The English translation means “Black Heart” and this fruit is aptly named.
It may start off green, but as it ripens, this heart shaped fruit will turn pitch black! Even more unique is the flavor within.
The flesh of the fruit is white with large black seeds. The fruit tastes like Strawberry-Banana candy and it is delicious!
One of our more creative shirt designs is called Tentakeel!
Some boats have full keels, others have fin keels, but no one ever talks about this setup!
Living in a boat and especially cruising demands a lot of resourcefulness. If something breaks or required too much electricity, it can be a frustrating situation or a puzzle. On the way down the ICW, our water heater broke and we were unable to take hot showers. This wasn't a problem at the time because it was summer, but as the weather got colder and we crossed the Atlantic, nothing felt better than a soothing hot shower. In order to make this possible, I simply boiled water in a teapot and poured it into our insecticide sprayer shower! Normally, we would leave this shower out in the sun and it would heat the water since we had covered it in black tape. This wasn't an option when we were underway because the sun wasn't hot enough and there was a lot of salty sea spray. The teapot worked so well even though it was a silly concept.
Moral of the story: don't deny yourself simple pleasures when at sea. If you need something like a hot shower, make it happen with whatever means you have!
When we left Baltimore in the Summer of 2017, we thought we would be in the Azores by Chrismas 2017. Well, we made it, but with a lot more time and distance in getting there!
We honestly were not ready yet to cross an ocean when we first set sail. Looking at this map, you can see that when we decided to head to the Bahamas to ride out the winter and made our way south, we clung to the coastline!
We were planning to cross an ocean and at many points felt like we were far from land, but the truth is, we were smack up against the coast the whole time.
By the time we made it to the Bahamas, we had gotten the experience we needed to feel confident and comfortable with heading out to sea to actually cross an ocean. No longer did we watch shore disappear behind our stern, no longer did we worry about getting far from land.
When we left Florida for the Azores, we were ready. Nothing had physically changed with us, but a mental transformation had taken place. We still had the same gear and the same thought processes about when to use certain sails, but our attitude about everything had changed drastically. Now, we were heading out to sea and the thought of land sickened us. We wanted to head straight away from land out into the blue horizon where we would point directly towards our next destination.
The trip began at the wrong time, for the wrong reason, and in the wrong direction.
We left Florida when the weather was not right to cross the ocean because the summer weather patterns that grant you safe passage had not occurred yet. We should have waited another two weeks for the weather to be correct.
We left to appease our angry crew member because we were worried that he would abandon us and we thought that we really needed a crew member to cross an ocean, so we left port to appease him and shanghai him (there are no airports out in the middle of the ocean) so he couldn’t abandon us.
To try and make our way from land, but avoid the nasty storms up north, we traveled way to far east. This placed us into the doldrums with no Gulf Stream to help carry us through the windless region.
We learned some very valuable lessons on this passage.
First: Don’t have crew.
Second: If you have crew, you don’t have to please them, they have to please you.
Third: You call the shots, not the other way around.
We stopped in Bermuda to drop off our angry crew member because we realized that we didn’t need crew (or his giant ego and bad attitude) to make the crossing.
This passage was insanely slow and was full of mistakes that we learned from and would not repeat!
Maddie and I waited in Bermuda, in St. George’s Harbor, for the winds to be perfect for us to leave. While we waited, we had a grand time exploring Bermuda and getting to know the locals. Once the winds were correct, we left and had a wonderful and fast passage to the Azores.
We stopped listening to the weather forecasts on the way to Bermuda because they were always wrong. We instead looked at the clouds to read what is really going on up in the sky. Using this method, we were able to sail on the rhumb line straight to the Azores, until we got caught in a high pressure system for a few days and were totally becalmed.
Being becalmed for a few days was the worst weather we had. While crossing, we had gales to the North, Hurricane Chris to the West, and trade winds all around us, but by looking at the sky, we were able to keep ourselves safe from powerful winds and simply relax in light winds.
The crossing was very surreal, we saw things that could never be imagined, like one night where photosensitive bio-luminescent creatures illuminated the ocean with as many lights as the stars above in the sky. On another occasion when the ocean calmed down completely, the entire surface was covered in a snow of micro plastics.
Now that we have made our first ocean crossing, we feel very confident that we can do it over and over again as we voyage the world and visit ports all around the Atlantic Ocean.
Arriving in the Azores was magical. The month at sea has come to an end and in such a splendid fashion. On our last day, we passed the island of Corvo, enjoyed the majesty of land with its high cliffs, and then sailed onward without stopping. Our port was still beyond the horizon and out of sight, probably another day away at this point.
Once we passed Corvo, the winds grew in our favor! We held a steady 8 knots for most of that afternoon and night, rocketing us towards Faial at speeds we have never had before!
Typically, there is no wind in the Azores, as you are in the Azores High. For this very reason, we were planning that this last hundred miles would take us several days with our light air sails set. Well, all that changed as the winds were wonderful and we were screaming along under full sail and having a blast!
As we approached Horta, the winds vanished which meant that we had to push our electric motor to the limits by trying to motor into port. Once in there, the lack of wind meant that docking would be as easy as possible. There was no wind pushing us around, everything was under the full control of the helm and we could graciously enter the harbor and tie up.
Our Transatlantic Voyage has come to an end for now, as we have made it to the Azores and have now crossed an ocean. It’s time for a steak dinner!
