Sailing Seren

Part 2
Our last stop going north was Îles des Saintes. Since Oscar and Tobias already visited these islands we went exploring the southern part of the main island. It is an island full of hills but we rented electric bikes which made life easier.

After Îles des Saintes the trip was coming to its end and we sailed back to Fort de France. In Fort de France we were going to meet up with a crew from Halcyon Yachts contracted to sail Seren back to Europe. Our visitors left the 15th and the last days was spent preparing the boat for another crossing. The delivery crew, consisting of Peter, Glenn and Alex arrived, and we spent the last days with them. A great bunch of people and we are convinced they'll do their best to bring our beloved boat safely back to Europe.

It's a weird feeling leaving your boat and home for more than three months to someone else but we had met Peter in Las Palmas which made it a little bit easier. Seren will now sail north before turning to the right aiming for the Azores and finally Lisbon where we will meet up and once again take charge of the boat. So for now it will be about 5 weeks before our next post where we will welcome Seren back to Europe. You can follow Seren's second crossing on https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Seren

Since we won't go on another ocean crossing anytime soon we have decided to sell Seren when she arrives in Europe. It doesn't make sense to sail such a well equipped boat in the Baltic. If you have interest in buying her, do not hesitate to contact us!

Part 1
116 days ago we arrived in Lisbon to kick off our Atlantic crossing. Two days ago, approximately 2760 hours or a third of a year after our arrival in Lisbon, the last two crew members came home. It has been a journey beyond what we could expect and it will take a while to adjust to the everyday life again.

It's also been almost three weeks since our last post. Here is a recap of the last weeks on board.
We left Margiot Bay and sailed to Le Marin in Martinique. In Le Marin and the bay outside called Sainte-Anne there are more than 1500 boats moored at any given time. It was a spectacular view arriving here and Le Marin is a very well organised and maintained marina. Here we had our last crew change as Michael went home and , and joined. It has been a pleasure sailing with Michael and it felt sad when he left. Knowing we would see him 3-4 weeks later back home made it a little easier but Seren is not complete without both Michael and on board.

We sailed our way along the coast of Martinique visiting Grand Anse D'Arlet and then St Pierre. In St Pierre we did a hike along a fresh water canal coming down from the mountain. You walk in the side of the canal and sometimes it was very steep on the sides but all in all an amazing hike through the rainforest. In St Pierre we met up with Olav and Haakon on the Norwegian boat Charlie and we sailed together for the next couple of days.
The next stop were Portsmouth in Dominica 🇩🇲. We took a ride around the island to watch some waterfalls and swim in the streams. One of the waterfalls we visited was a bit different since one part of it was cold water coming from the mountains and the other part was hot sulfur-rich water coming from the springs within the mountain. In Portsmouth we also tried scuba diving, a fantastic experience in the clear waters of the Carribean.

So we went to the beautiful island of Mustique... In our previous post we mentioned that Mick Jagger is said to have a house there, we did find out but let's start from the beginning.

The Mustique island is very special since it is privately owned and not many people are able to visit. This means that much of the nature is preserved and there are several beautiful views as well as turtles on both land and in the water. The first day we walked around the southern part of the island and did some snorkeling around the boat. In the evening we went to the Mustique Blues festival to enjoy some beers and music. There we were, among all the wealthy and more or less famous people, and Mick Jagger walked by. It didn't feel like anybody cared and we imagine that is exactly why this island is so unique (and expensive). However, met his long time idol after going to the toilet and managed to get a picture to prove it's true.

The party continued and we went to another bar called The View, owned by a local family. They played dance music, had locals hanging around and it felt like a normal bar. Once again Mick joined the party but nobody seemed to care. We went with the vibe and didn't care (or we didn't show we cared). The day after we met up with Kyle, the son in the family who runs The View. He took us around the island in his pick-up, took us to a local football game and got us dinner at The View, even though they are closed on Sundays. Mustique surprised us in many ways but all in all it is one of our favorite islands in the Carribean.

After Mustique we sailed to Margiot Bay in St Lucia. There we enjoyed a day at the resort (which is included in the mooring fee). The water was very blue and not that salty. Michael also managed to beat the Harbour master in table tennis!
Cheers for now!

Five days since the last update, here's what we have been up to!

We left Union Island for a short sail to Petit St Vincent (PSV), a small island which is only inhabited by a luxury hotel. The beach bar, the reception and a small part of the beach were the only things open for cruisers... We made a day trip to Petit Martinique where we tried to hike up the mountain but ended up in an inferno of cactuses and we gave up after a couple of hours. Back to PSV to enjoy a movie on the beach (they have it once every week, this time it was the original "The italian job"). It was really nice.

Then we left to go to Sandy Island. As the name implies, it is an island of sand. Next stop was supposed to be Salt Whistle Bay on Mayreau but it was packed so we decided to go to a bay just south of it called Saline Bay. Yesterday we walked around the island and visited Salt Whistle Bay as well. When we got back to the boat we watched a movie and all of a sudden Michael said there was something flying around in the boat. "Is it a butterfly or what is it??? No, it's a BAT 🦇!!!" The bat explored every room in the boat before it flew out but it quickly came back in again... After a while we managed to get it out and locked all the hatches. We could see two bats flying around in the cockpit for quite a while afterwards and kept the boat in lock down during the night, even though it gets very hot... Today we haven't left the boat, just some swimming around it and relaxing on board. Tomorrow we will go to Mustique. Currently there is a blues festival going on there. Mustique is a very special island. Just like PSV it is privately owned but this time about half of the island is a resort and the other half is houses of the rich and famous. It is said Mick Jagger has a house there and when our friends visited they met Ed Sheeran. However you are not allowed to stroll freely and the island itself is very limited to cruisers. After a couple of days in Mustique we will slowly sail north again towards Martinique.

@ Saline Bay, Mayreau, the Granadines, Caribbean

Three days ago we left Rodney Bay, however, we got back from the southern part of St Lucia to Rodney Bay yesterday. This was due to us winning a price. We don't want to brag but we'll do it anyway. "The spirit of the ARC" is the most prestigious price of the ARC and it was handed to us for our contribution taking care of and escorting the yacht that hit a whale. We are so happy to have been able to help in such a situation and value this price highly as a symbol of how sailors help each other.

Before collecting our price we snorkeled and today we sailed to Bequia where we will celebrate a typical Swedish Christmas together with 45 other Swedes! On the boat we were joined by Pim, a Dutch guy from the boat that hit the whale 🐳, and Tucker and Della (Wayupdown), a lovely traveling couple from the US.

@ Port Elizabeth, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

And we're off!!!! Read more here:

And we're off! The sails are set towards the goal we have had for so long, the almighty Atlantic Ocean and the Carribean! It feels really great that all the work we have put in to this finally will pay off. The forecast will be top notch the coming week and we can now enjoy our journey to 100% ⛵ Last night @ludwiglindebratt did some last fixes with the rig and the ARC had an amazing fireworks show! You can track our boat in the app "YB Races" if you add the race ARC 2018 and then search for "Seren" or at the worldcruising.com website or in the link we provided at both Instagram and Facebook earlier. #ARC #sailing #sailingseren #worldcruisingclub #atlanticcrossing

Is the engine running? Are we spending our Friday evening in a laundry or in the bilges of the boat? Or both? Find out here!!

38 hours to the start..! The exhaust elbow was rewelded and mounted back yesterday. However we still had troubles starting the engine... Thanks to the help from Peter and Jaqueline on the yacht Ellen we managed to crank the engine and rule out water ingress (hydrolock). But it still didn't start. Anxiously we went to bed and woke up early to pay a visit to the Volvo Penta shop this morning (even though we have an Yanmar (Yanmar were not eager to help...)). The mechanic used his magic presence in combination with shaking some cables to the starter and voila, the engine started! Like music to our ears! Set back one day in our preparations we continued to fix the boat. Half of the crew are spending their Friday evening drying out the last water from the bilges and the other half is doing laundry. Hopefully we will be all set tomorrow so we can enjoy one last evening in Las Palmas! #ARC2018 #sailing #sailingseren #worldcruisingclub #volvopenta #yanmar #laundry #thebilgeboys

What could cause us to call the Maritime Rescue Coordination Center and be towed back into the marina? Find out on our Instagram page!

"Las Palmas MRCC*, this is Seren. We are two miles outside the harbor and taking on water and the boat is filled with smoke. The leak is not found, and even though we can pump the water out, we might be in possible need of attention..." *Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre After a successful sail training, a broken exhaust elbow (avgaskrök) caused the engine room and bilges to be filled with water, steam and exhausts. We shut down the engine and the leaking stopped. However we couldn't use the engine to go in to port and were uncertain of what had caused the leak/smoke so there were no other option but being towed by the rescue boat in Las Palmas. Back in port we found the cause (as seen in the movie). The exhaust elbow is being rewelded and hopefully the engine will be running perfectly fine tomorrow. The crew behaved perfectly when faced with the problem and we are one experience richer. Looking back, were glad it didn't happen on Sunday or on the Atlantic Ocean. The boat is floating, the engine will be working soon and we're heading off to tonight's party! Today we also picked up our YB tracker so you can follow us during the ARC on World Cruising Clubs website. More info to come. That's it for now, ship ahoy! /🧜‍♂️🧜‍♂️🧜‍♂️🧜‍♂️ #mrcc #ARC2018 #ARC #sailing #sailingseren #leak #exhausts #worldcruisingclub #aktertakter #dontworrymum

What are we up to right know? Find out on our Instagram!

Day four in Las Palmas with the ARC; Today we walked the ARC parade together with the rest of the participants of the race. Turns out there is quite a lot of Swedes crossing the Atlantic and we will be joined by sailors from all over the world 🗺️ After the parade we took a cab 20 mins across Las Palmas to play our second session of 🏌️, @tlagerback and @ludwiglindebratt came out as the winners 🏆👏 Tonight's dinner will be in the marina and payed by the loosers. Then it's time for bed since we are waking up early tomorrow to continue working on the boat. We also got the cutest invite from our pontoon neighbors to a party on Tuesday 🕺🍾 That's it for now /🙋🏻‍♂️🙋🏻‍♂️🙋🏻‍♂️🙋🏻‍♂️ #sailing #sailingseren #worldcruisingclub #atlanticcrossing #laspalmas #ARC2018 #golf

640 nautical miles, five days and two jars of canned meatballs later, four tired but really really happy crew members sailed Seren into Las Palmas marina yesterday. We have since then registered our boat and crew to the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers (ARC), apparently we have the youngest captain of this years rally! Today we had our security inspection which, as you can see, we aced 💪
Now we have one week before the race starts and the time until then will be spent fixing the final things on the boat and attend interesting seminars held by the ARC.
In between work and seminars we will enjoy ourselves with some days off in Las Palmas.
It feels unreal to finally be here with all the other ARC boats after all these years of planning and work. Tonight we will join all the other crews for a welcoming party 🍹🏝️🕺 More frequent uploads will follow from now until the 25th (when we set sail over the Atlantic). That's it for now / 🙋🏻‍♂️🙋🏻‍♂️🙋🏻‍♂️🙋🏻‍♂️

We've lost track of the time, but we think it is day 10. After several days of waiting in Lagos we have now set sail towards Las Palmas. 640 nautical miles will be covered in the next 4-5 days.

Since our satellite phone is up and running you can now follow our position with updates every hour! ⛵ https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/Seren

In picture number two you will see the crew together with Derek, the owner of an Irish pub in Lagos which were great!