Atlantic Crossing

Cami De Conto

‘How was the crossing? How was it with Chris?’ These are the most asked questions we got since we arrived in Brazil. And I think they are one of them most difficult questions to answer.. from how do I start? The crossing was great, we have loads of highlights and unforgettable memories that we made, we didn’t have any problem, nothing broke down, nobody got sick or hurt, we didn’t have any problems with water supply, energy supply, food supply… and we went faster than expected, at least two days faster than we predicted. It was just perfect. And Chris, he is a natural. He navigates in the rocking boat as if he was in a normal house. He eats like a baby, he plays like a baby, he sleeps like a baby.. everything normal, but his house can move from A to B 😃 I don’t even think he noticed that something was happening. He certainly missed going on land and exploring his brand new walking skills, but we managed to improvise and walked him everyday on the deck, with him wearing his toddler harness and lifeline ❤️ a real little sailor 😁 For this trip we had our friend from Curaçao, Harry, joining us. Harry had never really sailed before, but he grew up in Curaçao, at the water, on motor boats, fishing every weekend. Harry was walking in the boat as if he was at home, and was very happy to have this opportunity of crossing the Atlantic. His goal was to fish, he wanted to fish big Atlantic fishes. We were so happy about it and very supportive for him to achieve his goal ahahhaha. Highlights of this trip: -it was fast! We did more than 1300nm in 10 days. For our 39foot heavy old lady, this is pretty fast - we tend to estimate our trip length by using an average boat speed of 4,5kts. We rarely saw the meter marking less than 6.0kts this trip, and for the last 30h, we didn’t even see it getting less than 7,0kts. That’s very fast, my friends. And all without losing any comfort. It was a great trip. -doldrums. We navigated on one of the most unstable zones of the world. We only had two or three big squall that we didn’t manage to go around. All of the other - many - we could track them on our radar and change the course to go in front or behind them. It was impressive also to see how fast they build up and how fast they dissipate. -my birthday! I celebrated my 35th birthday in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. That was really special. And I got a skateboard from Jurri. It was one of the happiest days of my life ahahah. -fishing! We got 3 huge Mahi Mahi. 2 of them came on my birthday. We also had one Wahoo, but we released it back as it was more on the small side and it was going to be a lot of work for not so much food, so we decided to give a second chance for the fish and released it back to the ocean. We also lost 3 lures. So big fishes were messing with us. -Message in a Bottle! We sent a message in a bottle when we celebrated the halfway trip. I hope it really arrives somewhere and someone contact us. -equator crossing initiation. Maybe my favourite highlight. I was the only Shellback on board, so I had the pleasure to welcome the three polliwogs into this selective group of people that already crossed the equator line by boat. I dressed up as king Neptune, let them scrub the deck, made them eat a slimy overnight oats without using cutlery, made a quiz with a couple of questions and for every wrong answer, I marked their face with a permanent lipstick. Ahahahha so much fun. The ceremony ended with them jumping in the water (there was no wind and we were just floating around - and of course they had a life line and were well secured). Last but not least, we had a good shot of rum for King Neptune, including a shot for him that we threw in the ocean. -fresh bread. Captain Kloek opened the Atlantic Ocean Bakery and we had fresh bread almost everyday. Nhaminhaminhami. -upon arrival in Brazil, i hoisted the Brazilian courtesy flag. What a moment to remember, hoisting the flag of my home country after an ocean passage. Mama, I’m home 🤩 We happily anchored the boat at Baía de Santo Antônio, surrounded by dolphins, just before sunset, in a fairly tale like scenery. Just wow.