Dry January??

It’s been a very dry, windy & (mainly) sunny January in Lagos so far. Which has been handy as the list of boat jobs is being slowly worked through. Though when one is crossed off, another seems to mysteriously get added to the bottom of it!

Trev’s been putting his practical and carpentry skills to the test by detangling the mass of battery cables and installing new batteries in their very own custom built housing! We now have the battery monitor working as it should, which will be really handy for us once come off shore power.

He’s also been busy filling holes in the deck & then doing new ones for a new permanent preventer. This means that we can tie off the boom and stop it swinging round in the swell or if the wind changes. It also stops an annoying thwacking sound as it moves around in light winds and heavy swell.

The new sewing machine is getting some use from not just Gianti but our Swedish friends on Nike. So far I’ve managed to make a life raft cover. I can safely say that I believe in the saying ‘it takes a village…’ As there have been you tube videos, lots of annoying queries (from me) to our neighbours about hot knives, material sources etc, video calls to the lovely Joyce and emergency sewing lessons for corners from Karin in order to pull the (very) rough shape together. Thank you to everyone who answered questions and requests for help. Just another million projects to go and I should be able to sew in a straight line 😜

Were both getting itchy feet now and are looking forward to April when we can explore the Portuguese coastline and move into Spain and towards the Med. We’re looking forward to our visitors in February and March before a final push on the jobs before we move. This has been prompted by seeing the posts and emails from other boats who are now in Panama, on their Atlantic crossing or in the Caribbean already.

It seems such a big adventure to us and probably a bit unreal for us to consider, but there is something really appealing about sailing over 2000 miles in a boat. We definitely need to get more experience on longer passages and different weathers before we make any decisions about that. It raises a lot questions about what we’d need to blue water cruise:

This boat or something else?

Different solar panels?

Boat tech – satellite phones, ssb radios (??)

The list is endless, not to mention the boat shopping … there are a lot of different makes & hull types to choose from. A favourite game that we play is what boat would we buy if money was no object. Feel free to put suggestions below.

Anyways, I have hatch covers to size up & patterns to cut, so I’d best be off.

Speak to you all soon,

Sarah & Trev