Author: kerrizane

Paramaribo is a pass……

July 21st, 2013 Time: -3 on GMT

We motored yesterday till midnight and the wind gave us a chance to sail. It wasn\’t very long, only about 30 miles, but nice to turn off the iron genoa\’s and give them a rest. We timed our arrival this morning at the outer sea buoy at Paramaribo for the beginning of the flood tide. However, there was constant rain, squalls, VERY SHALLOW water and muddy like the Mississippi! It was also going to be at least a 20 mile round trip up and back and it just didn\’t seem to be that appealing.

Hence, we\’re now en route to Georgetown, Guyana (former British Guyana). We\’ll be there by mid day tomorrow and we\’re sailing now with the pole to starboard (genoa) and a full main. The sun is coming out too! Speed around 6.5-7 knots. This is the most wind (12-16 knots) we\’ve seen in 8 sailing days!

It seems the strategy of being on the coast versus sailing the long haul straight line from Ascension Island is a mixed bag. We get great current, chances to stop, rest, see and experience but actually have had a much longer no wind area than the seaward route had. This is exactly the opposite of what all the \”sages\” said and as such, lots more motoring. Welcome to Mother Earth and her various moods. I\’m still glad we did it this way and would do it the same again.

We\’re 180 miles from Georgetown and only 425 miles from the top of Tobago. As such, we should be up there by sometime next week.

I also noted this morning on the weather files that another Hurricane is expected to form West of the Cape Verde Islands beginning on Thursday. This one will not come further south (if it tracks as expected) than about 14 degrees north. Not a concern for us, but it may recurve toward the mid/northern Caribbean Islands. Batten down the hatches!

The water being particularly \”murky\” is the dominant feature other than the generally fair weather cumulus clouds. The seas are calm and we feel like we\’re getting toward the end of the ITCZ.

Position Report is up, more tomorrow.
KIT,
Scott and Nikki

Space…the final frontier!…..

July 20th, 2013 Time: -3 on GMT

Happy 44th anniversary of the first walk on the moon! It was 44 years ago today that Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took that first step.

We were indeed able to get in to the Space Center tour yesterday. Despite the long waiting list, only three of us showed up for it, so we got in.
The limitation is due to the fact that they use two large busses. So, the number of seats is the limiting factor. The entire tour is in French, but for the most part I got the details. Our other \”wait lister\” spoke enough English to help out.

The facility is quite large and we were shown the buildings where the satellites are prepared to be installed on the rockets. There are three active programs here.
The Ariene 5 is strictly speaking a French affair and is the largest. Next down in size is the Russian technology (licensed by the Space Center) for the Soyuz launcher. Smallest is the Italian Vega. The Vega is mostly used for military launches if I heard correctly. Earth watching stuff with high resolution cameras.

The Soyuz is the most cost effective for commercial satellite industry and as such, the Ariene SIX is being developed. It will be smaller, very powerful and more fuel efficient. We also got to visit \”Mission Control\” in two different buildings. We could watch software being uploaded and checked. All in all quite interesting.

The next launch will be Thursday, July 25th in the late afternoon here. It can be watched LIVE on the internet. If interested, Google Korou Space Center and you\’ll find the link.

The Museum was also quite nice and fortunately the signage was also in English! There is a nice display on the history of the first lunar landing and the early space race between the Soviet Union and the USA.

We left the Korou river at low tide this morning and saw water less than 5 feet under the hulls. Glad we\’ve a catamaran with daggerboards. That way, Miss Piggy can hike up her skirts a bit to get through the shallow stuff….:-)

We again passed the Illes Salut (Salvation Islands) where the infamous Devil\’s Island is. Unfortunately, the refurbishments are just underway and there needs to be guides, not just \”self guided\” tours. I suspect in French, the tourists may get more of that? There does seem to be a small hotel/hostel on Ille Royal. We saw some peacocks; one male in full display. I\’ll post the photos when I get internet, most likely in Trinidad.

It\’s an over nighter to Paramaribo, Suriname, we should be there around mid day tomorrow.
KIT!
Scott and Nikki

Cayenne to Ille de Salut (Devil\’s Island)…..

July 19th, 2013 – Time: -3 on GMT

We were able to rent a car in Cayenne and a very nice young guy who spoke fluent English (originally from Guiana ex: Brit Colony) gave us a bit of tour of the town.
Andre brought us to the Tourist Office and we quickly discovered that despite this being very low tourist season, the Korou Space Center tour was booked for two weeks!

We are wait listed for Friday, but it doesn\’t look good. They have a Space Museum there which can be visited for a small fee anytime. The tour, when available takes a maximum of 15 people, twice a day and is free.

We got fuel, went to Carrefours (a well known French Food Market chain). We also met a nice Scottish Couple, Ian and Meg who were anchored next to us at the marina. Marina is an odd word to use for Cayenne, it\’s more like an old rest home for very old boats. Most of these boats don\’t seem that they ever may leave the dock again. All the locals said that they were so badly maintained that they all stopped paying slip rental as a group. No one said anything and it will be interesting to see how the local politics play out. Fortunately, we\’ll be long gone by then!…:-)

The town itself is a bit old French Colonial and things don\’t look like they change very often – lots of cafe\’s and bistros. We went to \”Palmistes\” Pizza and Cafe where we had good internet briefly and an okay pizza.

We left yesterday morning for the 40 mile jaunt up to where we are at Ille de Salut. These three islands made up the infamous French Penal Colony known as \”Devil\’s Island\”. All three are quite small and within 100-200 meters of each other (250 yds). We are anchored at Ille Royal which is the main area and Ille St. Joseph is within a shout. Ille Diable (Devil\’s Island) is on the other side of Ille Royal. We\’re experiencing heavy rain at the moment and as I write we\’re waiting it out to go ashore in the dinghy. Not sure if we\’ll go to Korou to try the Space Center Tour or not. They are open tomorrow, but closed Sat/Sun/Wed and Thursday mornings. Welcome to France!…:-)

We think we can see the Space Center facilities from where we are anchored and we understand that when they launch, these islands must be cleared of all people!
We\’re due East of the facility and it\’s the direction they sling shot their Ariene spacecraft toward to maximize fuel efficiency during a launch.

I\’m not sure, but we may be able to see from here, either a real Ariene Rocket or perhaps a model at the museum which is full scale?

That\’s it for now. We\’re getting near the end of the ITCZ. The NE Trade Winds should be as close as 50-150 miles north of us.

KIT,
Scott and Nikki

Forteleza Goodbye…\”Hot\” Cayenne on the menu!…..

July 8-9th, 2013, (Western Hemisphere) Time: -3 on GMT

The Marina Park Hotel where our Marina was, hosted a \”SAMBA BRAZIL\” event last Saturday night. Nikki and I got tickets and joined the 30,000 screaming fans.
Amazingly, the \”Samba\” culture here is very alive with the youth of Brazil. It has a Justin Beiber twist to it of course, but they know all the words, the artists and go wild for it. The age range was mostly 12-25 with some parents in attendance with the young kids. We had a good time and met a young guy who is an English teacher who explained it all to us.

Sunday was really hot and mostly a recovery day for us. We really hadn\’t taken a day off since leaving Cape Town and just needed to be human beings rather than human doings…

Forteleza is a mixed bag. Hundreds of high rises, some new, but mostly quite old, lots of poor, very crowded, but in it\’s own charming way; I\’m glad we made the stop.
The big deal for us was good markets and fuel! We think our propane will hold out to Trinidad, but I\’ll check if available at our next stop in French Guyana.

We left the Marina at 9 am yesterday and of course as we\’d Med Moored, lots of stuff to put away. The winds were light from the ESE at first, but steadily picked up.
In fact, just before dark, we took in a reef and put out the staysail instead of the genoa. The really big key to this route is the Guyana Current – WOW.

Where friends Dave and Kathie of \”Sunflower\” seemed to send us endless emails about the lack of a good current or worse, a counter current, this coast is like the SE Coast of Africa. It\’s an express train! We are only on occasion moving 5 knots \”through the water\”, but \”over the ground (bottom)\” we\’re going 7.5-9 knots! AND, in the right direction, this current lasts all the way to Trinidad! Winds currently are 10 knots from the east, but we\’re going 8-9 knots. That\’s terrific. The other nice thing is that as the winds are calm the sea is very calm with a less than one meter swell behind us.

The ITCZ, (inter tropical convergence zone) however is just being entered by us and extends to about the north side of French Guyana. So, all bets are off until we get to the North East Trades from Surinam to the north. We spoke with \”OZ\” and \”Jongilanga\” on the radio today. John on Jongilanga is 215 miles north of us and OZ is about 300 miles ESE of us. They both have light winds and not as much current. I suggested they get closer to shore for better winds and of course…the current ride.

Speaking of weather, we note that Tropical Storm \”Chantal\” is just about to the Caribbean, we hope it turns north and misses Grenada. Also, another as yet un-named system is developing West of the Cape Verde Islands and looks to be a humdinger as well. Being close to the coast and of course not in the hurricane belt; the ITCZ is actually acting as a block for us of the nasty stuff up north. At least so far, the coastal route seems the way to go. We\’ll be 40-100 miles off the Amazon delta when we pass both the Para and Amazon Rivers. I\’ll go into why I\’m not comfortable stopping in Belam, Brazil in tomorrow\’s blog.

Due to the current, we did 178 nm in 21.5 hours, whoopee!

For the moment, we\’re going fast, flat, calm and happy. IT IS HOT out here now as we approach the equator. The crew appreciates the air conditioning when the generator or engines are on in the sleeping cabin.

We\’ll cross the equator in about 150 miles and should have the entire Nikki goes from \”polywog\” to \”shellback\” story…. And with that teaser, we\’ll write more tomorrow.

Feel free to drop either of us a note at the sailmail or land addresses.
KIT,
Scott and Soon to cross the Equator Nik!