In the Mar Menor we didn’t see any dolphins – they don’t come into that lagoon – but Mummy and Daddy were always full of stories about heavisides dolphins here, and pilot whales there. It seems that even sightings made before I was born, twelve years ago, are still remembered in detail! There was the story about the first time Xoë and Caesar ever saw dolphins, and of how Caesar (who was only two) wanted to eat them. There was the story about the dolphins which swam along slowly under our dinghy making it difficult to row for fear of hitting them with the oars. And there were descriptions of dolphins squeaking, and dolphins flashing past in the night, outlined in green phosphorescence. It seems that I had seen dolphins scores of times, but we spent so long on that big puddle in Spain that I didn’t really remember them.

When we set off through the Mediterranean my first dolphin sightings were rather unsatisfactory. Just glimpses of fins, or fleeting visits where the dolphin left us again before I arrived on deck. True, we did have them swimming along beside us on a couple of occasions – but always in the dark. I could hear them, but I couldn’t see them.

My first real sighting that I can remember came as a Christmas present. We were sailing down to the Canaries and a huge school of dolphins arrived. There were groups of dolphins on either side of the boat for as far as we could see, and since we were in the middle they came to our bow. They were called common dolphins, and they were even more wonderful than I had imagined. They looked like huge, bright, shiny, newly painted toys! Their sides were yellow, and they glistened.

We had other visits during that journey, but none of them stayed long because they were fishing. Dolphins chase and eat fish. They are at the head of their food chain, rather like man is on land.

We actually see dolphins quite often in the ocean – probably almost every other day – and they sometimes come to surf at the bow and race each other to and fro under the boat. They seem to just do this for fun. In the dark they swim beside the boat, instead of at the bow, leaving long streaks of phosphorescence.

Once, we were becalmed a little way off the island of Tenerife. There was absolutely no wind and we had been sitting there for more than a day. We had to be in Santa Cruz by four o’clock, or we would miss the carnival, so we had to motor. Mollymawk sliced through the perfectly flat, mirror like sea, and then suddenly a school of dolphins came to see us. They stayed at the bow for about half an hour, and because it was very clear and calm we got a very good look at them and Mummy took lots of very good photos. They definitely liked the fact that the boat was moving fast. They had a lovely game at the bow, and every now and then they would roll over and look up at us.

[We sometimes find it quite difficult to identify a species of dolphin. The dolphins which visited us off Tenerife were marked in a very distinctive way - but not in a way which exactly matched the pictures in any of our books. Were they spotted dolphins, or were they striped dolphins? It was hard to say, even after we had studied my photos, because they had neither the characteristic spots nor a characteristic stripe leading from the jaw. Eventually I decided that the animals were spotted dolphins, but when I showed the photos to a local cetologist she identified them as Tursiops truncata - the bottle nosed dolphin. I was certain that this was incorrect, and so I contacted a couple of well-known dolphin preservation organisations. They both identified the animals as striped dolphins - but I still favoured my spotted dolphin theory... (Jill)]

One place where you can be almost certain to see dolphins and pilot whales is at the eastern end of the channel between Tenerife and La Gomera. Often it is very windy here, and our friends aboard Tosca, who have crossed ten times say that they have never had less than a gale, but whenever we cross it always seems to be flat calm. This is perfect conditions for seeing dolphins and whales – but unless you are motoring it is not perfect for having them come to the boat. Having had the pilot whales pass very near to us on one occasion we decided that if it was calm next time we crossed we would like to go overboard amd swim with them.

Swimming with the dolphins is not a new idea of course. Our friend Gigi swam with the pilot whales when he sailed across between the two islands. His brother-in-law made a video with his underwater camera. And some other friends have swum with the dolphins in the Caribbean. They had to keep getting into their dinghy and motoring after the dolphins, because the dolphins didn’t stop to play with them.

We were a bit nervous about swimming with the pilot whales, because they are very big. When we saw them coming towards our boat we got ready – but the whale was swimming very fast and before anyone had jumped in he had passed us. Then Daddy said, “There are dolphins too, coming from the other way.” Mummy hurried into the water and Xoë and I followed.

We swam to the bow, and as we reached it a group of four spotted dolphins crossed the bow. When they saw us they stopped and turned their heads to look. The water was full of their squeaks and also a sort of buzzing noise. They were chubbier than I had expected. When you see them from above they look very long and thin. The water was absolutely perfectly clear, and a beautiful blue. The dolphins were about four metres away, but when we tried to swim nearer they moved away and then looked back again. They were not scared, just careful. Mummy was making weird noises in her snorkel and I think that made them curious, or perhaps they would have been curious anyway. They can’t have seen people very often, if ever, so it’s funny they didn’t stay for longer to investigate.

[I immediately recognised these dolphins as being of the same species as the school which we photographed on the day of the carnival - and my identification was confirmed: they were spotted dolphins. Seen through the gin-clear water, the pale freckles on their flanks were very obvious. For me, my most enduring memory of this encounter is of the sharpness of the view. I want to paint the scene - it is embossed on my mind - but I am at a loss to know how to recreate that astonishing, pin-sharp clarity without reverting to photo-realism. Jill]

Swimming with dolphins does not always go so smoothly. Another friend, called Christoph, once swam with a school of dolphins in the Bahamas. While he was trying to keep up with them they disappeared, and he suddenly found that he was swimming with a shark instead! It was bigger than him, and it came in close enough for him to try to kick it away. Then it circled him twice. It is said that a shark circles three times before attacking, so Christoph was rather alarmed. He called out to his friend, who was still on the boat, and his friend started the engine. That scared the shark and he swam away, and Christoph lived to tell the tale.

Rox modelling the Guy Cotten oilskin smock

Oilies have come a long way since I was a kid. Way back then, we wore either heavy-duty canvas smocks or stiff, plastic-coated cotton ones. I guess the plastic-coated cloth must have been the hip new thing. Next to come along were thin nylon jackets more suited to trekking in a light drizzle than to fending off buckets of seawater, but the quality of these garments rapidly improved – the nylon cloth became thicker and more waterproof, and the design became more ergonomic – until, by the 1980s, sailors could weather the storm in comfort in a tough, cosy oilskin jacket with matching chest-high trousers.

Since then the colours have become trendier, the cloth has become even more high tech, and prices have rocketed.
A set of ocean-grade oilskins can now cost as much as £900.
But are these top brand oilies really any better than the cut price ones, or are we yotties being fed a load of hype and taken for a ride? Your impecunious correspondents set out to discover the truth of this matter.

Over the course of the past twenty years or so we have been through quite a few Musto jackets, and similar well-known-brand jackets, without ever actually being wholly satisfied with any particular product. Thus, when the time came to replace them we again we decided to do something different. We decided to put our trust in the cheapest seemingly-tough and seemingly-waterproof oilies that we could lay our hands on – namely, we decided to buy the Tribord sailing jackets marketed by the French sports mega-store, Decathlon.

Caesar and Roxanne in their Tribord oilskin jackets

If you have never heard of Decathlon you must have been hiding away inside the UK. In any event, you evidently haven’t been hopping across the channel on the ferry and touring Europe. Almost every other city in France and Spain now has a Decathlon store dominating its shopping centre, and there are also shops in other countries.
Decathlon stocks pretty much everything that anyone could ever want for any kind of sport; everything from footballs, walking boots, bows and arrows, skis, fishing tackle, ballet shoes, and bicycles, through to lifejackets, canoes, windsurfers, diving bottles, bailers – yes, and oilskins.

Decathlon Tribord oilskins carry a pictoral label which appears to state that their fabric is both waterproof and breathable – like the fabric used in the leading brand outfits – and they also possess all of the other features which have evolved, over the course of time, in the creation of the modern heavy weather sailing jacket. They have tall furry-lined collars, copious hoods, hand-warmer pockets, drawstring hems, and double cuffs fastened with velcro. So far as we could see, they were exactly the same as the top name products – and yet they were only a fraction of the price.
Could they really be just as good – or were we missing something?

A well-designed hood and collar are crucial elements

Before I go any further, I think I ought to clarify, or qualify that last sentence. When I say, “just as good” I ought really to be saying, “Could they be any worse?” – because, to be frank, we have never been very impressed by our fancy-price oilskin jackets. There is no denying that they are comfortable enough – or at any rate, they are comfortable for walking down the jetty or sitting about on a chilly day. And they are also waterproof – at least for the first season.
But after one season’s use our Musto oilies have always become distinctly permeable.
And when worn in extreme conditions, with the hood clamped down, they become distinctly uncomfortable. Nick and I both find that after an hour or two of standing at the wheel with the Musto oilskin hood tightly fastened, we end up with a crick in the neck.

Fisherman's tough plastic oilies are much more waterproof and durable than the high tech kind

One solution to the oilskin problem is a tough PVC outfit of the type worn by fishermen. These oilskins are totally un-sexy, to the point of being ugly, but this is the last thing that ought to concern the sailor; after all, who is going to be watching while you stand there, taking the waves over your head?
Nick and I both own Guy Cotten (Cires Cotten) yellow PVC chest high trousers and we would never swap them for any other kind. Despite the fact that they are somewhere around 30 years old they are still so waterproof that we can happily sit down in a puddle.

If you want to follow the same course, be sure to buy only the very best quality PVC oilies, and be sure to buy chest-high trousers, or salopettes. The thinner kind of PVC oilskin tears quite easily and is also less windproof. And plastic trousers with an elasticated waist are horribly uncomfortable.

When the time came to equip our growing son with a full-size set of oilies we couldn’t get hold of any Guy Cotten ones and so we bought the next best thing – a pair of tough plastic salopettes of the kind used by Spanish fishermen. These trousers were significantly cheaper even than the French ones (the French manufacturer having discovered the possibilities for marketing their product in the chandelries…) and, thus far, they have proved to be just as good.

Why pay more? Why buy a set of trendy, multi-coloured nylon waterproofs when you know that they won’t do the job so well for even a tenth of the time?

Nick also owns a plastic-coated Guy Cotten jacket, but even he, with his anti-fashion mentality, has to admit that this jacket comes a poor second to the cosy, yachtsman’s oily. Although the cloth is totally waterproof the cuffs are not, and nor is there sufficient protection for the neck and face. Fishermen evidently don’t stand around, gazing to weather and letting the seas break over them.

So – coming back to the nitty-gritty – how do the cut-price Decathlon oilies fare?

Adult and Child-sized Decathlon oilskin jackets

It was around two years ago that we made our purchase, buying identical jackets for the skipper, the Admiral, and the Midshipman. The Naturalist was provided with a miniature jacket and matching oilskins – but Xoë missed the spree; she had already been kitted out a year earlier.
Over the course of these past two years we have worn our oilskins in some fairly rough weather. We wore them throughout our chilly sail down from the Med to the Canary Islands, a year ago; we wore them during the gale which forced us to stay at sea for an extra day after our arrival there; and we have regularly worn them in winds of up to force 7, with seas occasionally breaking over the cockpit and over the helmsman. So, we are in a position to give them a full appraisal.

Essentially, the Decathlon jackets have lived up to our expectations. They are no better and no worse than we imagined they would be.
Caesar’s and Nick’s are no longer wave-proof – but they are at least as waterproof as other oilskin jackets would be, in our experience, after this length of time. My jacket and Roxanne’s are still fine.

Meanwhile, the jackets are no more and no less comfortable than the more expensive ones. Some of us are less keen on the hand-warmer pockets (which are positioned higher up than than they were on our Mustos) and Nick and I still find that the hood is a pain.

Are we the only ones to have this gripe about the oilskin jacket hood? And if not, isn’t it time someone came up with a solution? I spend a lot of time musing on the problem while I fiddle, ceaselessly, with the toggles, aiming to find a position where the hood will be tight enough to keep out the draughts and the water but loose enough not to clamp my head down on my spine. When I’ve got it worked out I will patent the idea and sell it to Decathlon, and finance our travels from the profit…

Why can't someone make a totally waterproof placcy jacket with all the features of the high tech oilies?

The other thing that we would like to see in production is a PVC jacket, of the Guy Cotten / Cires Cotten type, but with all the features which make the modern yachting jackets so comfortable – the furry collar, the velcro on the cuffs, the hand-warmer pockets, and so forth. Such a jacket would be both cosy and impermeable to the sea.
No, it wouldn’t be “breathable” – but, so far as the average cruising yotty is concerned, very little of our time is spent grinding winches or rushing up and down the deck; most of it is spent sitting still. Thus, the lack of breathability would be a very small price to pay for total and near-permanent waterproofness.

Rox rates the Decathlon chest-high trousers comfortable - but they arent as waterproof as tough plastic ones

In the meantime, if we find ourselves needing to buy any more oilies in the near future we will certainly be shopping again in Decathlon. Other supporters of this brand include a friend who spends his whole life out on the water, sailing his own very lovely but rather wet little vessel, and delivering other people’s yachts across the seven seas. Whereas the superstar sailors, after their spin around the globe, are issued with shiny new waterproofs, Shane’s jacket looks as if he has been living in it for several seasons. There can be few people who are better placed to test such a product – and he reckons that Decathlon oilskin jackets are “at least as good, if not better than any other brand”.

These brief notes cover a mere handful of anchorages, commencing in the north-eastern corner of the archipelago.

La Graciosa

The island of La Graciosa sits at the northern end of Lanzarote and is divided from the mother island by a narrow channel, or “rio” (as the locals term it). The high cliffs off Lanzarote seem almost to overhang the islet and they have a tremendous influence over the weather down here. When the wind is in the south they cause mighty gusts, or williwaws, to go hurtling down onto the channel. At such times, the anchorage on the southern side of La Graciosa is untenable, but in the prevailing northerlies it offers a very good refuge.

The adjacent port (Caleta del Sebo, on the chart) is safe in all imaginable conditions and also has the cheapest marina in the Canaries – but it has no electricity or water, and it cannot accommodate vessels of over 14 metres / 18 tons. Berthing elsewhere within the port is not at all cheap.

Approaching from the east, the first salient feature of the channel is a rock standing at the foot of the cliffs on the southern / Lanzarote side. It is topped by a white flashing beacon. Further along, on the same side, one finds a white tower. It is the “base” for the smaller island’s electrical needs and marks the narrowest part of the channel (and the position of the underwater cables). The entrance to the port is almost opposite the tower and faces west. Its seawalls feature suitable red and green lights, but they are powered by small solar panels, and unless the day has been a sunny one they will not be shining. The red one seems to keep going for longer than the green. Entering from the east and steering to pass this red light to port would take the vessel straight into the outer wall of the port…
Yes, on the whole it is best not to approach this place in the dark unless one knows the lie of the land.

The anchorage lies in Bahía Salado immediately west of the port. Be sure to give a good offing to the reef which extends from the port hand / westerly side of the port entrance. Even the little open fishing boats give this a good offing. (Note: we have been told that this reef is not marked on the Cmap electronic chart.)
The holding in the bay is good. Landing can be made on the beach.

The waters around La Graciosa are a national park, and we have recently been told that anyone wishing to anchor must now contact the authorities 10 days before their arrival. It is difficult to see how anyone arriving from the Med would be able to do this.

Note also that the shops here are the most expensive in the archipelago. If visiting from one of the other islands, aim to carry all of your supplies with you.

IF YOU VISIT LA GRACIOSA AND YOU FIND THIS INFORMATION TO BE OUT OF DATE, OR OTHERWISE INCORRECT, PLEASE LET US KNOW.

Fuerteventura

Corralejo

A one-time fishing village on the northern end of Fuerteventura, Corralejo is now a busy little tourist trap, with scores of restaurants, a street full of shops selling ticky-tacky, and a small fleet of glass-bottomed boats and charter yachts. It is also the port for the ferries which run between Fuerteventura and its sister island, Lanzarote. This makes it easy for an approaching vessel to find the place: you just follow the big boats!

Although it is easy to find, the approach to Corralejo can be quite exciting, especially if the wind is strong. The channel between the two islands is a wind acceleration zone, and with a force seven pumping through it the waves quickly pile up and become quite alarming. Just to make matters even more entertaining, Corralejo is tucked in amongst a set of reefs. There are reefs to the east and west of the port, and there are reefs to the north extending from the off-lying Isla de Lobos.

If your only chart is a large scale one, showing the whole archipelago, then you should keep at least half a mile off the coast of Fuerteventura and not consider coming any nearer until you are north-east of the port entrance. People surf on the reefs immediately behind the sea wall…

The passage between Fuerteventura and Isla de los Lobos is best avoided when the wind is blowing strongly along the channel. In these conditions, the waves roll and break right in the middle of that reef-fringed passage. Great fun for kitesurfing enthusiasts and windsurfers, but not for keel boats.

The ferries berth behind a big sea wall, and this wall also shelters the harbour. There is a small and very crowded marina. It did not seem to us that there would be space on the pontoons for a visiting yacht, but there is room to anchor. Just be careful to keep well clear of the wall and of the space at the seaward end of the wall, where the ferries turn. In theory, one has to pay – but of the boats anchored here during our visit only one had been nabbed by the harbourmaster.

Corralejo would be a good harbour, were it not for the fact that the holding is terrible. (A thin layer of sand covers a sheet of rock.) Pretty much everybody who comes here does a certain amount of dragging when the wind blows, and it would obviously not be a good place to leave the boat unattended for the whole day.

There is a wifi internet service which covers the port in a somewhat intermittent fashion. It is called Canary Net Oasis. Payment can be made online and varies according to how much time you want to buy. The hourly rate is pretty steep, but we paid 20 € for a week, and we found that we could run three machines at the same time from the same connection.

Going alongside to take water was not possible during our visit to Corralejo, and nor did we find an accessible tap. Doubtless, if one were in dire need one could creep into the marina with a couple of jerrycans… but this mission would carry the risk of coming face to face with the aforementioned harbourmaster.

One of our best finds was a hotel which has no objection to letting outsiders loose in the laundry room. Follow the main road, lined with shops and restaurants, until you eventually come to a place called Tony Romas. Turning right here you will find yourself outside the Hotel Bahía Lobos. The laundry room is between Tony’s and the hotel, but the tokens to operate the machine are sold in the hotel’s reception. One token, for one load, costs 4 €. Meanwhile, the laundrette at the other end of town wanted 70 € to wash and dry two loads….

For cheap phone calls to the UK, try Whereabouts, an English-owned internet café in amongst a group of English restaurants. It’s just beyond the furthest limit of the seafront promenade, behind a sandy beach.

For the best kitesurfing in the archipelago visit Flag Beach, which is half an hour’s walk along the shore and just around the corner.

IF YOU VISIT CORRALEJO AND YOU FIND THIS INFORMATION TO BE OUT OF DATE, OR OTHERWISE INCORRECT, PLEASE LET US KNOW.

(There are several other anchorages in Fuerteventura which we have not had time to visit, and nor have we explored Lanzarote.)

Gran Canaria

Las Palmas

Las Palmas is the capital of Gran Canaria, of the Eastern islands, and of the whole archipelago.
By reputation, there is more crime here than in any other Spanish city, but we saw little evidence to support this accusation. True, there was recently a spate of thefts in the marina, but security here now seems to have been improved. We have also heard of petty thefts from yachts anchored near to the shore – sunglasses and snorkels have been taken from on deck by young men swimming out from the beach – but so far as we know the only boat which was actually broken into during our visit was one which had been left unattended for a period of months.

Las Palmas is also reputed to be the biggest port in “Western Africa”, and this one can believe. It is an interesting place to pass a fortnight, because there is always something going on. Cruise ships, square riggers, oil tankers, foreign warships, an endless stream of container ships… they all flow in and out of the port; we’ve even seen ship-carrying ships and oil rigs in here. Set against this background of commercial activity are yachts of all shapes and sizes, and huge fleets of Lasers, windsurfers and Optimists which pour forth from the Real Club Nautico and flutter past like confetti on the wind. Whereas in Tenerife one risks a fine for sailing into the principal port, here it actually seems to be encouraged.

There are three marinas in Las Palmas, but the only one open to visiting yachts is the municipal one and the first that the visitor will notice. (The small Vela Latina marina is actually further south / nearer to the entrance, but it is easily overlooked.)
The anchorage lies between the public marina and the marina of the Real Club Nautico. Even in the middle of the night it is easy to locate. Just be sure that you don’t run into the low, scarcely lit can which marks its outer limit.

This anchorage is safe in almost any conditions but it my be untenable in a southerly or south-easterly gale – and the marina, which is open to the south, would also be very uncomfortable.
In a south-westerly the place is completely sheltered, and while the west coast of Gran Canaria endured a week of force 7-8 south-westerlies and torrential rain, we enjoyed sunshine and flat calm.The holding is good, but the bottom is foul in certain places due to the accumulation of other people’s anchors and chains. There are even a couple of wrecks down there!

The anchorage is no longer free. We were required to pay 5.50 € per night for our 50 footer. We thought ourselves hard done by until we found that the owner of the beautiful 80ft Hereschoff moored nearby had to cough up 45 € a day! No wonder he only stayed for one night!
In return for your fee you get the right to use the showers (if you pay a deposit for the key) and the right to bring in your jerries, or the boat itself, and fill up with water.

Generally speaking there are fewer than a dozen yachts anchored here, but throughout October, November and December the place is very busy, and during the week before the ARC race it is thronged. On these occasions the authorities turn a blind eye to vessels which have been obliged to anchor outside the yellow buoy, and we have never seen anyone turned away.

The town is nothing to write home about, but it has pretty much everything that a yachtsman could need in the way of supermarkets, haberdashery shops, car hire companies, ironmongers / hardware stores, and engineering shops.
Any spares that you cannot find will be imported promptly – but be warned that anything that you have sent with a carrier will have to go through customs, and you will also to have to pay a 20 € “handling charge” for each parcel.

Don’t bother asking suppliers to ship your goods to a Yacht in Transit. It cuts no ice here; you can argue until you are blue in the face, but you won’t get hold of your goods until you have paid the import duty.

If you need any parts made, we recommend Tekkocan, in El Sebadal (the main industrial area, in La Isleta). This machine shop produced various parts for our new transmission system. If you telephone the boss, Carlos, he will happily collect and deliver parts from and to the marina (670 877 607).

Two of the best things about Las Palmas are the Chinese supermarkets, and the vegetable and fish market. These are both located just inland from the Real Club Nautico.

The worst things about the place are the stink of diesel, the constant jingle of the ambulances passing on the adjacent road, the grey skies, the want of a decent landing place, and the oil.

The hoi-polloi in the anchorage are allowed to bring their dinghies into the marina, but unless you are heading for the southern edge of the town you won’t want to do this. The vegetable market, the closest supermarkets, and the industrial quarter (with its machining shops and wood merchants, etc) all lie to the north.
Some folks leave their dinghies on the beach. Others tie them to the wall. Neither solution is very satisfactory, and bearing in mind that we are paying to be here we reckon that something better is in order. We would urge all visitors to request a claim form (Hoja de Sugerencia) from the marina office and to suggest that a floating pontoon be provided:

We would like to suggest that, since we are required to pay to anchor in the port, better landing facilities be provided. One solution would be a floating jetty moored to the outer wall of the marina.
Quisiéramos sugerir que, ya que tenemos que pagar para fundear dentro del puerto, proveen un sitio mejor para desembarcar de nuestros lanchas. Un posibilidád sería construir un embarcadero flotante fuera del puerto deportivo, en el ancladero.

As for the oil… the photos say it all, I think. This slick came down on us during the night and washed to and fro for the following 48 hours. Although required, under international law, to clear up the mess, the port authorities did nothing. The slick eventually broke up and disappeared in the direction of the ocean. We are told that such spillages are not uncommon here.

On the whole, the only good reason to come to Las Palmas would be to stock up on food, to search for spare parts, or to visit the excellent archaeology museum in the old part of town. Anyone wanting a drop-off base for crew returning to Europe would do just as well to anchor in Arguineguín, in the south of the island.

Máspalomas et alia

This area offers the first available anchorage to sailors heading down the coast from Las Palmas. The dune system for which the area is locally famous forms a bulge on the extreme southern limit of Gran Canaria. Depending on the direction of the wind and the sea state one can anchor either to the east of the dunes, off Playa del Inglés, or some way to the west, off Playa Meloneras, or off the marina known as Pasito Blanco.

Although the swells were not particularly big during the time of our visit the beaches on either side of the point were swept by biggish rollers and landing in a dinghy would have been impossible – or at any rate, exceedingly wet and somewhat dangerous. Having been unable to land at either Playa del Inglés or Playa Meloneras, we re-anchored off Pasito Blanco and went ashore in the marina.

Most yachtsmen would consider this shore to be of no interest whatsoever. Having once been devoted to the growing of tomatoes, it is now an ugly brown landscape fringed with extraordinarily hideous holiday developments. One of the hotels is done up to look like a Spanish church; indeed, we were almost convinced of its authenticity – until night came and it was lit by red and purple lights. Roxanne called it The Polly Pocket.

Before the Spanish conquest of the archipelago Máspalomas was home to a thriving community of indigenous “Canarios”. More widely known as cave dwellers, these people also sometimes built stone houses. Those which they built in this vicinity have all been swept aside – all but one. At the extreme southern end of the island, at Punta Mujeres (just west of the lighthouse), there stands the last vestige of this stone-age village. It was this which brought us to visit the area, but, to tell the truth – and speaking as one who is passionate about archaeology – it is not worth a visit.

The marina of Pasito Blanco is open to all-comers. A berth for our 50 footer would have cost 27 € per night. As the manager pointed out, however, we were quite safe where we were – so why bother? He had no objection to our coming ashore into the marina with our dinghy.
Note that the anchorage would not be safe in a strong southerly – but then, we are not at all sure that the port would be either. Even as it was, the moderate swells were crashing onto the perimeter wall and covering the southern side of the marina in spray. Bigger waves would probably come straight over (just as they do at Los Gigantes and at various other south coast marinas in the Canary Islands.)

Arguineguín etcetera

Continuing westward from the region of Máspalomas we come to Arguineguín; or, to be more exact, we come first to the bay known to visiting yotties as Cement Factory Bay, and then to the little port of Arguineguín.

Arguineguín is an uninspiring little hole. Most of the buildings look as if they were thrown up, piecemeal; the rest look as if they were thrown up in an afternoon, from whatever came to hand. On the eastern side of town a monumentally ugly residential development (initially mistaken by Yours Truly for a prison) overlooks the smelliest, dirtiest, least attractive caravan park that I have ever seen (initially mistaken for a breakers yard).

All this having been said, the little port is actually quite nice. Small ferries and fishing boats come and go, turtles saunter past, and the sun shines down; the smell from the town doesn’t reach your nostrils here, and the view to seaward is… well, it’s blue. As for the view to the west, along the coast… the least said about that the better.

There is space for half a dozen yachts to hook in behind the wall and so escape from the swells. A German friend who spent the whole winter here reckons that the place is safe even in a southerly, but that it is not so good in a south-wester. When the swells roll in from that quarter the time has come to nip back round the corner into Cement Factory Bay.

Cement Factory Bay

This place is more properly known as Bahía de Santa Agueda. Agueda was the patron saint of Mallorca – or so ’tis said – and when some Mallorcan traders set up camp in this very place, a good century before the Spanish conquest of the islands, they established a chapel in a cave in the cliffs and dedicated it to the holy martyr. The cave was the first Christian church in the archipelago, and it is still used as a place of worship. Since it is not signposted nor even labelled finding it is no easy task. If you want to make a pilgrimage, look for an ultra-modern triangular shaped canopy – oddly out of context in this environment – which is perched half way up a cliff. Prepare to be very disappointed, because the cave is no romantic grotto; it has been cut to the shape of a conventional room, and plastered and painted. Moreover, it is kept locked; we gained our view by peering through the keyhole.

The peninsula which lends shelter to this bay is known as Punta del Parchel, and the area behind it is called El Pajar. At one time it was home to somewhere in the region of 400 Canario families, who lived in stone houses of the sort which also stood at Máspalomas (and at numerous other places on the island) and buried their dead in a variety of tombs and graves.

Although it had long since been abandoned, this stone-age settlement was still in existence in the early years of the 20th century. Since then, time and modern developments have run amok over the entire area. The necropolis, with its mummified chiefs and pauper skeletons, was destroyed by the construction of the cement factory, and the houses were gradually robbed of stone and buried beneath a shanty town of concrete huts.

Only one last house remains, and its condition is worse even than that of the house at Máspalomas. Standing on its foundations and surveying the sprawl of badly built shacks on the hillside below, we could not help but feel that, here at any rate, man has not moved forward. Photos and reconstructive drawings of typical Canario houses clearly show that they were more attractive to look at and very much better built than the trash which has been spewed up in their place.

If you plan to anchor in this bay, note that there is a blinder (a rock awash) lying about 50 yards offshore at the eastern end of the beach.

Puerto Mogán

Once a tiny fishing port, this place is now a German-dominated tourist resort, but because the development has been carefully crafted to benefit both the visitor and the locals it does have a certain charm. The marina lies at the heart of the accommodation, amongst a warren of prettily painted houses – through half-closed eyes one can easily overlook the fact that they are some sort of time-share resort – and the port is also home to a greatly expanded fishing fleet. (Or, at any rate, the boats have expanded. In times past the fishermen owned only open dinghies, which they launched from the beach.)

If you do not want to afford the marina, anchor just outside, beneath the cliffs. The principal attraction here is the sunshine. The main drawback is the constant flow of ferries and the perpetual whine of jet skis.
This place is not safe in a southerly gale, and boats have been known to come ashore in sudden southerly squalls, but these are principally winter phenomena and this anchorage is generally perfectly safe.

IF YOU VISIT GRAN CANARIA AND YOU FIND ANY OF THIS INFORMATION TO BE OUT OF DATE, OR OTHERWISE INCORRECT, PLEASE LET US KNOW.

Tenerife

Santa Cruz de Tenerife

Santa Cruz is quite an attractive town – as towns go – and whereas 20 years ago one could only reach it by bus, having berthed one’s boat in the Darseña Pesquera, two miles to the north, the place now has its own marina. Unfortunately, however, the crew who run the place seem to have it in for yotties.

In May of 2009 they introduced a new tax. Or rather, they began to impose upon visiting yachtsmen, a tax which is intended to affect only full-time berth-holders. In effect, if you visit the marina in Santa Cruz de Tenerife you will be required to pay not only your night’s dues but also the tax which, rightfully, is supposed to be spread over the entire year. (ie. A yacht staying for one night ought to pay 1/365th of the annual tax, but visitors are currently being asked to cough up the full annual fee.)

Rumour has it that various yachtsmen are attempting to take the government to court over this unfair treatment – but, so far as we can see, the only sensible thing to do at the moment is to avoid the place.

(If you decide that you don’t mind forking out 200 € for a weekend in the city, be aware that no one may enter the port without permission. A German yacht which entered without having made radio contact was fined 15,000 € “for endangering the safety of another vessel”.)

There is no anchorage in the vicinity.

Montaña Roja

Yachts can anchor either side of the Montaña Roja, near to the airport, the choice depending on the wind conditions. This is a satisfactory place to await a fair wind but has little else to recommend it.

Las Galletas

Yachts can anchor outside the marina at Las Galletas or in the lee of the headland to the north – but, again, there is nothing worth doing or seeing here. A friend reports that yachtsmen berthing in the marina have been approached by the Aduanas with regard to their length of stay and the imposition of import duty.

Los Cristianos

Yachtsmen are no longer allowed to anchor off Los Cristianos, the local authorities having decided that they were responsible for an oil spillage which made their beach unusable for a day.
Clearly, the financial value of shorebased, beach-using tourism is considerably greater than the revenue derived from visiting yotties – but equally clearly, the oil did not derive from one of our number; it can only have come from a ship.

In conclusion, the Tenerife authorities seem to have decided that they do not want cruising yachtsmen in their waters. Bearing in mind that their hotels are more than half empty (and some are entirely empty) this seems a little bit short-sighted. We may not spend £1,000 in a week, but we certainly spend a good deal more than that in the course of an extended visit.

We suggest that cruising yachtsmen avoid Tenerife altogether until the authorities recognise our value and realise that they have shot themselves in the foot. After all, there are plenty of much nicer, much more welcoming places in the world!

Of course, children are not the only ones who enjoy pootling around the anchorage in a dinghy; we older salts like it too. A run ashore under sail is always far more satisfying than a quick buzz under outboard -  indeed, I feel that it is even therapeutic – and so this article also deals with the requirements of bigger folk. Essentially, we just need a bit more leg-room than the youngsters.

So far as liveaboard families are concerned, the most important criteria for a sailing dinghy is size. If the boat won’t fit on the deck, then it is absolutely useless. Cost, weight, and whether the thing will actually sail are completely irrelevant in the initial stage of our search. Thus, the first thing for a would-be dinghy-toter to do is to get “up top” and measure the available space.

Generally speaking, the maximum length for your dinghy will be equal to the distance between the main mast and the sprayhood, but don’t just leave it at that; you also need to know how beamy your boat can be. Having established that a Topper would fit between our mast and our companion hatch we duly acquired one – only to find that it overlapped the cabin hatches on either side. Likewise, if we only take into account the fore and aft measurement then we have enough room for a Mirror – and a Mirror is an ideal first command for a child – but it, too, would obstruct the hatches.

Dinghies don’t come much smaller than the Optimist, and this is certainly one of the most suitable boats for a cruising kid. Let us not be predjudiced by the fact that it looks like a shoe-box. It is easy to handle, seldom capsizes, and since it is ubiquitous throughout the world there is a good chance that your infant will have the opportunity to pit his wits against other small sailors. It is light, and so can be launched without too much hassle, and it also rows very well. Since any ship-board dinghy will also be required to serve as tender, this is an important consideration.
On the debit side, an Oppie is not the ideal craft for an adult – unless you like to sit huddled up with your nose near your knees.

The Topper is the best-known modern contender for the Optimist’s role as junior training boat. As we have seen, it is not really boat-topable, being slightly too big even for the decks of a 50 footer, and nor can it be rowed.

There is now a newer sail-training dinghy which might fit both your child’s requirements and your cabin roof.
Bearing in mind the performance of the rest of their fleet one would expect any vessel from the RS yard to be fairly racy – and the RS Tera Sport lives up to this expectation. When he saw the boat lying athwartships on our friends’ yacht, Caesar was quite excited. A real racing boat to play with, at last!

Unfortunately, this particular RS is not the boat for a hulking great 18 year old – and nor is it meant to be; it is only intended for sailors of up to 50 kilos in weight. The fact that it stows across the deck of our friends’ 50 foot yacht gives a pretty clear indication of its size – it is almost two feet shorter than the Topper – but although it is just a baby it shares at least one of the characteristics of it’s big sisters: it jolly well goes!

Well, actually, with Caesar aboard it didn’t really go very well… but the boat’s two young owners rocketed around the place and made the Oppies look fairly silly. Fin and Sam are only six and four years old, but already the older boy handles this boat very well and with the greatest of confidence. As a training vessel for small children the Tera therefore rates very highly. All concerned reckoned it much better than either the Optimist or the Topper.

As an all rounder, however, the Tera is pretty useless. It does come fitted with rowlock holes, and I am told that it rows quite well, but it does not look like the sort of craft which would accommodate a family of four and a fortnight’s worth of shopping. Still, Fin and Sam’s mum and dad don’t mind; for trips ashore they use the rubber duck.

The RS Tera and the Optimist seem to cost about the same price new: around £1,000. Most liveaboard cruising folk are looking for something a little bit less costly, and whereas one can easily find a second-hand Oppie, the Tera is too new to be found at a bargain price.

Funnily enough, despite the obvious advantages, I have yet to come across a cruising yacht which carries a genuine Optimist. What one tends to see, on the cruising circuit, is tired old pram dinghies kitted out with an imitation Oppie rig. The boat in this next photo is even more rustic. Her spars are made from bamboo, and she is steered with an oar. The jib, carried on a bamboo bowsprit, improves the boat’s handling. It even has a boom, so that the helmsman doesn’t have to play with the sheets when he tacks. This particular dinghy is not as stable as an Optimist – as Roxanne stepped aboard to take the boat for a trial spin, her owner admitted that he had capsized on a couple of occasions. Mind you, although she goes well enough in a zephyr he prefers to take the boat out in a stiff breeze.

Other folks, with more time on their hands, sometimes like to build their own dinghy. The one shown in this next photo was constructed according to a set of plans which her owner downloaded, for free, from the internet. The blue sail looks remarkably like a cheap tarpaulin – and it is. It, too, was made according to a set of freebie plans.
I have sailed this boat and, to be honest, I was not terribly impressed with its performance. Whether it was the underwater shape which let her down, or whether the centreboard is too short or lacking in shape I cannot say, but the boat made a great deal of leeway. The local kids ran rings around me in their Oppies.
Still, a craft like this is very cheap to build, and its handling would not trouble an unspoilt child (ie. one who had not had the opportunity to play with something better). Certainly, it does not trouble our friend, Peter, who gets a lot of fun from his home-made toy.

When I was a small child, and my big brother wanted a boat of his own, my dad came up with a semi-DIY solution. Although perfectly capable of knocking up a dinghy, he apparently wasn’t in the mood at this time. Nor could he afford a Mirror or an Optimist – besides, he didn’t approve of those boxy boats. What he wanted, for his kids, was a Duckling.

A Duckling is a little hot-moulded dinghy with a bermudan main and jib. They were built by Fairey (who also built the Firefly, the Albacore, and various hot-moulded yachts). I doubt whether there are many Duckilngs still afloat today, and even in 1968 they were rare beasts. Unable to find one, Dad bought a slightly smaller hot-moulded dinghy, built by the same yard, and fitted her with a bermudan rig. My brother named her Dumpling.

Dumpling was easily cabin-topable. In fact she was specifically designed to fit on the deck of the Atalanta sailing yacht. She also fitted snugly over the aft cabin roof of our 43ft ketch, Maamari, and she remained in the family until the day when she was swept from our decks in a Southern Ocean storm. In the course of those intervening 30 years we had a lot of fun with her – and so did the cruising kids who we happened to meet on our travels. That little boat was faster and much far more fun than an Oppie and she won every cruising-yotties’ sailing-tender regatta.
(If anyone fancies the idea of going into production, and turning out a plastic version, drop me a line using the contact form. I still have the sails…)

If space is the main criteria then the ideal sailing dinghy for a cruising yacht might be one which folds.
The folding boat most commonly seen aboard cruising yachts is made from thin white plastic and is known as a Banana. It stows along the guard rail, can be easily and very quickly assembled, and rows about as well as a scaled-up paper boat would row, with the sides continually flexing. Mind you, it’s so light that it still goes faster than a rubber dinghy. A similar version is known as the Porta-bote.
The manufacturers of the Banana sell a rather nice-looking lateen-style rig – reminiscent of the low-aspect lateen sail on a sunfish – but the only one which we have seen under sail was wearing a home made junk rig. All things considered – and bearing in mind that the boat’s only keel was a pair of diminutive leeboards – she went remarkably well.

A new Banana, complete with the rig, will set you back around £1600. Porta-botes are made in four sizes. The 10ft version costs around £1700 and the rig costs a further £900.

One thing to bear in mind if you are thinking of buying one of these origami boats is that it is well-nigh impossible to board them from the water. This makes them highly unsuitable for children, because when the water is warm, children tend to spend as much time over-aboard as in their boat.
An exception might be the Stowaway K2. We have yet to meet one of these “in the flesh”, but the boat appears to be much more robust than the other folders; indeed, it looks rather like a Mirror. Unfortunately it also costs even more than a Mirror: a new K2 will set you back about £3000.

While we are thinking about folding boats we must not forget the world’s favourite inflatable sailing dinghies: the Tinker Tramp and the Tinker Traveller.
The Tramp is a nice little boat whose performance under oars is spoilt by its rowlocks. With a set of Avon rowlocks glued on in place of those silly little pin-type things it might actually go fairly well. The same, alas, cannot be said of the Traveller, which – in the humble opinion of both the Admiral and the Skipper – is an absolute dog to row. (The admiral is merely a wimp, but the skipper used to row for his school and has kept his rowing muscles in trim, so he has the right to broadcast this kind of opinion.)

P12 Ask G’pa to scan and send a photo, pref of G’ma?
Both boats sail surprisingly well – for a rubber duck. The Traveller is sufficiently big that it can accommodate three adults and two very small children under sail. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that it can carry them in comfort, but we made a couple of fairly long journeys, hippo-hunting on the Rio Geba (in Guinea Bissau), with such a crew. It turns out that hippos have been known to attack and sink rubber dinghies… but fortunately we didn’t find any, so I cannot tell you whether the Traveller is up to that kind of treatment.
As for the Tinker Tramp – this is my mother’s all-time favourite sailing boat, being greatly preferred, by her, over Dad’s Wayfarer, 33ft Contessa, Drascombe Longboat, Topper, etc, etc.

The Tramp is 9′ long and costs around £2900. The Traveller is 12′ and costs £3600.

As children get bigger they require more from their small command. A sixteen year old turns his nose up the idea of an Optimist, and one can see why. The average-sized sixteen year old looks pretty slly squatting under the boom in a kiddy’s boat. so, how can one provide a bigger, more suitable boat while the coachroof is still only ten foot long (or less)?
By cutting the boat in half!

The Mollymawks are now the proud owners of a Paul Johnson designed two-part dinghy. Since Johnson’s motherships are called Venus yachts I suppose that the baby of the family must be a cupid… but so far as I am aware their designer has not credited them with a name.

Our own “cupid” is called Tidely-Idely, and she stacks, with the bow snugged away inside the stern, under our main boom. We have been carrying her about with us for ten years but we have only just got round to fitting her with a centreboard, and we still have not found the time to make some suitable sails. With a lug main, a jib set on a bowsprit, and a mizzen to balance the jib, this little boat ought to go like the wind… but in the meantime we fool around with an old Mirror mainsail loosely tied to a windsurfer mast.

Eminently boat-topable, fast under oars and (if we get things right) under sail, too, this boat is big enough to carry the five of us (and the dog) in comfort. Moreover, she has great ultimate stability and, being constructed of foam, is virtually unsinkable.

Clearly, this big little boat deserves more than a passing reference, and we hope, in the very near future to tell you more about her design and her designer. In the meantime, we’ll just say that, even with her current insufficient rig, Tidely-Idely gets our vote as the best all-rounder in our search for the ideal liveaboard cruiser’s sailing dinghy.

Many thanks to Peter, Andre, Vincent, Fin and Sam, and the Las Palmas municipal sailing school for letting us loose in their dinghies.

On passage again, at last!

It was almost four months ago that our aged sails fell apart and our engine parted company with the gear box. We still haven’t solved the first of these problems; the salvaged pieces of the roller furler were straightened and reassembled, and the old rotten sails were cobbled back together, but our efforts to invest in a brand new set of wings went awry. More on that subject another day. After we finally got the boat back into a state where she could put to sea the Ship’s Engineer then spent two full months re-designing and rebuilding the transmission system. And then, after a few other bits and bobs had been fixed, we were almost ready to leave the Canaries.

Christmas was looming and the anchorage, in Las Palmas, was emptying. Most folks like to spend the season of goodwill on the other side of the pond, in the Caribbean. We had set our hearts on spending it down in the Cape Verde islands – but, as I say, the repairs dragged on and it was not until the afternoon of the festival day that we were finally ready to make sail. As luck would have it, two of our friends had been delayed in a similar fashion, and thus it was that three little ships went sailing out, went sailing out… leaving the city just as the sun set behind the mountains.

Cherub gets underway

The first of our companions was Paul Johnson aboard his beautiful gaff ketch, Cherub. Johnson was not only the builder but also the designer of his vessel – she is identical with the 42ft Venus yacht that he lost whilst cruising in the Pacific – and thus his devotion to the boat and his confidence in her abilities is profound.

Iolair

The second competitor was a lovely Irishman called Shane, with a lovely yacht called Iolair. Iolair is only 37ft long, but she is sleek and slim, with deep keel, a trim counter and a curving bow. A classic yacht, indeed.

These two sailed circles around Molly while we rushed about, stowing the dinghies and preparing for sea.
“Will you fekkers please hurry up!” cried the Irishman, and Johnson eventually took himself off to wait outside where the tankers moor.

Eventually we, too, were ready to leave – or ready enough – and our three little ships bowled out of the harbour. A fine send off the other few yotties in the anchorage gave us, and a fine sight we must have made – but a strange one. Our boats were about as different as any three yachts could be. One heavy-duty cruising ketch; one Colin-Archer look-alike; and one racy little number. A bookie would have had a hard time deciding which of us would arrive first, unless he could forecast the weather.

If the wind were against us, Iolair would have the advantage, being the most weatherly, and Cherub would be left to leeward. (Gaffers don’t point – or, to put it in land-lubber speak, they don’t sail very well if you’re trying to get to the place where the wind is coming from.)
But if the wind were on the stern the gaffer, with its huge sail area, would be hard to beat. Unlike most Colin Archer types, Venus yachts are very light; indeed, Johnson built them expressly for the purpose of bowling downwind in a strong breeze.

Whatever the wind, Mollymawk seemed likely to come last because Molly was not built for speed but for heavy-weather safety; and because Molly has to hump around tons of junk, in the form of diving gear and engineering tools, etc, etc. Moreover, whereas Iolair only carries a couple of hundred litres of water, Mollymawk was carrying a tonne; and whereas Shane had only stocked up for four weeks, we were carrying enough non-perishable food to last five people and a dog for three or four months. Our only chance of beating Iolair was a full gale; and if we were to beat Cherub too it would have to be a gale on the nose. Clearly, we were not wishing or praying for that!

The three little ships struggled along in the lee of the island – now becalmed; now riding on a little squall sent down from the mountains. Darkness had fallen, and Cherub and Iolair were silhouettes against the multi-colured lights of the coastal strip, when who should rock up but the Aduanas (the Spanish customs authority). They shone a light on our transom, to check on the name, and then they called us up, asking, “Where are you bound?”
“We’re off to the Cape Verdes.”
“Ah! So you’re off at last! Well, we hope you enjoy yourselves. How are the kids? How is the dog?”
There can’t be many customs services as friendly and personal as the Canary Islands one.

There was only one rule to this race of ours: no motoring. But with the wind light and fickle, Johnson became impatient. Limping along close-hauled, we saw him suddenly hurtle past in the darkness, heading for the open sea. We switched on our radar and watched as he put himself five miles ahead.
“He’s disqualified! He’s a cheat! He’s a pirate!” cried Roxanne.
But half an hour later we picked up a healthy little headwind, and by day break we had overhauled the pirate again.

Roxanne takes the first daylight watch

As the sun rose the wind fell away again, and we found ourselves beating into the lightest of airs. Cherub, sitting a mile to windward, with every sail set, made a beautiful picture – but of the little black sloop, Iolair, there was no trace. Was she still becalmed in the lee of the island? Surely not; the wind which reached us must have found her too, eventually. This faint breeze from the south would be much more useful to her than to either Molly or the gaffer, and if she was not already ahead of us she soon would be.

By evening time Cherub was a dot on the horizon astern of us – but the pirate captain was not to be so easily shaken off. Under cover of the night he again fired up his iron top’sl and came sneaking past. The rotter!
Nothing daunted, Mollymawk kept plodding along until, again, by daybreak, we had caught him up. Throughout the next day he gradually fell away to leeward – and when the sun rose the next morning it shone on an empty sea.
There was just Mollymawk, and nobody else.

The breeze had also fallen away altogether, and so we sat there and rocked to and fro on the swells.
“I wonder if Johnson is motoring again.”
“Maybe Iolair is motoring, too. I can’t see Shane sitting it out.”
But sit it out is what we Mollymawks did.

Sunset over a calm ocean

To be honest, we rather like calms. When there is wind of any kind then we work hard to get our yacht moving as fast as she jolly well can, but if there is not a breath of wind then there is nothing to be done. A calm is holiday time.
Not only that – not only do we get the chance to sit around drawing, or making fishing lures, or playing the squeeze box – calms are also Whale Watching Weather. When the boat is moving along and the sea is covered in little blue hillocks and white caps then the chances of our spotting a whale or a dolphin are slim; we only see them if they come to us. But when the ocean is flat then we can search the sea for at least half a mile all around.

Mind you, on this occasion we hardly needed to search. Our first Sighting was of a small school of spotted dolphins which came hurrying over the blue plain to make our acquaintance. Mollymawk was pretty much stationary, of course, and so she made a dull companion; today there could be now bow-riding. Regardless, the dolphins hung around, criss-crossing under our bow and swimming beside the stern.

I still haven’t worked out why the dolphins visit our yacht. Occasionally they turn on their sides and glance up at us, but it’s hard to see things through the surface of the sea – you can’t see anything at all through the surface unless it’s directly above you – and I still can’t decide whether they know we’re here. Perhaps they just think that our boat is some weird kind of whale.
At one stage half a dozen of our visitors lined up in a row, just ahead of the bow, and suddenly slapped their tails on the water in unison. Perhaps they were just playing – or perhaps they were trying to tell the whale something. Something like, “Get a move on, old fella; we want to surf on your bow wave.”

We later learnt that Shane, as he lazed along, was visited by a pod of orcas. A marvellous treat – but a slightly scary one. “My boat is black – like them – so I was afraid they might think it was another whale trespassing in their patch.” (Orcas have been known to sink yachts.)

The dolphins were wonderful, but later that same day we had an even better sighting. The mainsail had opened a seam (again…) and Nick and I were standing on top of the dinghy, on either side of the cloth, passing the needle to and fro, when we heard a tremendous, explosive gasp. I was so taken by surprise that I nearly fell backwards from my perch.
“Whale!”
And to have been so loud it must have been a big whale and it must be very near.

Sure enough, just astern of the boat we saw a huge, shiny, black back surging purposefully towards us. In the next moment it turned away; it humped its back; a fin slipped past; and then it was gone.
I ran to get the video camera.

Another blow – a tall, thin cloud of steamy spray – and a long back. Then another, a little further away. There were at least two whales, and they were quite a bit bigger than Mollymawk. Indeed, we reckoned that they were about 70ft long or more. The fin was distinctive, as was the fact that the whales never once showed even a glimpse of their tail flukes. We identified them as fin whales (but if there are any experts out there who think differently, do please let us know).

On our fourth day out the wind finally went into the north and gradually rose to about force four – and the mainsail promptly split from luff to leech. Again.
If ever we had been in with a slim chance of winning this race, or of not disgracing ourselves too badly, that chance was now gone. Without the mainsail our speed dropped from five knots to three.

Caesar hard at work on the mains'l

Fortunately, this time the mainsail tore along a seam, so that mending it was a relatively easy affair. Easy, but very time consuming. We got the sail below and set to work at once. It seemed to me that this was a two-man job, but when Caesar came on watch at 04.00 hours he found that he could manage alone – and so he sat and sewed; and he sewed, and he sewed, and he sewed – he sewed for 19 hours on the trot, breaking off only to eat his meals.
After Caesar had hand-sewn a zig-zag seam along both edges of the overlapping panels of cloth, using the old holes, Nick and I cobbled a patch over the torn leech tape, and 72 hours after it had torn the sail was ready to go back up.

Tinsel fishing lures

After that, things got better. The wind rose to about force five and Mollymawk went rolling along with her sails spread out like wings. During the calm, Roxanne and I had made lures from our Christmas decorations and these now proved their value: a couple of small dorado joined us for lunch and supper.
In the afternoon a baby booby came and sat on our guard rail for a few minutes.

The distance from the Canaries to the Cape Verdes is only about 800 miles, so that when the tradewind is blowing the journey usually only takes about 7 days.
On the evening of the seventh day I said, “I reckon that Shane will be just arriving now. And Johnson, too, perhaps.”
But we, ourselves, were still far from our destination. That three day calm and our problem with the mainsail had set us back.

Then, as I scanned the horizon for shipping I sighted a white sail about three miles astern. Could it be…? No, of course it couldn’t; Iolair must definitely be ahead of us.
“Unless they’ve broken something too.”

By the following morning the sail was ahead of us – and it had turned into a red spinnaker.
“Shane has a spinnaker.”
“Yes – and it’s red.”
We followed that sail all day.

Bowling along before the wind

By the morning of the tenth day we had only 40 miles to run. At two in the afternoon Caesar sighted a pale grey cone – one of the pyramid-shaped mountains on Ilha Sal – and looking into the radar’s magic screen we found that the land was twenty miles away. Not bad going for this part of the world. When the harmattan is filling the air with the “bruma sec”, or dry fog, the visibility is sometimes less than two miles.

As we drew near to the island the wind rose and the seas grew bigger – and peering through the jumble of grey mounds I saw that sail again. The spinnaker was gone and the boat was rolling along wildly under genoa and main.
“That’s not Shane; Shane would never let his genoa crash around like that.”

And it wasn’t Shane. Sure enough, when we rounded the harbour wall, at Palmeira, the first thing we saw was Iolair lying snugly amidst a mixed fleet of cruising yachts and fishing boats. As we rounded up, her skipper came dashing across in his dinghy.
“Where the feck is Johnson?”
That was what we wanted to know, too; because Cherub was not in the harbour.

How could we have beaten the Venus? And come to that, how could we have beaten – or at any rate, kept up with, that Bavaria which was still setting its anchor?
“And he had a spinnaker, too!” we told ourselves, as we patted Molly on the head – or on the wheel.
But Iolair was the undoubted winner of the race, for she had arrived a full three days earlier. According to Shane, he never had a day’s calm; while we spent 3 days covering 90 miles, he did 90 miles on the first day!

It only goes to show what a range in wind strengths one can experience over a fairly small area.
But it also goes to show that Iolair is fast – although, as we later learnt, Shane did spend five hours, on that first day, motoring.
“So he’s disqualified too.”

Cherub and Iolair at anchor in Palmeira

Cherub turned up 10 hours after Mollymawk, in the wee small hours of the morning.
All being well, we hope to have the chance to sail as a threesome to the next isle in the Cape Verde chain – but in the meantime we are renewing our acquaintance with a village and a people who we first visited 16 years ago.
As we strolled into the port captain’s office, to clear in, the man behind the desk said, “Ah, I recognise you! Welcome back!”

The bigger fish living on the sandy bottoms rely on hunting smaller fish, and since there is no plant life there the smaller fish are scavengers. All of the fish – both the hunters and the hunted – are disguised to be precisely the same pattern and colour as the sand, betraying their whereabouts only by shadows and by the scars which a few of them carry. They hunt not by chasing but by creeping up and springing out.

The fish of the rocky shore live very different lives. Many, like the damsel fish, the ornate wrasse, and the parrot fish are very brightly coloured. They do not hide; they stay out in the open. They do not skulk along on the bottom; they are mid-water fish.

Most mid-water fish live in shoals, hoping, when danger arrives, to hide themselves in the middle of the pack. Those who eat other fish do it by chasing them, not by stealth. Others eat the algae which grows on the rocks – and that, of course, is why the whole lot of them are hanging out in this place. The algae is at the bottom of the food chain. The hunters are at the top. In between them come the crustaceans and the sea slugs, and other such things, and the fish who graze on the weed and the ones who eat the crustaceans.

Some fish eat both algae and small animals, and some actually eat algae and go hunting. One of these is the parrot fish. These swim quite slowly around the sunken boulders, grazing on them with their strong teeth. With their thick, strong scales and their strong sharp beaks they must be fairly safe from other fish.

At first glance the parrot fish seem to be of several different species, but actually they are all the same type.
The huge grey parrot fish are the males. The females are smaller and they are brightly coloured. I believe that the females eat both algae and other fish, because I have certainly seen them grazing on the weed and I have also seen them chasing other, smaller fish. The immature parrot fish don’t seem to do this. I have only seen them eating the weed. They are small, of course, and they are a pale grey brown. It is illegal to catch them because they haven’t had the chance to breed – but in any case, this particular species of parrot fish is very difficult to catch. I have often tried to tempt one of the big grey ones, but I have never managed it, and I have since been told that they never take a hook.

The fish that the parrot fish chase and seem to prey on are very different. Their usual victims are the ornate wrasse and the damsel fish.
The ornate wrasse is another hunter, I believe. It is wonderfully brightly coloured, the male consisting mostly of green with lots of tiny red stripes in it. The body colour fades into a head with a maze of purple, pale blue, and orange. Even the female is very pretty. She is covered in lines of two shades of green and several shades of brown. They are bold little fish and so lovely to look at that I could never want to catch one – but my French friends do, and so do the Spanish fishermen.

I have seen ornate wrasse all throughout the Canary Islands, and in the Mediterranean too, and wherever I see them I also see damselfish there too. These fish also seem to be hunters, but one would never guess it to look at them. They are so pretty, with their dark blue body and their bright blue fins. But I once saw one chasing a smaller fish of its own type up and down the reef.
There is also the fula blanca, which is another damsel, more or less the same, but a lovely shade of purple with yellow fins.

The two branded sea bream and the salema (salpa) are both common reef fish which we also used to see in the Mediterranean. They are both silvery fish, and they can grow to be quite big. They almost always hang around in big shoals, and when the sea is shallow, and the waves are washing past overhead, the whole shoal sways to and fro. When they turn, they all turn in exactly the same moment like a flock of birds. A group of people could not do that. I wonder how the fish and the birds all know, in the same instant, that they are supposed to turn?

The bream are carniverous. They eat small invertebrates, such as shrimps. But the salpa are definitely vegetarians. However, they never waste the opportunity to eat a piece of dead fish. Although they are most common swimming close to the rocks I also find shoals of small salpa living an easy life inside the port, where there is lots of waste after the fishermen have cleaned their fish.

As well as all the common fish which one might expect to see amongst the rocks, there are also some surprises. One of these is the trumpet fish. They are such a strange shape that the first time I saw one I wasn’t even sure that it was a fish! They are long and thin, a bit like a very elongated seahorse, and they hang in the water. They have a long, horsey nose and instead of teeth they have a hole in the tip of their snout.
These fish are quite striking. I have seen them coloured anything from bright orange to muddy brown, and the tail is usually black with big white spots.

With their jawless mouth and lack of teeth I would have thought that they must be filter feeders, eating plankton and detritus, but my book of Canary Islands Sealife tells a different story:
“They eat small fish, which they catch by launching themselves rapidly towards and catching by suction.” (Translated from the Spanish.)
Presumably they suck in with their long snouts and clamp themselves against the fish and keep sucking. I should like to watch one doing this.

Another fish which I sometimes see on the reef is the cuttlefish. I don’t believe that these creatures live here all the while, I think that they are just visiting. They are, of course, not fish at all. They are close cousins of the octopus and are supposed to be very much more intelligent than fish. They have huge eyes, which look at me, and they can change their colour very suddenly, like a light flashing. They swim by flapping the frilly edge of their body. I have never seen them do anything especially clever, apart form the colour changing.

The red-lipped blenny is another common fish amongst the rocks. He spends his whole life lying flat on the rock, eating algae and trying not to be seen. With their funny markinhs I think that they look rather like clowns, watching the world go by and laughing at it – but I suppose this is just my imagination. I wonder what they are really thinking. Perhaps they don’t think at all.
I wonder what it feels like to be a fish… I dont know if I would like living in the sea, because there is always something creeping up behind you. I think I would rather be a reef fish than a fish hiding fearfully on the sandy bottom – but, then again, there might be a moray eel waiting to spring out and gobble me down!

Herewith, some general notes for the benefit of other visitors.
The information is arranged in the traditional form, beginning with a few paragraphs concerning such matters as history and flora. If you deem these things to be irrelevant to your needs as a yachtsman, just scroll down the page. Eventually you will find the nitty-gritty: an appraisal of the local winds, and a few words regarding local customs… (as in Customs and Excise).

Location

The Canary Islands lie to the north of the tropical belt, close to the desert coast of Northern Africa. As a result of this location they enjoy and endure a variety of climatic conditions, and their terrain varies from arid “bad lands”, which receive an average of one day’s rainfall per year, through to temperate rain forest which is perpetually cloaked and soaked by a cloud. Indeed, these extremes sometimes occur within the same island and can even be found lying within a couple of miles of one another.

Conquest by Spain

Although the ancient Greeks apparently knew of their existence, the Canaries were not much visited by Europeans until the 15th century. It was at this time that the various nations, led by the Spanish and the Portuguese, began to vie with one another for control of the New World. Despite the fact that they were already occupied when they began to take an interest in them, the Spanish had no qualms about conquering and colonising the various Canary Islands, one by one. Until recently it was widely believed that the original inhabitants had been obliterated – even the descendants of those original inhabitants seemed to have forgotten their origins – and thus Spain’s ownership and control of the archipelago has never been brought into question.

Culture

The status of the Canary Islands is similar to that of the various semi-autonomous regions of mainland Spain. They have their own local government and their own tax laws, but the bulk of their legislation is the same as in “the peninsula”. Their language, although spoken with what might be considered a “yokel” accent, has none of the differences of Catalan or Gallego (which are the lingos spoken in two of the Spanish mainland regions).

Despite this apparent cultural similarity, the Canaries have a completely different feel from the mainland, and this is due largely to the different temperament and different appearance of the inhabitants. A true-blooded Spaniard stands out amongst the local people almost as distinctly as a German or a Brit.

Climate

The climate in the Canary Islands is governed by the combination of location and terrain.

The African desert is only 50 miles away from the more easterly islands and, as a result, the winds which reach Lanzarote and Fuerteventura are relatively dry. Because it receives the brunt of the wind, and because it is quite tall, the northern end of Lanzarote receives what little moisture the air carries, and the rest of this area generally goes without.

The more westerly islands, being twice as far and more from the mainland coast, are caressed by a wind which is correspondingly more humid. In all probability it will have rolled down from the Azores, but even if it is only whistling off the Sahara it will have crossed enough sea to have become moist.

Since they are also very tall Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera  and, to a extent, Gran Canaria, are also capable of recovering more of this moisture than the eastern islands. As it reaches the mountains the wind is forced upwards, and as it ascends and grows colder it sheds its load onto their windward slopes.

The cloud having been emptied and the wind dessicated, the land to the south of the mountains is caressed only by the sun. Thus it is that one part of an island can be green and damp, and capped by a cloud, whilst just a few miles to the south the ground is parched and barren. Whereas the northern villages are capable of providing a proportion of the islands’ food requirements (in the form of vegetables and fruit) in the south, sun-worshipping tourists are pretty much the only crop.

The prime examples of extreme micro-climates can be found in Tenerife, where the Anaga region presents a stunning contrast to the arid south coast, and in La Gomera, where one can stroll out of the soggy forest and, within the hour, can be walking down a parched, orange-brown barranco.

The climate in the islands is generally described as sub-tropical, but I think that this implies a greater warmth than one generally finds here. It is true that it would probably be possible to suffer a heatstroke in the month of August – but only if one were hanging out in the holiday resorts on the south coasts of Tenerife and Gran Canaria. The northern coasts of these same islands are seldom overly-hot, and  the winter months are a tad too chilly for my liking. However, as long as he remains down on the south coast the visitor is unlikely ever to need a jacket, and unless he goes and stands on the top of El Teíde in the middle of the winter he is unlikely ever to see any snow.

Flora

Because of their relative isolation the islands have a high percentage of unique indigenous plants. The various species have evolved from their mainland equivalents over a period of millennia, and each fits within a particular climatic niche.  Thus, on the bare rubble slopes in the south of the islands we find several unique species of spurge (euphorbia) growing in abundance; in the dust by the roadsides we find the “ice plant” – a tiny succulent which appears to be covered in beads of water; and up in the damp rainforest we find the last traces of a type of vegetation known as Laurisilva. This last, we are told, used to cover the entire prehistoric landscape of Europe and North Africa.
Tenerife, La Palma, and Gran Canaria also contain areas of pristine Canarian pine forest, which grows only at higher altitude.

And now we come to the crucial stuff, of most relevance to the visiting yachtsman:

How blows the wind?

The weather, in this part of the world, is governed by the relative positions of the Azores High and the North-West African Low. The winds spin clockwise around a high and anti-clockwise around a low, with the result that, whichever system is predominating, the Canaries tend to get a north-easterly.

When the Azores High predominates, the air is clear and damp and relatively cold, bringing rain to the north coasts and to the high peaks.
When the African Low is in charge, then the visibility is poor (because the wind is loaded with fine particles of sand) and the weather is hot and very dry. The locals know the African north-easter as the Calima, and when it blows they run away and hide in their air-conditioned houses.
It is by no means impossible for the two winds to be blowing at the same time, with the eastern isles receiving a hot dry blast and the western ones remaining a little bit cooler.

From the yachtsman’s point of view, it makes little odds which north-easter is blowing – just as long as it is blowing. Although the north-easter is certainly the prevailing wind, it is by no means as reliable or predictable as certain cruising guides would have us believe. Indeed, one might say that the ruling factor here is unpredictability.

In our experience the tradewinds frequently fail to reach into this far flung corner of their supposed ambit, and there have been many occasions during our stay when the wind has blown from the north or the north-west. It also blows, occasionally, from the south, the south-west, and even from the south-east – and, contrary to popular opinion, it does this not only in the winter but also in the summer.

To quote a few examples:

In December, while we were heading south from Europe, the wind blew southerly for a fortnight. Its strength varied from near calm to force six, and then from force two to gale force.

In January, while Mollymawk was sailing from La Graciosa to Tenerife, the wind blew from the north-west and then, after a twelve hour period of calm, suddenly gave us a westerly force seven.

In February the north-eastern isles were being swept by a strong, cold northerly, but the southern ones were meanwhile being attacked by another southerly gale bringing in huge swells. (Note that these southerly gales frequently wreak havoc in the marinas on the islands’ south coasts.)

In May the winds were predominantly from the northern sector, but we had a three day period of calm.

In June the winds were, again, predominantly from the north, but we had two days of strong southerly wind.

And so it goes on…
At the time of writing (December) we are expecting a southerly force six.

Acceleration Zones and Wind Shadows

The principal feature of the Canary Islands weather system, and the factor which governs the life of the yachtsman cruising this archipelago, is the network of acceleration zones and wind shadows which form around and amongst the islands.
Since it is a creation of the wind flowing in at the top of the archipelago – or, occasionally, of a wind flowing in at the bottom – this network is far from static. Nor can we be dogmatic and say, “If the wind is in the north-east, and blowing force five, then this particular place will be calm and this area will be gale swept”. However, we can make a few generalisations.

According to our observations :
When the wind is blowing from the north or north-east there will generally be absolutely no wind at all in the lee of the taller islands. Thus, the south coast of Gran Canaria is likely to sitting in a vacuum, and so too the south-west coast of Tenerife. So too the southern region of La Gomera (from San Sebastian round to Valle Gran Rey).

Note that this does not mean that the anchorages in these places will be as calm as a duck pond. On the contrary: it is likely that they will be beset by a swell making its way around the island, and they are quite likely to be rolly. It seems to us that the stronger the tradewind is blowing, the bigger the wind shadow, the mightier the calm, and the bigger the swells driven around the island and into the anchorage.

When the wind is blowing from the north or north-east the channel between Tenerife and Gran Canaria acts as a wind funnel and a steady force five will be whipped into a force seven.
(Note: When I say force seven, I mean a steady force seven – 27 to 30 knots – with gusts of perhaps 40 or even 45 knots. Friends frequently report that the wind “was blowing 45 knots” in this channel, when actually they mean that it was gusting 45.)
The seas generated by this sort of wind will be quite big, and if you are on passage between the two islands they will be meeting you on the beam. Thus, this little trip can sometimes be quite a rough and rolly one.

Other wind acceleration zones include the channel between La Graciosa and Lanzarote, and the channel between Lanzarote and Fuerteventura. We strongly advise that you don’t try coming through either of these in a southerly blow.

When the tradewind is blowing, the wind tends to be accelerated where it has to pass around a headland. The south coast of Tenerife is one example, with the wind frequently picking up to force seven (with force nine gusts) off Punta Roja.
On the opposite side of the channel, the high cape just to the south of Puerto Aldea is often a very wild and windy place, with biggish, breaking seas; and the stretch immediately to the south, between the cape and the headland north-west of Puerto Mogan, is not a lot calmer.
Then again, when the tradewind is taking a break, these places can be mirror flat.

The channel between La Gomera and Tenerife is reputed to be one of the windiest places in the archipelago. Friends who have now crossed it ten times reckon that they have never had less than a force seven here. But we, who on two occasions have crossed it just a day before these same people, have never seen more than a fickle force two to four. On two occasions we found it lying as calm as a millpond!

As I said at the outset, unpredictability is the only predictable feature of cruising in the Canaries. When  a southerly gale arrives (a thing which seems to happen about once every winter) then the ports on the south coasts are smitten by huge rolling waves which break over their robust seawalls and cause a great deal of damage; but while Mollymawk was being ferried north along the Tenerife-Gran Canaria channel, on the back of a handy force five southerly, the south coast ports which ought surely to have become untenable were still lying in a puddle of calm. Friends anchored, at that same time, in La Gomera and in Arguineguín (GC) did not even know that the wind had gone into the south!

In our experience, the windiest place in the entire archipelago is to be found off the airport in Gran Canaria. We use this as our bench mark. When the forecast says, “Gran Canaria Airport: Gale” then we know that the day is a windy one, but when it says “Gran Canaria Airport: Five” then we know that the trades are not really pumping, and sailing conditions in the channels are likely to be good.
Oh, we like a good romp, but, believe me, you don’t particularly want to be transiting those channels with a force seven on the beam. The seas, hereabouts, are not the same as the ones found in the open ocean. They are short and steep and rather nasty, and they come rolling towards you, tossing the boat onto her beam ends in a most tiresome way.

Weather Forecasts

Most folk get their forecast from the internet. Some use PassageWeather (which is nicely presented but, in our view, not very accurate); some use WindGuru; some use AEMet.

AEMet is the Spanish met office, and their forecast (as it is termed) is also promulgated on the VHF. In reality, this broadcast tends to provide a good picture of what happened yesterday, but it does also include a very useful general synopsis from which the weather-literate sailor can form his own conclusions. Listen out on 16 to discover which channel to switch to in order to receive the forecast from your particular location.

The trouble with internet forecasts is that most of them are just computer generated and lack any local input. They might be quite accurate in the short term – they might give a reasonably good view of what will happen tomorrow – but when it comes to predicting what the weather might do in four days time they are pretty hopeless.
Friends who use Passage Weather seem to be forever hurrying to cross from one island to another “before it gets windy next weekend.” Having asked them, afterwards, about these passages, we have come to the conclusion that our friends might just as well have looked at their tea leaves. Or, better still, at the sky.

Seriously: the message is often written in the sky.
Fast moving high cirrus tells you that it is very windy in the channels – or that it soon will be.
Cloud sitting over one of the other islands tells you the same thing (and also means that it is probably not a good day for hiring a car, because your island probably looks just the same).
If you are anchored on the south coast of La Gomera and you can see low cumulus clouds to the west, then – again – you can know that it is windy out there.

Where to go, and When

The vast majority of yachtsmen come to the Canary Islands in November and stay for only a fortnight before they set off for the Caribbean. This is a pity, partly because November is not the best month in which to try crossing the pond (since the tradewinds don’t really settle down and blow properly until January) but more specifically because these islands are worthy of a longer investigation.

There really seems to be no good or bad season for visiting. Provided your boat and your crew can cope with a force seven, and provided you watch the weather – and, specifically, provided you don’t let yourself get caught on a south coast in a southerly gale – there is no reason why one should not cruise here in any and every month.

The Facilities

If you need to leave your boat unattended you will want to put her in a marina. La Graciosa is reputed to be the cheapest place to do this – but only if your boat is under 14m.
If you need to slip, there are a number of possibilities. A friend who researched the matter decided that Puerto Mogán was the cheapest.
If you need to do work on your boat and need to buy parts, Las Palmas is your best bet. This is also the best place to stock up for a crossing. The supermarkets here are slightly cheaper than in any of the smaller towns, with a wider variety of produce, and there is also a very good vegetable market. (Good, but nowhere near as good as it used to be 20 years ago, when the vegetables had not been refrigerated. Onions and potatoes which have been stored at room temperature will keep for up to three months on a boat, but those which have been refrigerated will only keep for a couple of weeks.)

Red Tape

Clearing into Spain seems to be virtually impossible these days – and what goes for the mainland goes for the Canaries too.
In our experience, you can ignore instructions in the guide books (to the effect that you can clear into any of the main ports, or that you must get a stamp in your passport if you will be flying out of the islands).  Nor is it true that you will need an exit stamp from your last port of call when arriving in the Caribbean or the Cape Verdes. The guys over there are presumably long accustomed, by now, to the fact that the Europeans no longer bother with these procedures.

Alas, the lackadaisical attitude of the immigration officials is not shared by the customs and excise department.
If you are anchored in the harbour of Las Palmas they will almost certainly come and visit you, and they also occasionally drop in on boats anchored off Arguineguín and Puerto Mogán. A second boat patrols the coast at the northern end of Tenerife and we have been approached here, in the dark. (If you detect an unlit boat coming roaring towards you, you can be pretty sure that it is the Aduanas.)

According to Spanish law, visitors from other EU countries can do as they please for six months, but at the end of that time they are required to import their boat. This is a very, very expensive procedure.
For reasons known only to themselves, the Customs and Excise very rarely enforce this law. We have met people who have been hanging out in the Canaries (or for that matter, in mainland Spain) for years on end, and who claim that there is no threat. You will doubtless meet people who tell you, “Bah! It’s just scaremongering! ‘Betcha can’t find anyone who’s been hit; you’ll just hear about the friend of a friend.” etc, etc.
Well, some friends of ours were hit. Having spent 18 months here they suddenly received a visit from the Aduana and were told that they must pay 15 percent of the value of their boat in customs duty.

(No, it wasn’t a big, fancy boat; it was their home.
No, they hadn’t bought property here, or got jobs (two things which are reputed to “alert” the authorities).
Nobody knows why these people were singled out from amongst the many.)

Note that you can happily leave your boat here, unattended, for as long as you care to; it is your presence which is the crucial matter. According to the law, the owner of a boat can only stay for 6 months in any one year before he is defined as a resident and is required to import the vessel.

Information about anchorages in the Canaries will follow in another article.

The Iberian lynx is a critically endangered species – so rare, in fact, that I have never even thought of thinking of going and looking for one… but Roxanne dreams big. One day she plans to have a finca on a Spanish mountainside, and she expects to wake, one winter’s morn, and find a trail of lynx shaped footprints on the terrace…

For more information about the lynx, visit IberiaNature.

Happy Christmas!

Life on the Ocean Wave, by Jill Dickin Schinas (Oil, 55 x 46 cm)

Well, it’s that time of the year again – and we’re still little nearer than we were last Christmas to our Southern Ocean goal.
As you can no doubt imagine, we spend a lot of time dreaming of the journey ahead. The admiral’s latest painting brings this dream to life; it shows Mollymawk flying along amongst a flock of assorted seabirds, through a sea filled with fish and other animals. No, it isn’t really quite like this, out there on the ocean – we seldom find ourselves at the centre of a throng of birds; and certainly, one could never expect to see mollymawks and tropic birds on the same sea…! This picture is a intended as a synthesis of the life on the ocean wave.

When we think of the passage south through the tropics and into the Southern Ocean, we think of the dolphins which will come to visit us and the whales which we will glimpse; we think of the shearwaters and the tropic birds; of the turtles; of the fish; of the mollymawks, or albatross… But then a little pang strikes our hearts: will the “mollies” still be there when we finally make it down to their end of the world?

Every five minutes, an albatross dies. And they aren’t dying of bird flu. They’re dying in our interests.

Mollymawks, by Jill Dickin Schinas. These and other albatrosses spend their lives on the wing, searching for squid and small fish.

Every year 100,000 albatrosses, flying around in search of food, swoop down and snatch up what seems to them to be a tasty-looking squid. Unbeknowst to these birds, the squids hide a hook. They swallow their dinner – and the next thing they know, they are being dragged down through the water and drowned.

Quite apart from the barbarity, there just aren’t enough birds left in the world for us to carry on killing them at this rate. 18 of the 22 species of albatross flying around our oceans are threatened with extinction. They simply cannot breed fast enough to keep up with the rate of their destruction.

But, of course, the fishermen who set the deadly lures are not aiming to catch mollymawks. They are aiming to catch our dinner.

Balearic Shearwaters hunting near a fishing boat, by Roxanne Schinas

The albatrosses are not the only ones which are suffering:
“We have known for many years about the deaths of albatrosses and other seabirds in longline fisheries in the Southern Ocean, but I suspect that many people would be aghast to learn that a species rarer than the tiger is being threatened with extinction by fisheries operating in European waters.” This quote, from the RSPB, refers to the Balearic Shearwater, a close cousin of the Cory.

Cory's shearwater (foreground) with Manx, storm petrel (L), and Cape pigeon (R)

The Cory is common in the Canaries – but this may soon change, it seems, because it, too is a frequent victim of the long-liners. Then there’s the great shearwater “which suffers an exceptionally high annual bycatch rate of 50,000 birds annually in the longline hake fishery to the west of Ireland”.

Divers, grebes, and various kinds of duck are also being needlessly murdered as part of the fishing industry’s “bycatch” – but, as I have pointed out, we can’t really blame the fishermen; we must blame ourselves, and take steps accordingly. We cannot teach the birds the difference between a plastic squid and a real one and so we must encourage our leaders to take legal action to protect the birds. More importantly still, perhaps, we must change our own feeding habits.

“We have been waiting for a decade for the European Commission to take action to reduce the toll of seabirds in Europe’s fisheries. Further delays will result in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of birds. The technical adjustments to fishing practices needed to prevent this bycatch are often very simple but the political will to apply them has been lacking for far too long.”

For as long as the laws are lacking, the crime continues, and this means that when we eat those particular kinds of fish which are caught on a long-line, or by any other method which endangers wildlife, then we are taking part, by proxy, in the slaughter.

Dolphins - watercolour by Jill Dickin Schinas

The birds are not the only ones which are suffering in our interests.
Each year, tens of thousands of dolphins and small whales are inadvertently slaughtered by fishermen.
Dolphins are smart enough to be able to tell the difference between a real live squid and a plastic lure – but they aren’t clever enough to keep away from shoals of tuna and other fish. Indeed, if they did keep away they would surely die of hunger; fish are their only food.
When a gigantic fishing boat encircles a shoal of tuna it often encircles a large number of dolphins at the same time. Ah, yes – we all thought that this problem had been addressed; we’ve all been buying tins labelled Dolphin Friendly Tuna – but recent reports suggest that the animals are still dying in those same purse seine nets.

To take the Mexican tuna fishery, for example:

“In an August 2002 report, U.S. government scientists admit that two dolphin populations in the eastern Pacific Ocean are seriously depleted and may not recover for 200 years, likely because of the deadly chasing and encircling practices employed by the Mexican tuna industry. … Dolphin populations are less than half of what they were in the 1950s, when tuna fisheries began using massive purse-seine nets to intentionally chase and encircle dolphins, which frequently swim with tuna in this region. An estimated six million dolphins have been killed. …”

The evidence from this government funded survey was expected to force the relevant department to deny this particular fishery the use of the coveted Dolphin Friendly label, but despite the report the government announced a “no significant adverse impact” finding.

Dolphins II - another watercolour by Jill Dickin Schinas

“Evan’s announcement allowed the government to weaken the “Dolphin Safe” label … This decision not only threatens more dolphins, but also deceives American consumers who have trusted the “Dolphin Safe” label since 1990 when all major U.S. tuna companies adopted it.” (From a US Animal Rights website)

“According to the US Consumers Union, there is no guarantee that dolphins have not been harmed, despite the various labels. This is because there is no universal and independent verification of the dolphin-friendly claims” (From Wikipedia)

Even when the tuna is caught by dolphin-friendly methods the fishery is still very far from being environmentally friendly, because thousands of tons of other fish which are not wanted by the tuna-catchers are also being rounded up and destroyed. So, too are turtles and sharks. Ten percent of the fish captured by genuinely “dolphin-friendly” methods is unwanted bycatch.

Spotted Dolphins, from a watercolour by Jill Dickin Schinas

“Fishing practices used by the global tuna industry are contributing to the sharp decline of populations of sea turtles, sharks, rays and other marine animals. Marketing campaigns attempt to make tuna fishing look like a quaint cottage industry, but the truth is that the tuna trade is all about big business.” (Greenpeace – For access to the full report, follow this link)

Dolphins and turtles also get caught in near invisible nylon nets and in trawl nets, drowning when they cannot free themselves and reach the surface to breathe.

As if this weren’t enough there is more bad news: the fish themselves are also threatened with extinction!
Put simply, many species of fish are being caught at such a rate that, like the dolphins and the birds, they are unable to breed fast enough. Certain species of tuna are on the endangered list, and so too are anchovies, cod, European hake, dogfish, conger eel, and a great many other fish which are often to be found in the supermarket freezers, or in tins, or on the wet-fish counter.

Bluefin tuna, with yellowfins in the background, chasing smaller fish

One of the most critically endangered fish is the bluefin tuna. It takes at least ten years to become sexually mature and so is very vulnerable to overfishing, but it is extremely valuable – a full-sized fish can fetch tens of thousands of dollars – and so it is highly sought after. Many countries, including Britain, have acquired a taste for sashimi – thin slivers of raw tuna – and in China the fish is becoming a gastronomic status symbol.

Farming these fish is not the way forward either. No one has yet worked out a way of rearing tuna from eggs, and so “farmed” tuna are simply wild-caught fish which have been fattened in a pen. Buying them doesn’t stop the depletion of the stock swimming in the ocean, and environmentalists are now calling for a total ban on the capture of this tuna.

No more fish doesn’t just mean no more cod and chips, or no more tuna salad. Down in southern Africa, where the fishermen have mopped up almost all of the sardines, the penguins are dying out. And up at the other end of the world, in the North Sea, puffins are starving for lack of their favourite staple. Whales, too, are said to be threatened by the size and scale of our South Atlantic squid fishing industry. Everything is beginning to feel the pinch, it seems. Even the fastest and fittest of Nature’s fishers cannot compete with a fleet of long-liners or a ship setting a huge purse seine net.

Death on the Ocean Wave, by Roxanne Schinas

Roxanne’s collage depicts the scene all too clearly. With our advanced technology and our huge numbers, we are rounding up everything that swims in the ocean.

And then there’s bottom trawling, which just tears up the whole seabed and destroys and captures everything that’s down there.

By our greed, we are threatening the entire marine ecosystem.

Eventually, if we keep on the way we’re going, the sea will just be one big blue desert.

We have to do something about all of this. The UN is talking about doing something to control unsustainable fishing, but – hey, just look how effective their global warming policies have been, so far!
We have to do something, ourselves – and since the fishing industry heeds only the sound of money rattling into the bank, the only thing that you and I can do at the moment is to vote with our purses and our dinner plates. Until we can come up with a better solution we need to stop eating fish whose capture means the death of seabirds or dolphins or sharks and turtles, and we need to stop eating endangered species.

The Wanderer (watercolour by Jill Dickin Schinas). If you want him to survive, don't eat long-lined fish.

Dominating our painting of the world’s sealife is a black-browed albatross, or mollymawk – of course. There are two others in the scene, and there is also a wandering albatross. This bird is the biggest in the world, with a wingspan equal to the South American condor. Isn’t that something worth saving?

To the left of the scene and towards the foreground we find a Cory’s shearwater – the bird that makes such a wonderful noise at its nesting site – and to the right of the boat there is a great shearwater. As we have seen, both of these species are endangered by our modern fishing practices. The storm petrels flitting about over the water are too small to take a fishing lure, and so too the tropic birds – but the dereliction of their ocean home will harm them too, alas.

Spotted dolphins frolicking and chasing fish

Under the water, in the clear blue sea, we find a small school of spotted dolphins and a couple of common dolphins. These species are threatened by the tuna industry.

The fish in the foreground is one of the very last bluefin tuna in the world. Isn’t it terrible to think that, because of our greed and our stupidity, this fish may soon be extinct?

In the distance we glimpse a sperm whale (lifting his flukes) and a humpback whale. Fortunately, as a result of the protests made by a few concerned individuals, these beasts are no longer hunted – except by a very few, mediaeval-minded nations. But the would-be whalers are constantly trying to overturn the ban on killing cetaceans – they say that numbers have now recovered! – and so we need to keep the pressure on.

All species of turtle are on the wane.

In front of the sperm whale, we see a loggerhead turtle. All species of turtle are endangered, partly due to our fishing practices but also because many of their breeding sites have been developed for tourism or otherwise disrupted.
Turtles are also some of the principal victims of our mad habit of dumping non-renewable resources, such as plastic. Most of the rubbish floating in the oceans arrives there from the land, having blown offshore or been carried down rivers. So far as the turtles are concerned, the worst item of rubbish is the plastic bag. Seen from below, a plastic bag floating near the surface of the sea looks just like a jellyfish – and jellies are a young turtle’s staple food. When they swallow a plastic bag, they choke to death.

Plastic bags are finally becoming a thing of the past, and it seems that we will all need to cultivate the habit of carrying a thin cotton bag in our pocket (for those times when we weren’t planning to shop, and haven’t brought along a fleet of tough hessian bags…) In the meantime, while they are still in use, if you must dispose of a plastic bag please tie it in a tight knot. That way, it is less likely to blow around.

An albatross, caught on a long-liner's hook and drowned

As it says on the dolphin research centre website : “Each day you have the opportunity to choose, and to change your behaviour. … Industry responds to the needs of consumers; namely you and me. No matter where you live, your personal choices affect the health of the oceans.”

If you would like to know which fish you can still eat with a relatively clear conscience, take a look at the lists published by the Marine Conservation Association. One shows which fish to avoid, and the other tells us which fish we can still eat.

The matter is still not entirely straightforward, because even when the tin of tuna is labelled with its exact species, we still don’t know where or how it was caught, or how many other animals were killed during its capture. In which case, perhaps we should err on the side of caution, and eat veggie burgers and nut roast…

Meanwhile, if you’re looking for a gift for a child, this Christmas, and you want to spend your money in a way which will benefit the environment, you might like to consider buying from the RSPB.
Amongst the RSPB’s many campaigns is one which seeks to protect the mollymawks.

Black-browed mollymawks drifting across a stormy sky. The weather won't hurt them; their only threat comes from us.

Essentially, the aim is to educate fishermen in the methods by which they can try to avoid ensnaring birds – because, after all, fishermen don’t actually like killing birds either. Sending missionaries to preach to the heathen has always been a costly business, of course, and in order to pay the expenses of their Albatross Task Force the RSPB needs funding. Their fund raising merchandise includes a range of cuddly toy birds, and amongst this flock is a large fluffy albatross! Hey, I want one!

Roxanne, when she was small, had just one rag doll but she had dozens of cuddly animals – including badgers, seals, dolphins, an octopus, and a gull. Thus it would seem that this is an ideal present with which an environmentally-concerned adult can introduce the love of nature to a child.

Happy Christmas!

What’s New

The most obvious change you’ll notice is the header. Readers complained to us that we don’t have enough photos of Mollymawk and her crew – so we’ve added lots of them to the new header. There’s a different selection of photos on each page and each category of articles.

It is now easier to find your way around the site, with links to each section of the site in the header and footer, and the most recent articles in each section listed at the bottom of every page.
Using the new recent article list on the home page, you can now see at a glance whether we have published any new articles since your last visit.
Those of you who use a feed reader can now subscribe to our feed by clicking the link at the bottom of each page of the site, to be notified whenever we publish a new article.
For those of you who don’t know what a feed reader is but still want to know when we publish new articles, you can now subscribe by email and have notifications delivered right to your inbox!
And for those of you who prefer to just come to the site every now and then to see whether we’ve published any new articles, note that we are now trying to keep to a biweeky schedule. We tried weekly for a while, but it was just taking up too much time.

There is a new Q&A section, with our answers to questions we’re frequently asked about cruising. Feel free to send in your own questions.

Fund-raising

A final change is that we have decided that the site has to make some money, since we spend so much time on it, so we are experimenting with Google ads. They are currently shown at the bottom of each article, just above the comments.

Note that we don’t choose the ads ourselves. Google choose them, based on the content of the page. They aren’t always very good at it, but apparently the accuracy will improve with time.
We don’t get anything just for showing the ads; we get paid a very small amount each time someone clicks on them and opens the advertiser’s website. We’re not allowed to ask people to click on them…

For those of you who are feeling generous, we have also added a collection hat. We’re also planning to add a shop soon, selling books and T-shirts designed by the ship’s artist, who has always wanted to open a T-shirt shop.

Feedback

If you have any comments or suggestions about our new-look website, or if you just want to tell us you like it (or you don’t like it), we’d love to hear from you. Please leave a comment below.

And if you want a similar (or different) website designed for you, please visit Caesar’s Grunt.