Morocco has been a great experience, but after building up 15 prosthetics there, it had come the time to move on and get ready to face one of the biggest challenge for every sailor: crossing the Atlantic Ocean.
At first we had to move Imagine, our Lagoon 410, to the Canary Island, where we took care of every detail on the boat, in order to avoid finding ourselves in danger in the middle of the Ocean. Everything has passed an accurate check, starting from the rig, ending up with the bilges. As soon as the weather conditions got enough stabile to leave, we bought the last provisions and store them…. believe me, we never saw such a long bill!!!
After a last good steak lunch, on the 5th December, we left the safe water of Las Palmas harbour direction Caribbean : a new feeling, difficult to tell, took place in our hearts. A mix of tension, adrenalin, respect and curiosity only big events are full of. We watched in our eyes, gave a last caress to our Imagine and set the sails: 2800 miles, infinite blue, waves, sun, wind, were waiting for us.
The first 7 days have been a calm approach to the cross: we decided for a southwest course and set our spinnaker, supported by a moderate wind blowing into the sail. The sun was shining and the nights were mild. Sailing with an average speed of 6 knots, we thought to make it in time for X-MAS. Imagine was amazing, moving through the waves smoothly. Everyday schools of dolphins came to visit us and play with the boat, maybe curious to see which beautiful orange big fish was swimming out there, and I would dare to say that also Imagine enjoyed playing with them!
Almost in front of Cape Verde the wind left us and we decided to turn on the engines in the hope it would have refresh again. But after two days of engines, a little conservative with the fuel consumption, we decided simply to turn everything off and wait for the wind. This has been an incredibly magical moment! Staying in the middle of the Atlantic, the water still like a mirror, we could play with a big old turtle, fish from the boat really tasty Mahi Mahi fishes and watch movies at night simply covered by a sheet of stars. Two more days passed like this and we will never forget the imagine of a small orange Lagoon calmly resting in the middle of the Atlantic.
On the morning of the 17th December the wind came to knock again to our door, but this time without any courtesy: 5, 6, 7 Beaufort blowing into our back, high and stiff waves in cross sea. No chance anymore to set our light spinnaker. Supported only from our reefed main sail, Imagine was jumping, running, surfing down the waves and roaring. But she was still stabile and stiff, holding on wave after wave, shacked, smashed but still. We couldn’t buy a better boat than her!!! We got fast used to the new situation and went on with our daily duties on board, sleeping 3-4 hours each during the night, cooking, downloading the weather cast, reading, checking the boat. The first squalls came, overall overnight, and we had often to steer and watch out, but everything worked great.
Unluckily, after four days of calm wind, we couldn’t make it to Saint Lucia for X-MAS, but we celebrated anyway an unforgettable X-MAS EVE on board rewarded by the biggest Mahi Mahi we fished during the all travel, a tasty dinner, presents and even a X-Mas tree!
On the early hours of the 27th December we could see the profile of Saint Lucia: after sailing 2873 miles and crossing the Atlantic Ocean, we two and Imagine made it! How did we felt? Like after crossing an Ocean… there are no other words to describe it! Wow, we made it! As first we gave a good wash to Imagine, who was covered in salt and deserved only the best treatment. After few days we started the scouting of the patients supported by the Health Government of Saint Lucia, but about this we will write soon!
Crossing the Ocean has been on of the strongest experiences of our lives! We gained, if possible, even more trust in each other and overall in our Imagine. We didn’t regret, not even for one second, the choice to buy our Lagoon. We have been instead so thankful to have such a stabile and trustable boat, easy to handle, amazing to live in and incredibly great to sail! But now it is already time to work and bring a little bit of hope also here: happiness can crosses Ocean and land everywhere!
