Its always like this, we enter the harbor and the logbook entries stop… and you as our reader are left without an update.. So here is our finishing entry of the leg Cape Town to the Netherlands.
The nights got fairly busy! Lots of traffic and still fighting against the wind to make it North. The wind completely died out on the night of the 2nd of June, but we still had 180 miles to go! So under engine, we stayed in the traffic separation scheme, doing 6 knots with the current and doing 3,5 against the current. We saw new windmills, old windmills, many cargo vessels and some fishermen and then all of a sudden we saw the light of Lange Jaap, the lighthouse of Den Helder.
For me that felt like sailing home. We had about 2 more hours to make it in time for our tide.. and that seemed unlikely. So we set course for Den Helder, just for a few hours, until the next tide. We said goodbye to most of our crew here, who got picked up by friends and family and then Gijs, Joel and Alice set sail for Harlingen.
And since then we have been in maintenance mode. Work on the mainmast, work on the interior (doors, hatches and beds), work on the steering wheel and we started on sanding down the boxes for a new coat of varnish.
Saturday we made our way to Den Oever, done with most of our work in Harlingen, in Den Oever, Sandfirden will give a little TLC to our main engine and Thursday we should be ready for our docking period. The plan in coming together and that feels good.
And while we are in the Netherlands, we are organizing a webinar on the Northwest Passage that we will attempt in 2025. Please send us an email if you are interested in joining our Webinar, then we will send you the link where you can log in!
All is well on board, Jet
Well done Jet and crew.
Back in time and ship and crew in one piece!
Good luck for your next yourney and maybe we’ll meet again!