Last Friday I was finally notified that my battery is beyond repair. I won’t go into the “why” and “what went wrong” etc. I did that for myself long enough and apart from destroying my mood it also didn’t help at all. I then tried ordering a new one (the ones they were selling in Tenerife were to large for my battery case and very expensive). I tried ordering and every time it would take one or two days until I got a message that told me the seller wasn’t delivering to the Canary Islands. This went on with different Sellers for days. I had postponed my reservation in La Gomera to next Tuesday. So I cast off Monday evening to sail the 70 miles overnight and not arrive in the dark. I still had my starter battery. That would have to suffice.
The wind was strong and there was still a bit of a swell from the storm that had hit Madeira. Since the wind was directly from behind I only rolled out the Genoa and was happily cruising along with 5 knots and Wayne was handling the waves well as expected. There was a mix of clouds and clear skies a nice moon, stars some rain, interesting gusts and the beautiful skyline of the lights of the towns on the Tenerife coast. I was enjoying the ride although it was a bit bumpy.
We were around Punta Rasca, the southern tip of the island, when it dawned. The wind got lighter and lighter but the waves weren’t. So pretty soon the sails (I had raised the main in the meantime) were flapping unhappily in the waves and the boom was banging against the sheet and the vang.
Before I could get the mainsail down the boom vang steel wire ripped (rather exploded) and the whole construction ripped out of the boom. I was now quick to get the sail down and collected what was left before everything went overboard.
I tried the poled out Genoa for a bit but soon gave that up, too. There was just no wind. We were only12 miles out of San Sebastián so on came the iron sail and we motored the rest of the way through an uncomfortable wave. The view was fantastic. The Teide (Spains highest mountain) to one side, La Gomera on the other. And of course the sun was shining.
Just before I called Puerto de San Sebastián on the radio to get permission to enter the harbour, the wind piped up to 30 knots in gusts. Great. I thought I should maybe anchor some place and wait for lighter winds because I didn’t feel like manoeuvring in the tight marina with so much wind pushing Amy around.
After having passed the Armas and Fred Olsen ferry I called the marina on the radio and told them I would probably need some help with the docking depending on the place they had for me. A young German marinera met me with the dinghy and helped with the docking. There was now hardly any wind and everything went smoothly.
I was a bit tired and fell asleep for a couple of hours. When I woke up there a message from the last seller I had contacted that they couldn’t deliver my battery to the Islands either. I then learned from a friend in Porto Santo that the Canary Islands have special customs status in Europe and therefore certain goods can’t be delivered. What a bummer.
I thought my situation over, went to an Auto repair shop and checked their car batteries (sizes and prices). I measured again at home and did some research. The next morning I when back and got an old fashioned car battery. Although it weighs twice as much and I can only use half of its power compared to the lithium, it will hopefully die the job, too. And I wanted to finally be done with the whole thing. It had already eaten up to much of my time. The people at the garage were real friendly and patient with my Spanish. The price was great and they even drove the heavy battery and me back to the harbour. What a success!!
The next day I started repairing my boom vang, did a few other repairs, cleaned up the boat, went to the beach and cooked a nice risotto. Finally back to normal life 🙂
Tomorrow I want to take a hike up the mountain to the Jesus statue.
