Las Palmas (Part 5)

ARC+ party   

When we got back from Agustín’s house on 4 November we found that we weren’t the only ones partying. The ARC+ was setting off in the morning and fireworks lit up the night sky as part of their final social bash. It was certainly a good send off and the end of a very busy time of checks, briefings and general preparations for them.

The ARC+ departs Las Palmas for the start of the race   

Given the fun of the night before I suspect that many of the ARC+ teams could have done with a lie-in. Instead they were up and about getting their yachts out of the marina in time for the start. You could feel the tension in the air which is probably why the organisers rallied a crowd of well-wishers and played fanfares from the breakwater as each yacht passed on the way to the start line. Both the racers and the cruisers had clean starts and with the brisk northerly wind we wished them a safe and fast passage down to the Cape Verdes.

Nicky ‘doing drugs’   

We were also anticipating moving on from Las Palmas and so busily worked through the last of the important admin jobs. Whilst I went ashore first thing on Monday 6 Nov to chase up why we had still heard nothing from the generator engineer, Nicky finished sorting through our ships first aid and other medical stores to draw up a shopping list of replacements. She then did a circuit of the pharmacies to get what we needed including replacing any out of date antibiotics. It wouldn’t have been the easiest of tasks in a foreign language but I would have loved to have seen her mime being constipated to the poor lady in the pharmacy! However, it ended up with the right drugs being bought and laughs all round.

She also bought us a new computer printer. Bizarrely you can’t get the refills for the Canon one we’d got in Turkey in Europe. We’d have to go to Russia, Turkey or the Far East for that. Similarly ink refills for the European one we have just bought are not available in the USA but at least it is 240 volts so works with our generator!

Ed: and at some point in all this, I fitted in a couple of coats of varnish around all the hard-wear areas   

For my part, the morning trip to Rolnautic brought the promise that the engineer would service our generator the following morning. However, Tuesday morning came and went with still no word from the elusive engineer. Another trip ashore to ask when I could pick up the engineer and his tools to ferry them out to BV highlighted the problem. Having finally had a conversation with the engineer he said that he couldn’t work on BV whilst she was at anchor so he’d think about it and we’d get a call later [Ed: it would have helped if we had been told this 2+ weeks ago when we first booked the service and highlighted that we were in the anchorage!]

Our ARC mooring in the marina   

That prompted a swift trip around to the marina office and some pleading with the staff there to let us stay in the marina for 2 nights so that the work could be done. Jolly helpful they were too and by mid-afternoon we were moored up in one of the berths reserved for an ARC entrant who was still to arrive. A message was passed to the engineer but by 5pm we still hadn’t heard anything. Traipsing back to the Fischer Panda agents I had a second conversation with a very indignant engineer, “of course he would service the generator today, 100%!”.

Delivery of emergency water   

Just in case, we had made arrangements to stay in the marina for a second night and were very glad that we had when the phone rang with the news that the engineer would not visit that day but would be with us first thing the following morning.

So, on 8 November, after 2 weeks of waiting, we finally got the generator serviced and the cylinder head torques checked. That took up the morning and so we probably could have got away with just one night in the marina. However, the ARC entrant still hadn’t arrived so we stayed for the second night and used the extra time to put in a big order of supplies for our own crossing which were delivered directly to BV. Perfect, because the largest part of the order was our emergency water which we really didn’t fancy having to carry to BV ourselves.

ARC yachts dressed overall – their turn next to set off for the Caribbean!   

We were surrounded by ARC yachts dressed overall and flying the ARC banners. With the ARC+ boats away, it was now their turn to be the centre of attention for the ARC organisers. There were safety checks for each yacht and the crews started their round of daily briefings too. It was difficult not to feel that we should be setting off for the Caribbean in a few days as well. However, we have other plans and with our generator logbook now stamped up for the service we were once again free to move on. We got our money’s worth for the mooring though. Having spent the morning doing some final admin and e-mail checks, we slipped our lines and left the mooring to refuel BV just as the ARC catamaran came in to tie up!

Las Palmas, Gran Canaria, Canary Islands