We Never Expected to See This SAILING Off The Coast of AFRICA [Ep. 65]

We wake up and find ourselves off the coast of Africa. We are still being pushed by over 20 knots of wind. We had an amazing encounter in the big waves as we continue to surf our boat towards Cabo Verde, the equator, and South America.

#sailing #yacht #dolphins #howtosail

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0:00 Intro and sunrise while sailing off the west coast of Africa
1:00 Curtis gives us an update about the current conditions
2:03 Relaxing sailing with peaceful music and we add bit jib halyard with the winch and show the sail setup of 3rd reef and genoa
4:00 Kate gives us a position update and tells us how her first 24 hours at sea were in the big waves and high winds of the previous episode, Roxy the sailing dog has braced for the waves
4:53 Curtis goes to the bow to do some maintenance work, replacing a jib sheet
6:40 Bluewater sailing in huge waves from a leftover storm while far offshore to fun music
8:24 Kate shows us the chafed through jib sheet and tell
10:37 Walking the dog :-) How Roxy the Dog goes to the bathroom while sailing far offshore in the ocean in large waves, and how the humans stay safe
11:51 We unfurl the Evolution Carbon Membrane cruising genoa for more speed and talk about how to use outside leads, move jib cars, cross sheeting, and adjusting the jib sheets for better sailing performance
14:39 Curtis talks about flying the spinnaker while offshore, our position, speed, and autopilot use and updates us at 48 hours offshore
16:06 We are surrounded by a school of playful dolphins jumping in the waves around our sailboat
18:07 Discussion of autopilot settings, use while sailing in large waves downwind, true wind angles, and weather routing with Expedition sailing software

We are running and reaching downwind in big waves and heavy seas left over from the big blow we left Tenerife under. We are on our way to Argentina, Patagonia, and Chile via the trade winds off the coast of Africa. We talk about jib car position and genoa trim for performance cruising, hoping to teach interested viewers how to sail and how to trim a bit better. Dolphins join us at the end of the day for an amazing playful experience.

So who is this crazy sailing couple making fun videos to share? Well, we are Kate and Curtis. We both sold up and headed out to sea, with the goal of sailing around the world via Cape Horn and the Cape of Good Hope. We brought our mixed rescue dog along with us as she loves sailing and swimming too!

Our boat is a year 2000 J Boats J/46. We searched for 3 years for our perfect sailboat for sale, when we found it, we knew it was the one. We spent 6 months re-fitting it in Rhode Island and then went for our shakedown voyage in Maine. We stopped in Annapolis for a bit to do some more refit work and offshore modifications, then we set off to the open sea. We went to the Bahamas, Miami, US Virgin Islands, BVI, Grenada, Carriacou, St. Maarten, where we enjoyed outdoor adventures, scuba diving, and have now did an Atlantic Crossing to the Azores where we had a chance to fly our DJI drone (and learned how to fly a drone from a boat) and one of our favorite past times, mountain biking. We have sailed over 10,000 bluewater miles to date.

We watched other sailing channels before we left as well. We even considered van life, a tiny home, or a motorhome / rv. Some of the channels we enjoyed were Gone with the Wynns, Project Atticus, MJ Sailing. Of course also Delos and La Vagabonde. We didn't really set out to be influencers, but we wanted to return the good karma and pass our inspiration and knowledge along.

Enough of this, we hope you enjoy our relaxing video on #sailingsunday!

XO XO Kate, Curtis & Roxy