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Sunday, November 16th, Las Palmas, Gran Canaria
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The sister ships Zia and Following Tides sit next to
each other in the anchorage in Las Palmas, having
finally caught up to each other on Friday. After
two and a half years of emails back and forth, we felt
like we already knew each other when we finally put a
face to a name. We have been referring to them as
"our friends on Following Tides," despite having never
met in person. It is great to be able to
confirm the friendship after spending several days
together here in the Canaries. The friendship even
seems to have survived it's first test as I offered to
show them the ropes on the good places for provisioning.
Who do you think wound up helping whom carry their
purchases back to the boat?
We
still haven't seen any more of the Canaries than the
anchorage and marina in Las Palmas and the immediate
vicinity. It is hard to switch track and think
about touring after spending so much time and effort on
"getting ready." I am happy to say, however, that
we are READY. We actually spent the day today
relaxing and enjoying the festivities ashore, an annual
dinghy race put on by the local Texaco station here in
the marina and very well attended by the locals.
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We
never did quite get the whole set of rules, but it was a
costume dinghy rowing race. Zia's entry was our
little red dink (AX2), piloted by our youngest and
lightest crew members.
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They got right into the middle of the fray and had a
blast splashing and being splashed, while always keeping
their eye on the prize. As they led the pack to
the south end of the port, they figured they were
supposed to turn around and row back since there was no
one there to declare them the winners. As it was
still unclear well after the "race" was obviously over,
we decided that the goal wasn't necessary to be in the
lead, but to wreak the most havoc on ones fellow
competitors. Cassie and Juliana had a blast
either way.
In
the meantime, we keep checking the weather forecast
looking for our window to head south to the Cape Verde
Islands. Every time we download a new grib weather
file, the forecast is different. Yesterday, it was
looking like the wind would fill in late tomorrow and
give us a pretty steady ride all the way down.
This morning, it looks like we'll be using up a lot of
diesel if we leave tomorrow. The upshot is, we
don't know exactly when we will be leaving and probably
won't know for sure until just before we leave. It
will certainly be within the next three or four days.
We'll be in and out of touch on our zialater email
accounts until we land in the Caribbean. From all
we have heard, the Cape Verde Islands are pretty remote
and underdeveloped so I doubt we will have internet
access there. We'll update you as soon and often
as we can. In the meantime, keep in touch and
don't worry if we don't respond immediately.
Next Entry
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Many thanks to our friend Craig Homenko for his assistance in setting up the website.
We also would like
to thank our buddy Scott Brunner who has been kind
enough to host the website on his server.
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