We were happy to be in warm sunny weather in Lanzarote after months of chilly Northern European weather. We landed first at Arrecife marina. We first noticed how all the boats we ocean going live aboads rather than day sailers.…
Science Report
From before we started our trip, our family wanted to take part in a self guided citizen science project. Some reasons my parents gave for doing this trip was to show Ben and I some of their favorite places before…
Cascais, Portugal to Lanzarote, Canary Islands
Guest post written by – Scott Dinhofer Scott….Scott….. SCOTT!!! I was having a dream and one of the characters turned to me and started calling my name sharply. Turns out that on the boat outside of my dream, Renee was…
Lisbon – our last European mainland port
Lisbon was a transition point in our Verbena adventure. Since July the four of us on Verbena have been traveling on our own. We met up with some past European friends and made some new ones, but all our sailing…
Sintra
While in Portugal, we were looking for things to explore and see. We came upon Sintra that was only a 25 minute ride from Cascais, where the boat was. When I heard that Sintra was a collection of colorful castles,…
Porto, Portugal
From Baiona, Spain we started out motoring toward Portugal. Porto was about 60 nm south and forecast was for southerlies 10 to 15 knots going southwest. We started out motoring and were eventually able to sail on a close reach.…
Spain
After the Bay of Biscay, it took us a day to recover and clean up the boat in La Coruna. We walked from the marina into the town for lunch after cleaning up the boat and enjoyed buying and tasting…
Bay of Biscay – an overnight to remember.
Before this journey to Australia, my overnighting experience had been very slim but that would all change overnight. What I have done so far in my life before the Bay of Biscay was participate in the sail from Boston to…
Roscoff, FR to Brest to Audierne with Bay of Biscay crossing on our minds
Back in the spring when I was doing my armchair route planning I had frequently read that it is best to cross the Bay of Biscay in August. This World Cruising Club article on the subject sums it up best…
5 Ways You Know You’re French – by Benny
Now if you thought that 5 ways you know you’re Dutch, you should prepare for 5 ways you know you’re, wait for it – French! The French feature in food though there is quite a bit of history. We spent…