202 NM – Skipper – 41ft Sailing Yacht
41 ft Offshore Regatta Yacht
Marina San Miguel (Tenerife, Canaries) – Playa Blanca, Marina Rubicon (Lanzarote)
This was a random hitch-hike with an owner of a boat I have met while working on a shipyard on Teneriffe. Was supposed to help him as a crew to take his boat from there to Lanzarote in the Canary Islands. Very quicky however it turned out that I was the person on board able to take us safely there and we agreed that I will be in charge.
At that time I lacked some experience that´d tell me what questions to ask and what look at while agreeing to sail with somebody on a boat I do nott know, especially if the vessel seems a little bit undermaintained… Te electrical installation even though equiped with additional brand new batteries (resulting in a 3-battery bank) turned out to be connected a withut separation for the engine battery. Glad we had cold drinks untill I’ve realized that we can not recharge our batteries with engine as we simply can not start it anymore…;) On the end we have made it all the way to Laznarote, but the long and narrow upwind entry surrounded by rocky beakwater on the lee, considering our tiller working very hard on the rudder shaft, was too much of a risk. After several attempts we ended up with a little help from local marineros.
Great experience. Great lesson. What else should I add?
