Stormälö - South America

15/06/2015

Rounding the southermost point of Tenerife

14.6.2015 Laying the boat for a stopover in Canaries

Bilden är tagen av Ulf Olsson, S/y Clary

Lazy days in the sun, but after all not so lazy at all. Making the boat clean and ready for a few months stay in the island of Tenerife. Securing the mooring lines with double ropes.
Taking down the sails and the equipment on deck. The iridium radios packed with the electronic chart chips to my bag.

The harbor capitan and the marineros are extremely friendly and helpfull.

The landscape here in southern Tenerife is lower but interesting with the mountains and Teide in the background.
The prevailing wind is from E-NE and it is normally quite hard, on the contrary to the northern parts of the island and the east coast where it is quite calm.
The business life in the harbor with rental companies is harder because Puerto San Miguel is only surrounded by two golf courses and it is not a real village or town.
The nearest town is Las Galletas also known as Ten Bel, a tourist atrapp from the previous years.
The harbor is mainly aimed to the yachts to be left here for the stopovers. This harbor seems to be calm not big swell. The wind when southerly can be strong, storms 1-2 times a year max. Other good harbors in Tenerife are Puerto Colon, it is big and today full. Also Santa Cruz in north of the island is calm, a big and busy port, it should be a bit cheaper. Gomera you find a calm harbor with a good prize. Also in La Palma a harbor in the West Coast is calm.

We met many interesting sailors and a great variety of boats. A interesting Judel & Vrolik two tonner and an older Ocean 60 from a greek owner which had some minor damages from a storm. With our dutch friends we had a glass of wine in our boats. A well sunburn Liisa from Finland, what could not be recognized immediately. But I tell a story later on.
A huge reconstructed Viking ship Ragnarök is waiting for the customers here in the harbor. Ready for a great adventure in the sea. A galley and a bar with delicious dinners is ready!

The southermost lighthouse

Ketun nenä mountain

Our harbor

Here you can haul out your vessel

The big beauty

Clothes are hanging here

Polished boat

Background mountains

The landscape is dry here

The point at a distance

Ragnarök waiting for the customers

wine barrel

Viking bar where you can get balsam to your Viking soul

Here is your seat!

10/06/2015

Sailing continues in Macaronesian islands

Day sailing in Canaries, more like mountain hiking for me. We have to climb to every top we see in our trip trough these Atlantic islands.

The Macaronesian islands in the Atlantic ocean are volcanic and high in altitude. The peaks reach easily to 2000 meters and over. The climate on the hill sides is often humid during the night and gives the vegetation the water it needs.
The begining of the day starts cloudy but bursts to sunshine before the mid day.
The finest example is Madeira. The Portugese inhabitants have built an exquisite watering system that gives water even to the huge plantations and farms they have on the island. Te levadas are a great system to get the water from the moist hills down to the plantations on lower levels on the slopes.

Porto Santo was a bit dry on the east but the town of Vila Baleira was very green and the parks flourished with flowers and water fountains.

Palma was very green in the north and had a lot farms to cultivate vegetables.

Tenerife was clearly divided in height levels with different vegetation on each of them. We even found woods just under two thousand meters of height. Teide was majestic volcan with the tops reaching over 3 700 meters. Rock formation reminds of the moon landscape.