Looks like we are off again…..

Tomorrow morning we are heading off toward Carbo Verde and then hopefully will keep going past it and onto Martinique.

You can see the weather is looking much better for us, now, with good winds from behind the beam, after the first day and around 2-3M swell, also from behind the beam, mostly.

The weather that has been upsetting the normal trade winds, lows pushing down into the lower Atlantic, have passed, or are passing and normal transmission “seems” to be returning.

But of course a week is a long time in weather forecasting and the total sail will be more like 3+ weeks so we’ll reassess as we approach Carbo Verde.

If you look closely you’ll see we are leaving from Gran Canaria to Mindelo (Carbo Verde ) and then west across the Atlantic to Martinique.

What we’ll be looking for, as we approach Carbo Verde, will be the Atlantic ridge or Lull line, the blue line you see forming in the gif above across the bottom of the Atlantic and just above the course we’ll want to sail.

The Blue line, or Lull line is what creates the Duldrums of old folk law and it is where the bottom of the Atlantic high meets the trade winds and results in no wind.

If its is stable and well defined, that makes for perfect conditions and you can sail north, toward it, for less wind, or south, further away for stronger trade winds.

Those of our friends who are out there at the moment have barely had an Atlantic ridge (Lull line) to talk about at all and winds both very light and all over the place as lows and tropical depressions ran over above them. This has meant more than just no winds to sail with, without those winds the swell pushing down in front of them from the lows and also Squalls, thunderstorm have more chance to form. So its made for a challenging time for them.

Fingers crossed it stays stable for us passing over.

The total distance will be about 5,500km in a direct line (so we’ll invariably do a little more).

With any luck all the excitement will be about fishing adventures. Mahi Mahi anyone :-).

Wish us luck.