Ximera - Day twentysecond - Landed

-->Will we still be able to walk? Will we remember how to walk? Will we be shy in the middle of a lot of strangers?Will Ximera crew be able to put more than two metres between each other without shout out loud for a MOB (Man Over Board)? Will the boat ever be clean again? Questions without answer, we need to put our feet on land and taste back the normal mammals life in the 21th century. Now it'sAM and we're moored in Rodney Bay, St. Lucia. The Caribbean! Thanks to all Ximera crew for this fantastic atlantic crossing, thanks to the sea for being blue, thanks to the stars to be in the sky, thanks to the plankton to be our seasky.Actually, the emotions on reaching land are diverse and extremes ... wanting land but wanting to continue ... wanting new supplies but happy with what we have. read more...

Ximera - Day sixteen - Mid-Atlantic Crossing

14∞22.96N - 42∞32.08W--13∞09.52N - 045∞04.54W We've crossed the 43∞20'W longitiude and our DDT (distance to go) on the GPS is now only in a three-digit format. At noon we are ready for this happening with our second champagne bottle. Cheers to everyone, also to whom are not in the middle of the atlantic but are with us reading this (b)log. Our cheers today are also in the hope of seeing some dolphins. On the one hand, since the ARC started in Gran Canaria we've seen dolphins almost everyday, we've written about their marvellous pankton-luminescents wakes and tracks in the night. On the other hand, in the past few days we haven't seen any more dolphins. Birds also are really rare. Maybe the middle of the atlantic is too far from land for these animals, maybe they are at a great party just. read more...

Ximera - Day twenty one - Aroma of land

14∞27.84N - 56∞51.11W-->14∞09.33N - 59∞32.12WI wake up for my watch and I realize that tomorrow we will arrive in St. Lucia after three weeks at sea. Now the GPS says 200 miles to go, 30 hours. I'm a bit sad, this is our last day of our crossing, tonight we will have our last watches and we will say goodbye to all the happy animals' names that had been our companions for these 21 days. We'll stop rolling, we 'll stop trimming sails, checking the rigging in the morning, having funny sea-bucket showers, fish incredible fish and tales, seeing beautiful and amazing sea-life phenomema and a lot more. Of course I'm happy and excited to land in the Caribbean, but I'll also be happy to continue sailing non stop to an indefinite destination. Maybe, just a quick provisioning stop for fresh. read more...

Ximera - Day twenty - Gimme one more (last) hour

14∞01.02N - 53∞43.13W -->14∞27.84N - 56∞51.11WToday we are in the Caribbean time zone (UTC -4) and we put our watches back another hour. The wind, the waves and the current consistently push our boat towards our destination. We're approaching fast, we're sailing fast, 8-9 knots with two reefs in the main sail, sometimes a bit of jib furled. At 8 o'clock in the morning 363 miles divide us from St. Lucia. Apparently (and luckily) I'll win the forecast sweepstake for arrival date and hour (Sunday 11th December at noon) that we all have declared when we were leaving the Cape Verde islands. At 0.00 of the 10 december only 248 miles from St. Lucia. We are really close now. Wow!A strange land-feeling is all over the boat...Welcome. read more...

Ximera - Day eighteen - Dozens of sunrises

13.31.64N - 047∞47.49W-->13∞51.98N - 050∞49.35WI'm on a solo watch at 5 o' clock (the 'cock watch'). I gaze up to the sky, stars and constellations patterns. On these days Jupiter rises two or three hours before the sun and I like to imagine that the sun is a bit lazy and it needs to be pulled outside the curtain of the dark by the big Jupiter. Around 6 o'clock it starts to become light. My sight is at the brightest point in the East, behind us, just under Jupiter ... I'm waiting for the earth to rotate a few more degrees to show the sun; I'm waiting for the first rays of direct sunlight, these you can feel the warmth on your skin (and the vitamin D, as they say in northern Europe, (oops, Great Britain).And there it is, 'Here comes the sun'... But now I can't see it anymore, then I. read more...