GRIBS......

  We obtain most of our weather information from GRIB files which we obtain as email attachments. GRIBS or Gridded Binary files are electronic weather information compiled and distributed for free, incredibly useful. However on this occasion the GRIBs were giving us a rather depressing picture.

A large depression from The American east coast was interfering with the stationary Azores high which drives the trade winds. As well as giving us very light winds it was also creating a substantial northerly swell. This would mean we could go out and slop around wrecking gear and generally feeling sick or stay in harbour and wait for the depression to move east, probably a weeks wait.

Needless to say we have decided to wait along with all the other birds of passage.

It gave Dave chance to fill his two UK gas bottles in the local Enarcol station. The guys there didn't baulk at filling propane bottles with butane and seem to have adapters for every type of gas bottle.

More depressing news particularly for Lynne was the death of David Bowie and it seemed appropriate to go out and have a drink or two in his memory that evening.

We discovered the rather charming bar on the main square was open so we had a couple of drinks there.

We later visited the Jazzy bird bar which has live jazz music ( on Fridays only ) and finished up in our new local, Simpatico with Tom the genial Irishman and a couple of guys from a a cable repair ship anchored in the bay. Noel from Cumbria and John who had a house in Mindelo.

This turned into a proper session and saw the skipper and crew of Hocus Pocus weaving back to the boat at 5.30 am! However David Bowie had a proper send off.

Unfortunately we had arranged with Christopher to move Aku Mor out of the marina and anchor her near us in the bay at 10 am, primarily to save Christopher and Blue the rather steep marina fees, with the weather being so calm it seemed to make perfect sense. We had the assistance of a Geman, Michael who's dis masted boat had been at anchor for months and somehow despite our rather massive hang overs, we got the job done.

The rest of the day was spent recovering as the temperatures climbed to 32 degrees. The evening was not a great deal cooler due to the very light southerly winds.

We may get the chance to explore the island more. 

Post update....depression has been reclassified as a hurricane. Hurricane "Alex" first of the season and a very unusual thing indeed. It won't bother us as it is heading towards the Azores and eventually Greenland.