Seet the sails again

This morning at 7.30 local time we set the sails to take off towards the Brazilian coast to finish our Atlantic crossing. The stop over was very beautiful and we all enjoyed it. The short description of the island of Fernando de Noronha is beautiful, green, peaceful, expensive, exclusive Natural Preserve area with extremely lovely and nice inhabitants at land (people) and in the waters (dolphins, turtles and fish). The highlight was yesterday morning and today morning: Dolphins came into the bay near the harbour, we could see them from our boat lying at anchor. Yesterday we took the Dinghi and drove over to them. There were hundreds of them around us, mostly swimming, some jumpong around. One jumped right next to our Dinghi, I thought we would all be soaking wet from the splash when he lands, but he landed gracefully. Once we speeded up and they came to swim infront of us, they love to play with driving boats. It's hard to express the beautiful feeling that we had when w were amongst them when we had the motor od the Dinghi off and it was so peaceful. This morning we just watched them during our breakfast, they were pretty close. And we drove by them when we left, they had come to say good-bye. Sooooooo cute I almost got a heart-attack yesterday being amongst them....We're having a wind of 5Bft (averaging at 21 knots) and go against the wave, so it's a rought ride for those 2 days til we reach the harbour. We'll hit the land at Cabedelo and then drive into the river towards Joao Pessoa, stopping at the harbour Jacré village, where we'll most probably stay for 3 weeks. They have showers and a pool there which we can use, it seems to be a vacation resort. What we need most urgently is washing machine. And the internet so I can post pictures.
Now at position 04°23,3'S and 033°10.3'W, course 230 at around 6 knots.

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Fernando de Noronha

Just a quick note: beautiful, green, expensive. Rarely internet and tooo busy to keep looking for one. Will write all about the island when we arrive in Brazil mainland on monday evening. We'll leave here on saturday morning hoping to see some dolphins and should be on the water for 2 days. Then I'll send pictures. Bye.

Island Ferndando de Noronha

So we finally did arrive this morning at 9am UTC = 6am brazilian time. We "celebrated" first by jumping into the water and second with a nice breakfast. Then we packed our stuff and went to the land with the Dinghi where our first stop was the "harbour" office. Since we had to do our immigration they called the national police in. Seems like not too many people come here by boat. All the guys were brought here from town just to do paperwork with us. We had to fill out papers three times. Everyone was soo nice though, they even offered coffee while we waited for the next officers to come. Then we walked to the next town over the hill trying to get money from the machine or get it changed. Well, we ended up getting some money at the airport (me) and changing in the evening ( Marcus). Eva was not lucky so far in retreiving cash. We spent most of the afternoon at the most beautiful beach. This island is extremely beautiful, my favourite so far, cause it has beautiful bays, great for swimming and snorkling, low waves and it's GREEN! Beautiful trees, beautiful palmtrees, natural water running down (they even have a shower at the beach with natural wateer coming down from the hill), very nice people, a lot clenaer and more developed than Cape Verde, and yet VERY quiet, very exclusive. Love it here. Had our sunset drink above the beach in a bar/restaurant, We celebrated our crossing of the Atlantic with a Pina Colada. Now we're TIRED and go to bed....
We can't access internet here, so too bad we can't send pictures at the moment. Maybe we will be able to solve that, but it does not look like it. On friday early in the morning we'll continue our journey towards Brazil mainland. WE could stay here forever ( I could), but it's very expensive (Tax = $15 for the boat /day and $50 / person/day just to be able to visit here!), but it's worth it. Sorry you can't see paradise right now....

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The last day

The last day has started, the computer says 12 more hours to go if we continue at the same speed, which right now mostly is at least 7 knots. That would mean we have to SLOW down (!) soon in order not to arrive too early (before sunrise). We need to slow down 3 hours. We're now at position 02°44,'S and 031°13,1'W travelling course 230 at 8,6 knots with 16 knots wind from the side. The waves have gotten bigger now, it feels like being in a speed boat. Please pray they let us anchor at the island, I need the rest and to be able to stand straight without the continuous push to the side. We will let you know when we're there...By the way, I really feel it's winter here. It's a lot cooler than 2 days ago.

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