I have arrived! All is well, and safe and sound, and all of that. And not a moment too soon, either- that new system with all the wind showed up yesterday morning with gusto. Fortunately for me, the 25 to 30 knot winds were a beam reach, and as I was along the southern shoreline there was no fetch for the waves to build. Which made for very fast, easy, wonderful sailing as the sun came back out, and got me to Buenos Aires in the early afternoon. The part that came next ended up being the hardest thing I had to do in the last 20 days of sailing solo- park the boat! The wind was 20-25 knots through the marina, and it was sideways to the slips. And I wanted to back the boat into the slip, and my dock was on the upwind side ( 2 boats between sets of fingers). It took 3 attempts and some help from the marina staff, but I got it parked without damaging my boat or anyone else’s in the process.
This last leg was the longest single-handed trip I have done, some 2700 miles, which is about 25% longer than a Transpac. And now the inevitable mental review has started, deciding what was good and bad, what I Iiked and didn’t, etc. Perhaps I will change my mind over time as some details fade, but right now I would say the trip was overwhelmingly positive, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact, I liked the single-handing much more than I thought I would. Overall, the boat did really well, and most of the issues were with items that had been “repaired” by the Moorings folks. I understand how it is with a charter operation, though- something breaks and they need to get it fixed quickly, so the boat can go out on a charter. And a quick fix is often a temporary fix, so they end up doing the same repairs over and over quickly, instead of fixing them right once and for all. Today I will develop the long list of stuff to do on the boat…
On the formalities side of things, I had to do immigration and the port captain yesterday, and it was surprisingly easy and quick, especially compared to Brazil. Today is customs, and they come to the boat for that, so hopefully that is equally easy. The boat is in a prime spot in a great marina in the middle of downtown, just steps from my office here, and surrounded by scores of the best restaurants in Buenos Aires, where all good folks come to promenade. So I am particularly happy about that.
So what’s next? Back to regular life, which for me is pretty good- I am leading the Tahiti charter in a month, which is always tough duty. But for the boat, I plan to keep it here for a while and discover the delta and local waters. Perhaps share them with friends from near and afar. After all, the boat is designed for charter, with 4 double cabins, en suite heads, etc. Spring arrives in a few days, so we’ll see…
Thanks for joining me on this trip!
-David