An Atlantic crossing


Once the long and hard Mediterranean season is over, it’s time for some RnR, a few days in the refit yard then perhaps head off across the Atlantic for that savoured winter season, but what can you expect if it’s your first time? Words: Frances & Michael Howorth


T


here comes a time, in every seafarer’s life, when a trans oceanic voyage becomes inevitable. For those crew who hail from Australia, New Zealand or South Africa, it is either the Indian or Pacific ocean that generally does the calling. But for most Europeans, it is crossing the Atlantic that gives crew the opportunity of enjoying their first trans ocean voyage when they move from Mediterranean to the Caribbean. For many, crossing the Atlantic is just another step in life’s journeys at sea.


For others, the prospect of crossing what is often rudely referred to as ‘the ditch’ it is a somewhat more daunting experience. What will it be like to be out of sight of land for so long? What is on the other side? And how will it compare with what I know now? Will I like it? Or will I simply get lost in a land that is new and different? All questions that quite correctly and rather naturally come to my mind as crew contemplate crossing the Atlantic.


We remember only too well our own first crossing in Red Hackle a sixty foot ketch designed by German Frers. That was the first and I have lost count how many since that one in the 1990s, but everyone remembers their first crossing.


THE ROUTE


For many, Gibraltar with its duty-free fuel and excellent provisioning capability is the departure point. Smaller yachts might cross


78 | AUTUMN 2021 | ONBOARD


to the Canary Islands and set off from there. Where you end up depends on the type of yacht you are in and the purpose of the crossing. Large motor yachts looking to charter the Caribbean Islands in the northern hemisphere’s winter months tend to head first to Antigua where thy might participate in the Antigua Charter Yacht Show held each December.


Others a little more sure of what fills their calendar, might head for Simpson Bay in Sint Marten, the Dutch portion of the island that is jointly administered by the Dutch and French, or perhaps the nearby island of St Barts. (St Bathelemy). Sail boats prefer to let the wind do the work and as such, in a bid to save the costs of fuel oil, tend to head south until the butter melts before turning westwards. Then, with the trade winds behind them, they comfortably roll nicely across the ocean towards islands in the middle of the chain making landfall in either St Lucia or Martinique.


No matter which route you take or despite the length of time you spend away from the sight of land, there is something magical about your first sight of land at the end of the first crossing. We find that after so long away from the land, the first thing we notice as we approach a Caribbean landfall is the sweet smell of tropical vegetation.


Generally, you can smell it before you see it. This is such an exciting moment for those crossing for the first time and should be savoured.


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