Salvador to Cabedelo Brazil

We departed Salvador on February 16^th, as a mini WARC, sailing with TULA MHOR, SANDVITA, TAKEOFF, The OWL, and ALTAIR heading for Cabedelo Brazil about 450 NM up the coast.  ALTAIR took off straight for Grenada as they needed to the get pulled for a little hull work.  3 days before the wind put us in Cabedelo after a bumpy ride, caused by 20 knots of wind on our beam, especially for the 1^st 24 hours.  Our destination,  Marina Jacare, was 6 miles or so up a fairly shallow, wide muddy river with currents as high a 6 knots driven by the tides.  We could only get into a slip during slack tide which lasted for ½ hour once per day, but the AURORA knew that and arrived exactly at slack tide and managed to back into a slip unscathed and aided by zero current.   Cabedelo is quite and laid back compared to Salvador so relaxation was once again the norm.   There is a  good size artisan market about a ten minute walk up the river and every day for the last 30 years this guy blows out the Bolero at sunset on his saxophone while getting paddled around the river by that market:

He is now a local celebrity having blown that tune out more times than anyone else in the world now estimated to be over 10,000 Boleros.  Other than that there is not a lot happening aside from the marina restaurant and a bar (both of which are friendly and provide great food and drink) so we rented a car for a week to check out the local region.  We arrived at Inga, a petroglyph site about 100 KM north of Cabedelo and the majority of the carvings are on one stone about 80 feet long and 7 feet tall:

This artifact is located in the bed of a river accessible only during the dry season for about half of the year.  You can sense that this was a sacred site.  The carving is still precise and deeply carved into the granite.  Considering it is estimated to be 6,000 years old the art is still crisp.  It is easy to make out forms depicting ears of corn, humans, fish, flying creatures, stars and some other things described by our guide, which require a bit more imagination.  The ancient local tribes left only a few tell tales as their temples, markets and homes were made of wood, mud and thatch thus did not make it to the present like the stone structures built by their neighbors in the Andes or Central America.  But enough with the cultural enrichment.  Back to our quest for food and drink.  Our next destination being the town of Praia (beacg) Da Pipa.  We headed for the coast on some rough roads, over many a hill and dale, cruising trough a few small typical Brazilian towns best described as lacking wealth.  We arrived Praia Da Pipa in the dark.  It’s a good size beach town:

... frequented mostly by Brazilian tourists.  We stood out.  We finally found our Pousada – a Brazilian style small hotel come B&B:

Very cute and confortable.  A few nights of A/C caused our comfort factor to climb.  It was a 5-minute stroll to the beach and center of town.  We walked to the center arriving about 8:00 PM:

There were a few folks hanging out but not too much drama.   It turns out that this town does not come alive until around 10:00 at night and picks up steam for hours finally shutting down around sunrise.  Partying is the local lifestyle.  You know what they say “when in Rome…” So we sucked it up for a few days and followed local custom.   The girls dragged us through a few high-end boutiques until the pain was too great causing the boys to enact a pre-planned retreat to a bar terrace over looking the street action.  After 2 days of bars and a few respectable restaurants we surfed some waves in Dolphin Bay and checked out many bathing suits on the fairer sex which were materially challenged in classic Brazilian style… the dolphins often coming in close enough to swim with (we were told), must have been on vacation. On the way back to Cabedelo we stopped at a large fishing village and selected a large fish which they cooked up for our lunch while we sipped large beers – (did we ever mention the coldest beer (by far) in the world is consistently served in Brazil) - sitting under a palapa with our toes dug into beach sand - watching the waves.  We finally got back to AURORA and planned our next local assault.  This time on the Historic Center of Joao Passeo and then a tour of their botanic gardens – a 20 minute car ride from the marina.  Their historic center is an area about 3 blocks by 5 blocks in size with plenty of old and often neglected buildings centered around another San Francisco church – this one being a 16^th century convent – very impressive and in great nick.  The intrepid explorers from SANDVITA, TULA MHOR and AURORA don’t look displeased in this one of the many ornate halls offered by the convent for our inspection:

And the church itself is not too shabby – better described as ornate:

The Botanic garden seemed to be busy when we arrived.  On closer inspection we found it to be populated by many very pregnant ladies with their professional photographers snapping serious bump shots… and then we found the garden is only opened twice a day (sometimes) for guided tours and we missed it.  Our best course of action was a hasty retreat to the Marina to discuss the weirdness of that afternoon in the B-garden.  The next day about half of the ARC boats took a tour to the 16^th century well kept town of Olinda, a UNESCO World Heritage site about 100KM south of Cabedelo.  We walked the town for about 4 hours and in a few pictures you can hopefully see why it is a UNESCO site.  Just across the river is the port town of Recife:

Olinda enjoys a popular carnival – some decorations stay up year around in a ‘museum’ for visitors to enjoy until they are used in the next carnival:

The views from the top of town in all directions are memorable:

Eilo could not resist a new hat:

And more 16^th century churches:

Unfortunately or fortunately it is time to provision, get ready for the last leg of the WARC and leave Brazil.  A 2300 NM passage up the coast of Brazil, across the equator, and then offshore to Grenada is in our immediate future.  We leave on the 28^th of Feb and should arrive Grenada by the 15^th of March.  We’ll let you know how that goes.

Salvador Brazil & Carnival

Amazing enough – AURORA took 2^nd place on leg 15:

That was because we ran our engine very little compared to the other fleet boats.  It was enough to get Eilo up on her feet:

On the way in we could hear Salvador warming up for Carnival – and there we could see them getting ready:

 8 Miles off Captain Ken heard a really low droning sort of noise and was wondering what that was?  In other words - what was about to break?  Lucky it was only the bass notes coming from some nightclub in town at 3 in the morning.  As we got closer we found many different bands playing in various clubs along the coast… obviously warming up for Carnival.  The town is on 2 levels and we made good use of the elevator near the Marina, which would lift us from the strip of land near at the sea which was just a few feet above high tide, about 500 feet to the historic district the whole area being a UNESCO site.  Plenty of old churches:

some very ornate:

 and retail/housing buildings dating  as far back as the 17 and 1600’s :

And the odd palace:

All the streets in the historic center are cobblestone icing this historic cake:

You could not escape the warm-up for Carnival – it was everywhere from the drumming bands combing town you could hear approaching blocks away:

To the garb the locals were sporting:

More decorations being installed daily:

They obviously take this very seriously and must spend a huge amount of dinero making it happen.  And then it happened from February 9^th to the 13^th.  Each day around 5:00 in the afternoon the mayhem starts and it does not end until 5:00 in the morning.  Carnival occurs in 5 separate parts of Salvador.  About 4 million people attend each day which makes it the largest street party in the world.  We checked it out 3 nights out of 5.  The first night we went to the Barra district and checked out the Electronicos:

These are huge “Low Boy” trucks outfitted with scaffolding making them about 20 feet wide, up to 90 feet long and up to 30 feet high.  They hang speakers off all sides and cover them with huge plasma screens.  The speakers and screens hide the generators.  On top is a stage with full lighting providing space for the Brazilian pop artists, their bands and their groupies and everything they require.  In essence each electronico is a self contianed rolling rock and roll concert.  The artists spend about 4 hours preforming as they are pulled through the street at a slow and very very loud pace.  Then there are the rest of us either hanging out in relatively safe purpose built balconies (camarotes) erected next to the route which have food and drink and all the other things one needs to survive or you can tough it out in the street with the rest of the crazies.  Note that they also have everything they need – the yellow boxes lining the street are filled with very cold beer:

The next night we went up to Carnival in the old part of  town. The streets are not wide enough for the Electronicos so the carnival there marches past in full regalia.  Costumes span the spectrum from flamboyant:

to scary:

So we wandered around for hours and consumed our share of the 10,000,000 cans of beers consumed each night at this festival.  One needs to stay focused on the whole show including watching the processions pass or you could miss something:

What they can’t accomplish marching by is performed on one of the many sound and light stages set up around the old town;

We were burned out after night three so we cast off and AURORA took a break to a little Brazilian beach vacation spot called Morro de Sao Paulo:

It’s always great to check out where the locals vacation;

It is also good, or maybe not, to know how you might be treated if you fall foul of health – if a ride in this ambulance does not kill you it will make you stronger:

And the gang from the OWL, SANDVITA, TULLA MHOR, and AURORA was in rare form and very appreciative of the opportunity to visit this little piece of paradise:

Tomorrow we are off again for a port in northern Brazil, Cabedelo, 450 miles distant and on the 1^st of March are heading off on the final leg of this WARC to Granada where we will catch you up again.

Cape Town to Saint Helena and then on to Brazil

We left Cape Town as planned starting Leg 15 at 11:00 on January 6^th.  The wind was good at around 16 knots and the start was OK for AURORA. We had a new crew member on board…  Dan from Jersey City.  Dan was a friend of a friend of Ken’s from work…never met!  Not a sailor but a fisherman and windsurfer.  He wanted an adventure and to sail.  We broke him into sailing fast.  Unfortunately after 30 minutes the great wind soon gave way to variable winds imbedded in a thick fog bank, which rolled in from table mountain:

 …and swallowed the fleet whole in a matter of minutes.  You could see maybe three boat lengths at best and then guess or radar out to fill in the missing pieces. The best part was all the large cargo ships steaming on in seemingly random paths through the fog with their tell tale fog horns blaring, all the other fleet boats bobbing and weaving  through it all and  Robin Island and it’s attendant reefs somewhere out there in the white… all collectively doing much to increase the blood pressure of the fleet captains. This lasted for what seemed like hours but was actually about 45 minutes.  Luckily there were no touches.  When the fog lifted the fleet boats were strewn about pointing in random directions – as though we all had no idea at all where we were going.  Then the wind died to below 10 knots and most boats started their engines and headed on a rhumb line toward Saint Helena.  Not AURORA nor ALTAIR.  We did the best we could to escape the Cape Town coast sailing with what wind we had.  AURORA ended up heading more west than north and a day later we had made almost 100 miles and only got about 25 miles closer to Saint Helena.  At best it was an ugly first day of our South Atlantic passage.  Unfortunately the SE wind which eventually found us forced us to sail AURORA wing on wing which is our slowest point of sail - OUCH.  After traversing ¾’s of the planet AURORA finally dropped a fish hook in the sea.   Dan caught a MahiMahi on our 5^th day:

… and that event and the ensuing diner were the high point of the first half of our SA passage.  We had 1 day of sun while sailing to Saint Helena making it the cloudiest part of the circumnavigation to date and that did extract some of the fun from that experience.  Day 11 at sea found us entering James Bay at the capital of Saint Helena, which is Jamestown.  The south side of that 45 square miles island is constantly touched by the SE trade winds and benefits from a good amount of rain (except for the collapsed volcano cone on the right which is still relatively devoid of vegetation):

The north side where we were moored was bone dry:

We were only there for 3 days and found the Helenaeans to be a very friendly lot – about 4,000 of them on Island.  We, with crew from 2 other boats, hired a van and a guide (Albert was 82 and a character) to show us the highlights of his chunk of paradise over the course of a day.  We got to see the 600 million pounds Sterling worth of international airport just completed.  It was closed.  Apparently the British, who funded the project to boost tourism, decided (actually their politicians decided) to save money and orient the runway counter to expert recommendation.  It is turned 90 degrees to the prevailing trade winds creating a dangerous and continuous cross wind so they cannot land any large jets there.  They have started trying to use small jets and so far the one jet, which uses it each week, has not crashed.  The islands claim to fame is Napoleon was exiled there by the British after his loss at Waterloo.  He spent 6 years there before succumbing to the big sleep.  When first on island and being whisked around he saw and then requested  to spend time in Briar House.  He spent about 3 months at Briar House (while a cow barn was being converted to his prison)the resulting Longwood House was quite beautiful…not at all bad for a “prison”.  It also had wonderful gardens:

At Briar House he made friends with the 13 year old daughter of the house as she spoke excellent French.  There were lots of juicy stories written and movies made about those 3 months but the locals and our guide all insist they were just good friends.  Could you imagine being a 13 year old and having as your good buddy the emperor of France?   They did a real nice job on the conversion of the cow barn into Longwood House:

Napoleon died 5 years later in the room under the attic  window.  He was under house arrest the whole time and he was not allowed to see outside (note all the shutters) lest he see ships potentially coming to rescue him.  Note the shutters on his bedroom windows which would be closed when he was in his bedroom:

And here is the view he missed – or did he?:

Another story goes that the Emperor was handy with a knife and he carved the 2 little holes in this shutter (in bottom right panel and bottom left panels) so he could look out to James Bay with his secret telescope to see what ships were in port:

Well the 3,000 troop garrison Britain posted to St. Helena to prevent Napoleon from escaping worked and his first tomb was and still is in a nice little quiet and well kept place about 2 miles down the road (His body was removed from St Helena and now rests in Paris):

The old Emperor can still be found everywhere around the island.  Here is our friend Lars cozying up to him at one of the local hotels in Jamestown:

Toward the end of our island tour we passed Hayley’s Hill.  Remember Hayley?  He set up his telescope on top of the hill and over many many nights discovered that he was not having any fun like all his friends down in the pubs of Jamestown however he did discover Hayley’s Comet.  So who is remembered?  Haley or his bousy friends?  Hum – must be a message in there.   On the way back to town we stopped by to see if the Governor was at her residence.  She was out for the day – no doubt making final arrangements for her wedding day on January 28^th – but we did find the oldest inhabitants on the island were at home... George and his buddy the local tortoises:

We still had some time to kill so we climbed what may be the longest single flight of stairs in the world known as Jacobs ladder. Here is Dan on his way down the 699 steps:

That exercise really beat us up so we headed off to our favorite restaurant for a beer (Annie’s).  Note there are 2 ways to enter this fine establishment.  You could be normal and walk around the left and up a ramp and then in or you could climb the ladder on the right, cross the hedge and then climb down another ladder on the inside – guess which way captain Ken preferred?

Jamestown is said to have one of the best-preserved Georgian architecture main streets in the world.  It is impressive:

One morning, when we were feeling civilized, we found this coffee shop to be superb:

All good things must come to an end.  After spending 70 hours at the island nation of Saint Helena we raised AURORA’s main sail and then dropped AURORA’s mooring lines and sailed off our mooring on a western heading bound for Brazil – 1927 nautical miles distant.  We fought the wind shadow behind St. Helena for 3 hours before gaining access to the clean trade wind breezes.  This leg promised to have good winds from the East, which would hit AURORA’s beam in her sweet spot and propel us on our fastest point of sail westward.  That didn’t happen.  We got ESE winds and had to go wing on wing for 9 days as we headed WNW –  on AURORA’s slowest point of sail.  To add to our slow misery the days and nights were completely clouded over, and for the first seven days, and the trades never blew over 12 knots.  We missed the stars at night and the solar during the day all at a very slow pace – 5.5 knots – the pain!  All bad things must come to an end as well and they did on day 7.  The sun came out as did the stars and the wind picked up a little and switched to the east… our fun factor increased significantly as did AURORAS’s speed.  Then Dan bagged another fish.  This time by VHF radio from Lexington.  LEX caught a big Mahi-mahi and offered AURORA a fair few meals if we could catch up the mile difference in our longitudes.  Captain Ken sprang to action and in a very uncustomary measure started AURORA’s engine and powered her up motor sailing to 8 knots.  In about 40 minutes we were ready to either collide with Lexington’s rear starboard quarter or catch a bag of fish.  1000 miles off the coast of Brazil Dan executed the later like a master:

Eilo cooked up a very fresh and tasty diner as evidenced by smiles all around the table once again.  We sailed alongside Lexington for another day and a half until the wind died to the point that they started their engine and headed for the horizon.  We bobbed and made slow progress which we were getting good at.  It looked like we would not even get to the finish line in time and gain ourselves the honor of a “Did Not Finish” award for the leg but the real goal had not changed and that was to sail across the South Atlantic with as little engine time as possible.  Our engine ran for 4 hours during the 4,000 mile crossing.  That works out to a fuel efficiency of around 2,000 miles per gallon… not bad.  So why sail with a fleet?  First it’s the safety in numbers game.  Then there is that humans typically like other humans around factor to consider.  That being a consideration and another factor, when passage making is, you typically do not see any of the other fleet boats thus we voluntarily stay in contact twice per day by short wave radio or single side band, using the vernacular.  At each skippers briefing, preceding the star of a leg, we agree to a morning broadcast time and an evening roll call time and then look for volunteers to host each session daily.  The multinational fleet agrees that Eilo is very clear and easy to understand so she is a regular on the SSB.  The morning broadcast to each boat is in alphabetical order.  They report their position as well as the wind speed and direction, which is dually recoded by the host and anyone else who cares.  The afternoon roll call is just that – just want to make sure everyone is still safe and sound. Also tales of catching fish , broken boats, medical care advice etc. is exchanged and discussed.  For instance one night around mid-night SANDVITA, our Swedish friends, had a very scary experience which they related to the fleet at the morning broadcast.  Captain Lars was on the helm and all of a sudden Sandvita hit something big and soft.  They went from 7+ knots to zero knots in microseconds then the boat heeled over probably 30 degrees in the next half second.  The next instant their cockpit filled with water and a torrent washed down the companionway into their Saloon.  Everyone on board was terrified specially those who were woke out of a sound sleep to this new brand of ocean mayhem.  Then it was over- in less than 4 seconds – except for the mental trauma which will live on.  They had hit a sleeping whale – a big one.  And as the whale cleared town with a flick of his tale he turned the boat on it’s side and filled the cockpit with the best the south Atlantic could provide and it may also have damaged their rudder.   Here is Eilo in action – keeping the fleet safe:

Day 10 out of St. Helena the wind finally picked up (16 to 23 knots out of the east) so we finally were flying along at a 24 hour average of almost 8 knots.  It started looking as though we might arrive Salvador Brazil before our unborn grandchildren died.  Yes the Captain often gets negative during wind lacking slow passages and this one has been the slowest of our circumnavigation so far. Eight miles off Salvador the Captain heard a low base noise and thought – great – Now what’s broken on AURORA. Lucky -  It was only the low base of a band playing on shore – loudly.  Early warnings of carnival about to arrive.  Let the games begin.  The wind and its direction persisted for the last 3 days of the voyage and we arrived Salvador after 13 days at sea, on Feb 2.   Nothing to be proud of but we did arrive alive. Yipee!  Now all we have to do is find a mall so we can acquire a SIM card so we can post this blog.  If we survive carnival (Feb 9th – 13^th) we will post another, before we leave Brazil.