in Santa Cruz de La Palma

Sunday-October 16, 2016-Santa Cruz de La Palma, Canary Islands

In order to stay connected to family and friends, and engage anyone interested in long term cruising, we will begin making regular posts based on excerpts from my log. This will be a catch all space for the activities of Dawn Treader and her crew.

This Week…

We split taxi fare with new friends Matt and Amy (SV Florence) to the top of La Palma, approximately 2,400 meters up. In the cab Amy commented on how peculiar it felt to be moving so fast because they hardly ever ride in automobiles. It got me thinking, I remember every bus, cab, and hitch in the last 5 months since departing America. There have been 6 of them; 3 buses, 2 taxis, and 1 hitch.

The views were fantastic at we walked the 30km back to sea level. We enjoyed taking our time walking downhill. Last week, we walked up from the boat to an elevation of 2,000 meters, but had to rush back down, returning home after nightfall. This time, it still took every bit of daylight to make the journey, but constant vista explosions and chatting with new friends made the day seem short. Getting to know the crew of Florence made the day special, and I am reminded of when Klara of MyFlower told us that her favorite part of cruising is all the people she has met.

Going up 2,000 vertical meters

Lunch at the top

photo credit: SV Florence Crew

2,400 meters

photo credit: SV Florence Crew

View of the neighboring island, Tenerife

Back aboard Dawn Treader we have rested our legs and are now busy again with the daily duties of boat life. Debbie has been occupied with bucket laundry. I replaced a pin in the steering control worm gear of the Norvane, and greased the starboard jib sheet winch.

Bucket laundry

Greasing winch

Here, we have good access to city supplies, and we bought 5 liters of 96% surgical alcohol for pre heating our Atom Stove. We now have enough Alcohol and Kerosene on board to last us about 6 months. We use approximately 1 liter of Alcohol and 3 liters of Kerosene a month.

We closed out the week by making our first homemade pizza. Thanks to Garth and Monique from SV Heartbeat for teaching us how back in the Azores.

Rolling dough

The versatile Atom Stove makes pizza

One of three made

This one has pineapple, which makes Deb happy

Next Week we would like to do some camping before sailing to La Gomera…