We’ve found a new favorite island. Madeira is just fantastic!
We arrived at Calheta on the western end of Madeira after a full day sail from Porto Santo to once again find Horizon waving at us as we entered the narrow harbour. Anders and Anette have been in Madeira for about a week and plan to be here in Calheta for another week, so we made plans to rent a car and generally have some nice socializing to blow away the Covid blues!
First we had a couple of projects to take care of: Toodle-oo!’s anchor light was on the blink and despite an effort in Porto Santo to fix the issue by replacing the connections at the top of the mast, it was still a problem. Anders offered to go up the mast with a view to re-connecting the wires, but when he got there, he found the wiring intact and the lights all working. He jiggled them around trying to make them fail to no avail – so I guess we still have a potential problem – but for now, all is good!
The following day, Anders and I played with the rigging on both our Outbounds. Horizon is only 3 years old (Toodle-oo! is 15), and our rigs were tuned very differently, with Toodle-oo!’s being much stiffer. Anders developed a very nifty way of evaluating the rig’s tension and we then set about stiffening Horizon to more closely mimic Toodle-oo! Ander’s measurement technique is written up on his blog here. For anyone with a cruising sailboat, this technique will probably prove very interesting…
We had a car for 3 days and made full use of it, travelling most of the island and stopping for walks along the way. Oohs and Aahs at every turn – the scenery is spectacular. Of course we managed to climb the highest peak on the island Pico Ruivo de Santana at 1862M. Take a look at the pics – clicking on them will make them bigger…
View from the top looking down to the Valley of the Nuns
On the way to the top
Broom in profusion – turns out it’s an invasive species here and they’re trying to eliminate it – looks like a losing battle!
Valley of the Nuns
Clouds roll over the top of the mountains.
Another oooh – aaah
Interesting rock formation.
I think this is a Azorian (Madeiran?) Chaffinch
25 Fonts
Looks like an Orchid to me!
Following the Levada to 25 Fonts
Anders and Anette from Horizon
On the way to the top
Another stunning view
At the top of Madeira!
To cap off a great first week on Madeira, Laurie just found out that her 28 month long attempt to gain Portuguese Citizenship has been successful! (Though we don’t know how long it will take to get a passport…)