cut a section from Eric’s spare anchor chain, which is 7/16” galvanized, bigger than the chain we are replacing.  For the broken extrusion, Eric used the Dremel tool to cut off the bottom part of the extrusion that was broken, and fit new bearings (which he had spares for) by tapping new screw holes in the bottom.  Our next worry is that the remaining extrusion is long enough to accommodate the jib. 

    The Dremel tool is an amazing thing.  Eric uses these little grinding wheel attachments to cut everything, from the heavy aluminum extrusion to the 7/16” chain links. 

    The entire day Friday was spent doing boat chores.

    During the day on Friday, our friends that we had met in Flores (Cegonha of Falmouth) arrived, and we met them for drinks at the Marina Bar later that afternoon. 

    After dinner, David and I went wandering around, and while I was on the phone with Sue, David found a local festival, which he came back and directed me to.  By the time I got there the music had stopped, but the food stands were still open, and I got a donut and a bottle of peach nectar.  Peach is a very popular flavor here.

Peter Café Sport, the Local Yachtie Bar

    On Saturday we spent the morning doing more boat chores.  We had to send Eric up the mast to check the top of the extrusion, then replace the topping lift line.  We went to Peter Café Sport for lunch, and to see the scrimshaw museum upstairs.  The service was terrible.  Afterwards, Eric complained to the waiter about the poor service, and it turned out the waiter was Peter, the owner of the bar!  The scrimshaw exhibit was quite impressive, though Eric remembered seeing more things  he last time he was here in 1986. 

    Saturday afternoon I wandered around the town on my own.  I found a small market where I was able to  buy a Horta t-shirt for 2 Euros, and also verified that they had the Porto Branco (white Port) that Eric had been looking for, at 5.50 Euros a bottle.  I then walked to the other side of  town where there was a beach in a harbor that was formed by an old volcanic crater. 

The Town of Horta from up on the Mountain

    On Sunday we went to the market to get the Porto Branco, then took a taxi on a tour of the island.  We went to see Caldeira, the giant dormant volcano in the middle of the island, and viewed the massive crater.  Then we drove along the south coast of the island to Capelo on the west coast.  All along the trip, we saw houses that were in ruins from the earthquake in 1998, and much new construction.  At Capelo, there is a museum that details the great volcanic eruption that took place from 1957 to 1958.  During this event, a new peninsula was added to the island.  We drove out to see the old lighthouse, which was on the  water at the time of the eruption, and now looks like it is in the middle of the desert.  From there, we had to rush back to be at the marina by four, as that was the planned departure time of the French boat which was rafted between us and the dock.  It was nice when the French boat left, as we were then right next to the dock and could wear shoes whenever we wanted. 

    Later on, we met another boat from Flores, John and Ann on Faustina II out of Ireland, and had dinner with them that  night. 

    Monday morning we went grocery shopping.  The local supermarket was pretty well stocked, though there were some things we couldn’t find, such as canned soup, canned meats (spam and corned beef) and yeast.  We bought 352 Euros worth of food, and got a taxi to take it all back to the marina.  When we got back we had two new boats rafted up next to us. 

    In the afternoon I walked around the town again, and went into some of the shops.  There was not much in the way of shopping in Horta.  Eric and I also spent over an hour in the Post Office, waiting on line to get stamps.  They had a take-a-number system.  There were twenty five people ahead of us, and only two clerks working – very slowly.  We had dinner at a local Pizzeria that night.  The Pizza was very salty, and Eric would talk about that for months. 

    The next morning (July 9) was time to depart.  We backed out of the raft-up, leaving our two neighbors behind.  Before we left, Max Fletcher (Juanona) came to take a picture of us.  Max had given us a copy of an article he had written for SAIL magazine about his trip around Cape Horn on a Westsail 32 (“CHRISTOPHER ROBIN”).  As we departed, the crew of Cegonha came out to bid us farewell, and wave a can of yeast that they wanted to give us. 

FIONA's Signature on the Concrete Jetty

    Our next stop was the fuel dock, where we were directed to raft up next to a huge wooden Danish boat.  We didn’t realize they had a yardarm rigged, which is a spar that is hung high in the rigging and sticks out perpendicular to the boat.  The yardarm got crossed in our rigging, and before we knew it, had disconnected the running backstay, breaking the light line that we had used to secure it amidships.  Luckily no damage was done to the permanent rigging.  David was sent off to Cegonha to fetch the yeast while Eric and I began the fueling process.  I dug out the jerry cans from the bottom of the sail locker.  After our previous experience with diesel fuel, we wanted to have every possible tank filled. 

    We shoved off from the fuel dock at 1000 – right on schedule.  Eric had to reassemble Victor, which had been disassembled on the way in so as not to interfere with the towing bridle.  I was reprimanded for allowing the halyard to become fouled when I loosened it to attach the shackle to the mainsail head.  It is very important to keep tension on the halyard so it doesn’t wrap around something on the mast, ladder steps, or the steaming light.  This time it got fouled on both, and I had to do a lot of playing with the halyard to get it to run free. 

    We started off with a nice west wind, which was good because our heading was SSE.  This later veered to NW and we set the whisker pole and preventer for a run. 

    By the time I came on watch aqt 2400, we were reaching on port tack with a nice 12 knot NE wind, which has so far continued through Wednesday.  We made 133 miles in the first day.  If we keep this up, we should be in the Canaries by Monday.