Sailing Positive Waves

  We sailed from the Azores to Galicia, a province in northwest Spain. Our plan was to spend some time exploring the Rias Baixas region of Galicia--the protected coves and harbors that form the jagged coastline. Heading ashore for the first time after dropping anchor in Baiona Paella for our celebratory arrival meal Popping the champagne on arrival in Baiona--transatlantic circuit complete! Baiona We started in Baiona, eating our fill of Galician seafood, walking around the 14th century castle, and relaxing at the small beach in town. Freja got her ears pierced. We started our fourth year of homeschooling, 5th grade for Matilda and 7th grade for Freja. Our curriculum is quite a bit more structured than we've used in the past, partly because the kids are getting older so their educational needs are changing, partly for ease of lesson-planning for me, partly because they have more stamina, and partly because Freja is working on math concepts that I would need to re-learn in order to

We left Povocao on the southeast tip of Sao Miguel on September 3, 2023 at 11 in the morning. We didn't know exactly where we were going, we just knew we were sailing east and were aiming for mainland Europe, anywhere from Porto, Portugal to Brest, France. We had a pretty wide target to hit! We would make our decision during the passage, based on weather and crew mood. We were hoping for Brest because we all wanted to spend more time exploring the south coast of Brittany, but we also didn't want to beat ourselves up to get there. A good, comfortable passage was trumping the destination. It had been hard to find a good window to make the final leg of the Transatlantic. Big low pressure systems kept coming off Canada generating a sizeable northerly swell. There were also days of strong northerlies funneling down the coast of Spain and Portugal to keep an eye on. Eventually we decided we just needed to go for it. If we pointed more southerly, toward Porto, Lisbon, or even Lagos,