Pitufa.at

We’ve spent the last “florines” in Willemstad, tidied the boat, said good-bye to our friends (that’s the sad side of the cruising life: many of the friends we make sail into other directions…) and will get up the anchor in one hour. The weather forecast looks ok, if it gets too rough we can still anchor in some safe spots along the way

We spent the last 3 weeks in a little side bay of Spanish waters that is quite protected from wind and swell, but experiences gusts from unpredictable directions, so most boats have either a stern anchor, or a line ashore to keep them from swinging against each other or the shore. While our engine didn’t work we had 3 anchors out which kept us in… Continue reading »

Incredible, but we’re still in Curacao. The expected 2 weeks have already turned into 5, but at least we’ve finished all repairs and maintenance jobs on the engine. We’re theoretically ready to leave, as soon as the weather allows it. Sailing down to Cartagena is a bit tricky, because the cape in the north of Columbia (Cabo de Vela) is infamous for strong winds and… Continue reading »

After getting all the love and attention it had obviously missed, our Yanmar is now happily purring again (even the turbo works…). We’re now finishing some minor works, waiting for fair winds and getting in touch with “agentes” in Colombia (that sounds more exciting than it is. These agents don’t have the licence to kill, but the licence to speak to the harbour master to… Continue reading »

We’re still in Spanish waters, but now without a working engine (vital parts of it are at the mechanic being cleaned etc.). The little bay we’re in is fairly protected from the wind that constantly howls over Curacao, but we still get unpredictable, strong gusts from different directions, so we’ve brought out 3 anchors to be on the safe side… Another disadvantage of our little… Continue reading »

During the last few days we fell into a nice routine: I worked on my translations in the morning, while Christian did maintenance jobs on Pitufa. In the afternoon we packed our dive gear into the dinghi and explored the dive sites in the vicinity. With the wind blowing between 20 and 25 knots (gusting up to 30) we didn’t dare taking our small dinghi… Continue reading »

I wasn’t really in the mood for writing any posts last week, because I damaged my ears on our second dive, got a “don’t stick your head under the water for 1 week” from the doctor and had to watch from the surface while everybody else had a good time in Bonaire’s underwater wonderland… Yesterday I tried going down for the first time again and… Continue reading »

We’re still in Grenada Marine working on Pitufa–the ten days we expected have turned into 3 weeks, but on Tuesday we’ll (hopefully) get back into the water. The mast has been repaired, we’ve finished sanding it this afternoon and now we’ve got the weekend to mount the hydrovane, put on a last layer of antifouling and finish a dozen other little jobs. We’re really ready… Continue reading »

The mast was pulled without further problems this morning, but our poor boat now looks like a wreck… The welder thinks repairing the crack won’t be a big problem, but unfortunately the welding machine broke this morning and we’ll have to wait until Wednesday to have it done. We’ll use the opportunity to sand the mast (we’ve been talking about doing this for ages) and… Continue reading »

The days fly by with all the work we’ve got to do on Pitufa while she’s on the dry. We’ve taken off the skeg, then the rudder and discovered that we need new bearings (as expected). Additionally the mechanic found that the bearings of the propeller shaft had too much play, so we replaced them as well. I’ve been sanding the hull for the past… Continue reading »

This morning at 9 we had an appointment at the boatyard to haul out Pitufa. We were quite nervous, because we had to take her into the berth stern first (so that the forestay wouldn’t be in the way of the crane). Unfortunately our smurfette doesn’t like going backwards–she usually goes unpredictably either sharp left or right… Not so this morning: she turned like a… Continue reading »

Today we went to the veggie market and then the fishmarket in St. George. However, we forgot two basic things you should bring to an island fishmarket: a bag (you don’t want the leaky ones you’re given there) and small change (the change you get there might well be covered in fishblood ). Anyway, right after we got back Christian did some belly-scraping (not his… Continue reading »