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Touring Lanzarote with Hannah and friends

Our daughter Hannah (center) with her Swiss friend Adina

We are still at the Marina Rubicon at the southern end of Lanzarote Island in the Canary Islands.  We have become very fond of this place, even more so now that we have had the opportunity to explore the island by car and foot.

The highlight of the past month was the visit of our daughter Hannah and her friend Adina during the week of November 17.  Unfortunately, the uniformly good weather we had been having ended with an unusual weather system that brought some rain, strong winds from the southwest, and big seas.  So leaving the marina in the boat was out of the question, but we were still able to explore by land.  Hannah and Adina went off hiking for two days while staying at an AirBnB near the surfer’s beach, and with the big waves, there was plenty to see.

Hannah and Laura at Los Hervideros, famous for its lava cliffs.
Hannah and Adina with the unique volcanic “vineyards” of La Geria in the background
Hannah and her parents at La Geria
View from Mirador del Rio at the far north of the island
Squalls cast shadow on the water, as seen from Mirador del Rio
Mark and Hannah at Caleta de Famara, a surfing beach
Surfers preparing to enter the water, Caleta de Famara
Low tide at Caleta de Famara
Mark and Laura at Caleta de Famara

Our good friends Barbara and Frank from the sail boat “Destiny” also caught up with us in Lanzarote.  They came while we were in mainland Spain and France and spent a month at the Marina Rubicon.  They are now at sea on the way to the Caribbean.  We had some great walks and memorable meals with them.

Fisherman’s house near El Golfo
Barbara and Frank on our hike to Caldera Blanca.  The volcanic plain leading to Playa Blanca is in the background.
Los Hervideros on a calm day
Camels walk back to their resting place after a long day giving tourists a ride
The rain brought our some greenery on the rocky path north of El Golfo.
View of Playa Blanca, the town with our marina, from the promenade leading to lighthouse (Faro Pechiguera)
View of the sunset from the promenade between Playa Blanca and Papagayo
Red clouds over Marina Rubicon at sunset

Since Hannah returned to California, we have spent almost all of our time preparing Sabbatical III for our upcoming Atlantic crossing.  We have a Norwegian couple, Tom Erik and Vivi-Ann, joining us for the crossing.  We found them on a volunteer crew site and they even visited us for two days when we were in Valencia in May, We all seem very compatible.  Their presence will shorten our usual 6 hour night watches into 3 to 4 hour watches and give us much more time to rest during the day.  Tom Erik and Vivi-Ann arrive tomorrow (Monday, December 10) and we may start our nonstop crossing of the Atlantic as early as Wednesday (December 12).  The boat is in excellent shape and full of more food than we could possibly eat.  Laura has prepared a few meals of  chicken curry and “Shirley’s” meat balls and put them in the freezer.  The forecast is for pretty light winds to start so we may delay our departure for a couple of days.  We will post our departure to the blog and you can always check on our position at our shared map page here:  https://share.garmin.com/MarkPitt.  You will need to scroll out to get an idea of where we are, otherwise you will only see blue ocean on the map. Our position and other relevant data are updated on this map page every 10 minutes once we depart. The sail will take 18 to 21 days.  Our destination is the Marina du Marin in Martinique.

M.