Our first glimpses of Faial were through a heavy mist and it was remarkable in its greenness. The islands are undoubtedly volcanic and the isthmus we had to round before heading up to Horta was clearly originally the rim of a volcano. The small fields were bordered by hedges and the whole impression was one of ‘time gone by’. Our timing into the harbour was inspired as the customs/fuel dock was clear and we moored alongside to do the necessary formalities – or rather we tried to do them. Our arrival at 11.45 was unfortunately just as the port office, customs and immigration offices closed for lunch but this gave us time to take on fuel and water. We have almost come to expect a lack of ‘joined up thinking’ when encountering bureaucracy and perversely, although the port office and immigration have an hour for lunch and returned at 13.00, the Customs were not only due to re-open at 14.00 but by 14.15 has still not appeared so, with pressure on us to leave the berth, we returned to Hejira to vacate the dock.

The wind by this stage had picked up considerably and being allocated a tight spot, rafted 3 out from the dock, we took to open water to see if it was possible to keep Hejira head to wind while motoring astern. Vicious gusts suggested that we would have to ‘weather cock’ into the berth and this we did. The only downside to this orientation was that the aft cabin (mine) suffered from a continual slap under the counter but this was a small price to pay for the ease of maneuvering into the berth.

Every available space around the marina is taken up with paintings by the crews of the various yachts that pass through on passage. The Azores is an inevitable staging post on the majority of northern transits of the Atlantic and I was particularly struck by a poignant painting in remembrance of the crew of Cheeki Rafiki which was tragically lost a couple of years before.

We explored the town before our evening function starting in the famous ‘Peter Cafe Sport’ bar. The following meal was in one of those ‘cook yourself on a hot rock’ restaurants and we shared a table with the crew off an American yacht which turned out to be great fun and the company was entertaining.

Returning to Hejira with Cliff from AWOL, we inevitably opened the scotch and true to form (understandably as I was tired) I fell asleep, apparently mid-sentence, to wake up to two empty bottles on the table and three very pissed people telling each other how much they like each other!

Ollie writes:-

After two weeks at sea, our first sight of land was a dark smudge on the horizon.

The islands weren’t wholly visible until much later on, since it was a grey day and they were mostly enveloped in cloud.

Despite this, we made it into Horta just as the promised gale was beginning to stir.

The skipper shuffled off to do the bureaucratic bum-flufferies while I treated myself to a shower. It’s indulgent of me I know, but we’re no longer conserving water and it’s been a whole week since my last one.

I should probably mention that a representative from ARC gave us each a cold beer when we arrived. We slurped them down very quickly and to be honest, continued drinking at that pace for the rest of the day.

Sailors have a justified reputation for drinking, and after this voyage, I can see why they do it. I think it’s a heady mixture of relief and celebration of not having died – a perfectly justified thing for us to revel in, and we did.

I think the skipper’s done an excellent job describing the restaurant we ate at. You all know that classic restaurant format – ‘cook your own on a rock’ don’t you? We were sat at a table full of yachties and I was fearful of getting found out, since as you may have gathered by now – I know embarrassingly little about sailing. It’s especially embarrassing given my heritage – because you’ll definitely have worked out the skipper is capable of representing yachties at the United Nations. But thankfully I was placed next to an American couple who were happy to steer clear of sailing and chat about anything and everything, very enjoyable it was too. After dinner it was back to the yacht for a few whiskies and further chat that descended into pure unadulterated bollocks.

As I write this, the skipper has just returned with a carrier bag and a glowing smile. He’s apparently found the finest shop in the Azores. Why? Because it sells a vast range of wines-in-boxes! “I asked someone and apparently this is the best one, so if it’s any good, we’ve got to stock up before we leave.” So stay tuned for a review in the next few days.

As we close in on the Azores, yachts crossing the Atlantic funnel towards the island of Faial and the harbour at Horta. It has become one of the four busiest yacht transit harbours in the world. Zooming out on the plotter I can see 13 vessels within AIS range homing in on the refuge and clearing in and berthing promises to be a challenge. Hopefully the ARC organisation will help smooth the process.

The warnings of a storm seem to have moderated to advice about a gale but we still press on to achieve a midday arrival, hopefully after the backlog of overnight arrivals have been processed. AWOL continues in our wake, keen to steer to our lights as their auto pilot is on the blink again. We have replenished their diesel stock by a further 60 litres, floated down to them in three cans and they now have the capacity to comfortably motor in.

I had been told that the trans-Atlantic passage to the Azores was not to be missed because the wildlife is spectacular. Well it was good advice as we have been blessed with sightings of many different cetaceans. It is in these circumstances that one would like to know more about the subject as there were clearly different species of dolphins that visited judging by their markings. All indicators suggest that the whales we saw were sperm whales. These are massive, up to 60 feet in length and weigh up to 50 tons. At this time of year they are likely to be the larger males. They dive to nearly 3000 metres for up to an hour feeding on squid and some fish then spend a period on the surface recovering and blow around five times a minute. We were lucky enough to see one dive when the tail comes out of the water and this was absolutely spectacular.

There are a number of indicators of getting older – going grey, hair falling out etc. Another indication became apparent today as I stood at the bow with my son Oliver, watching the dolphins. “listen to that” he said, “what?” I said, “the dolphins talking to each other” he said as though derrr, can’t you hear them. Well I couldn’t, it seems that their communication is outside of the audible range of the older man so that’s another faculty lost.

Ollie writes:-

Today’s been like one big trip to Sea World.

To kick off, Barry saw one of those underwater tortoises floating by.

And as if that wasn’t enough excitement for one day – we then saw three whales…three!

The second one surfaced only a boat’s length away, then did some serious spouting.

If the wind had been in the right direction, the vapour could’ve easily wafted over us.

But the piece de resistance was certainly the third one.

It was a little further away, but it stuck its tail a couple of metres above the surface before diving, so we were treated to a full view of its rear wingspan.

I’ve never seen whales before this trip, though admittedly, I have lied about seeing them.

You see, on a family holiday in the Caribbean when I was a kid, we once went deep sea fishing.

I remember all of a sudden people on the boat started shouting and pointing.

But the sea was rough, and I couldn’t make anything out.

“Did you see those whales Ol? They only surfaced for a few seconds.”

“Yes, I did!” – I lied.

I can recall being quietly frustrated that I hadn’t caught a glimpse of them, whilst having to maintain a veneer of exuberance because I’d said I had.

I’ve been living a lie for the ensuing fifteen years.

But happily after today, I can reveal the truth in the hope my friends and family will forgive my deception and accept me for who I really am.

To top it all off, we were also visited by at least four pods of dolphins, each of which indulged us with a show up at the bow.

As a special treat, I could even hear them talking to one another.

You know that squeaky buzz they do, a bit like when you try to squeeze out the very last of the Fairy Liquid.

Unfortunately neither of my commanding officers was able to hear it.

And I had to explain to them that it’s probably because they’re of retirement age.

Apparently as you get older the range of pitch you’re able to hear narrows considerably.

I tried to assuage their obvious disappointment by explaining to them just how much I would love a free bus pass.

Torrential rain, thunder and lightning, lumpy sea and semi darkness did not augur well for the day as we were forced to motor to try to beat the storm into Horta. We had spotted the threatening weather system on our long term weather forecast nearly a week ago but it has only just shown on the shorter Emailed forecasts. With our self-imposed limited use of the Satellite communication system, we are relying on these Emailed forecasts but would prefer the grib files we used to download. The day actually soon brightened and with the wind and sea dropping we had a fairly languid day under engine.

The fleet seems to be strung out and the warnings about the impending storm carry the advice to head south if it’s not possible to make Horta by Monday evening. Looking at the speed of some of the stragglers and the light wind conditions, it would appear that they are motoring conservatively, if at all to save their stock of diesel. AWOL is happily not suffering from such a constraint as they power along in our wake. They have asked for another 60 litres to be floated down to them again today which should mean we can both motor into Horta by the storm imposed deadline.

It is frustrating that we have been unable (or rather reluctant) to post photos since our satellite data hiatus but I will be illustrating the blogs with some pictures once we connect to the mobile data network in the Azores.

Our frugal use of water means that we have only just switched over to our full second tank so we should be fragrant when we arrive in Horta on Monday. We will have to find a laundry to have a thorough wash as everything is caked in salt and dirty. Ollie has run out of clean shirts and is wearing mine – no cred in that!

Ollie writes:-

Well my night watch was quite dramatic yesterday.

When I took over from Barry, there was frequent lightning on the horizon, which looked all gothic and exciting.

Though over the next hour we moved from the side-lines to the centre of the action – that’s when it became unnerving.

The yacht was engulfed in torrential rain and enormous flashes of lightning, almost in unison with the accompanying thunder.

There I sat, trying to focus on my audiobook, but couldn’t help contemplating what would happen if we got struck.

We’ve got a mast after all.

And while I don’t know much about meteorology, I’m pretty sure it’s un-ideal to be attached to a forty foot metal pole that pokes up into a thunder storm.

We’ve got lightning conductors and that sort of clobber, but despite all that, I kept returning to the memory of seeing a tree that had been struck by lightning near my school.

The tree had literally exploded.

Still, we emerged unscathed and it was another dry sunny day – though tragically windless.

In the afternoon the skipper unravelled a special treat on the foredeck – our very own hammock.

I think it must be designed for backpackers because it fits down into a cagoule-style bag and is made from similar material.

That’s great for easy stowage, and it strings nicely between the baby stay and the mast.

However it was still quite choppy today; and I did wonder if this ‘cagoule hammock’ was designed to have an 18 stone bloke getting violently swung back and forth whenever a particularly big wave came along.

But just as in the lightning storm, my anxiety was happily unfounded.

Just before dinner we were visited by another pod of dolphins, and they spent some time playing around the bow.

The skipper and I stood in the pulpit to watch them.

We both agreed it doesn’t get much better, especially when a dolphin turns its head round to look at you.

And it may be anthropomorphising, but we also felt that they tried to put on a performance for us: jumping out of the water, quickly changing direction and sweeping from one side to the other.

Perhaps they’re worried that since Flipper was taken off the air, their star is diminishing.

And their routines are an attempt to recapture the limelight, a bit like going on ‘I’m a Celebrity…’ or doing panto in Guildford with Les Dennis.

While off watch at 0300, I had a knock on the door as Ollie was concerned about an AIS indicator and enormous radar reflection apparently coming our way. He had rightly scrolled the data and established that the Sofia Express, bound for New York would pass us 1 mile away but its track was seemingly towards AWOL, 1 mile astern. The AIS data lists lots of useful information like speed, draft beam and length and this is usually quoted in feet. The size of the Sofia Express was such that its length was quoted in fractions of a mile! I was concerned because AWOL does not transmit an AIS signal and its radar signature is not very strong, had they been seen? A call to their bridge established that the Sofia Express had indeed seen AWOL and was tracking them. So, a reassuring outcome and a precaution well taken.

It seems that AWOL has fixed her auto pilot by re-installing the old unit and she has miraculously started steering in a straight line. Cliff is still keen for us to stay close though as the old one had been replaced because it was struggling and, as we are ‘cracking on’ to try to beat the storm, he may need some more diesel if we continue to motor.

No news from Mailasail so it’s plug in, send and receive, unplug until I have some assurances.

Ollie Writes:-

Well, I’m still alive.

And I just took over the watch from Barry, and he was very much alive too.

If the skipper emerges from his bunk at 4am then yacht Hejira still has a full complement of crew.

Why should this need confirmation?

Well, tonight we each cooked a Fray Bentos pie for dinner, and the newest one was 15 months out of date.

Both my commanding officers were adamant there’d be nothing wrong with them, and that the rust on the tins would just add a little extra flavour.

We’re on something of a deadline now; we need to get into Horta by Monday lunchtime – apparently there’s a fat storm headed our way.

As a result we’re likely to be running the engine over the next couple of days.

Though that didn’t stop us shaking out the Parasailor this afternoon.

It’s the Skipper’s absolute favourite toy, even above his Fisher-Price sextant.

For those of you that aren’t familiar with all the different types of sails, the Parasailor is technically known as a ‘bloody big one.’

And for the yachting cognoscenti, here’s some more advanced details…

The Parasailor goes out the front of the boat and it has lots of ropes attached to it.

Like many other types of sail, there needs to be some wind for it to work properly – otherwise it doesn’t.

The Parasailor works best when the wind is coming from behind you, and the most effective way to determine that is by plucking a handful of grass and throwing it into the air.

The Parasailor comes in an enormous lycra condom that you have to unravel.

Sorry to get technical, but as you can probably tell – being onboard with such seasoned seamen as Barry and the Skipper has had an effect and I’m quickly learning the finer points of sailing.

Tomorrow I’m planning to hold forth on the difference between the mast that points upwards and the small dangly mast that points backwards.

The settled windless weather has resulted in the sea eventually losing its boisterous attitude and we continued to motor while the crew stirred themselves.

Our first job was to decant the diesel bladder (loaned to Hejira by Barry) contents into our fuel tank and it was very heartening to see the starboard tank needle rise from about ¼ full to over ¾. We subsequently connected the deck wash pump and gave the decks, cockpit and the bladder a thorough hosing down.

While talking about tank levels, even with our shower indulgence a couple of days ago, we are still using water from our first tank even though the gauge is showing empty. With only 3 days to go to Horta, it may be time to relax the showering regime which would be welcomed by all on board and probably those ashore in Horta when we arrive!

As agreed, we decided to take the opportunity to transfer a couple of barrels of fuel to AWOL to supplement their capacity and extend their range. This involved tying the barrel and a fender on the end of a long polypropylene (floating) line and letting it run out from the stern while we maintained minimal steerage way. AWOL then came up to the fender marker on the end and picked it up with a boathook and lifted the barrel over the guard-wires and onto the deck. This was repeated for the second barrel and the line and fender were then recovered, job done and a happier Cliff.

Having used the last of the sliced Bermuda bread by making Welsh Rarebit – to please Barry, we have turned to our stock of about 20 packs of bread mix. Barry is the undisputed maestro but I think his eminence may be under threat from the age of the packs. The sell by date on the recent pack is December 2015 and Barry can’t get it to rise. It must be the yeast in the mix that has aged so we will need to scour the shops in Horta for some fresh yeast as Barry says he doesn’t usually suffer from this problem – no comment please Helen!

We await further Satellite analysis from Mailasail.

Ollie Writes:-

Like the skipper said, no word yet from the internet people about Bill Shock.

As I wrote yesterday, it’s obviously a cock-up on their end; it’d just be nice to get to the bottom of it.

Anyway, the ocean was flat and glassy today.

So glassy that when looking at the horizon – it was difficult to see where the sea ended and the sky began.

So with a steady yacht, it was time to haul Barry’s swollen bladder to the highest point on the deck, and empty its dieselly contents into the fuel tank.

Perhaps we wouldn’t have needed to wash the decks afterwards, but as we were decanting, the skipper decided to grasp and twist the big knob that protrudes from Barry’s bladder.

The result was a sudden dribbling onto the deck and all over the Welshman’s favourite trousers.

After we’d mopped up that little accident, it was time to do another fuel transfer.

This time from yacht Hejira to yacht AWOL.

I think the skipper’s done an excellent job of describing how this was achieved, so I won’t try to guild the lily.

I’ll only add that it was planned and executed exceptionally well.

And, if I may say so, I did a terrific job of getting the necessary ropes out of the locker…and then putting them back afterwards.

Later on, the idea was to have sausages and crusty bread for dinner.

Though unfortunately, instead of crusty bread, Barry served up a plate of small brown rocks.

Maybe it’s a Welsh thing, from what I could tell, the point was to just butter them, then throw them overboard, where they no doubt sank straight to the bottom.

The unquestionable highlight of the day though, was seeing a whale in the distance.

It began with Barry pointing out a faint object on radar.

“Not sure what that is…I suppose it could be a whale.”

We all stared intently in the direction of the mystery object, and had almost given up.

But then for a split-second, a huge dark head emerged above the surface, followed by the whole length of a whale’s back rolling on the waterline.

Then again, and again, then nothing.

I’ve never seen a whale, so this was a special treat for me.

Apparently there’s a large community of sperm whales in and around The Azores, so we may see a few more in the coming days – fingers crossed!

There were some dolphins that came fairly close to the yacht in the early evening too.

But dolphins are shit compared to whales, so we hardly looked up from buttering our brown rocks.