We did it. Wild Rumpus and her crew sailed from Cape Town to Grenada with stops in St Helena and Fernando de Noronha. We survived without physical injury, some bruises to our ego, some broken boat parts, one stabbed dinghy, and an excess of Ostrich sausage that nobody could bring themselves to eat, and we all remained friends (or the crew was about to mutiny and we landed just in time for my safety). This is the super brief recap.
I’ve been home for about 28 hours and thought I’d start sharing some pictures and give some insight into our journey, which was planned for years and took months to complete. I am hopeful the writing process will help me organize the trip, which is now just a giant mishmash of memories in no particular order.
With the benefit of hindsight, I’ll do my best to give an honest recap of the entire trip and my thoughts on what I would do differently next time. For now, suffice it to say that we made it, and the trip was great.
Leg 1- Cape Town to St Helena
We departed in the late afternoon on July 14. The weather prediction was for cloudy weather with 14-16 foot seas. The crew for this leg included Stacey, Eric, Dinna, Bernard, Jay, and Nik (Nik is an Xquisite employee they sent along since our shakedown was an ocean crossing.)
Leg 2- St. Helena to Fernando de Noronha
We said goodbye to Nik on St. Helena and departed for Fernando de Noronha. Overall, this was a calm sail with good winds and relatively moderate seas.
Our visit to Fernando was lovely. We left Jay there to make his way back to the U.S. via Recife, Brazil. We were also lucky enough to re-meet Matt and Amy of Sailing Florence. We met them briefly at St. Helena and they ended up anchoring next to us for a few days.
Leg 3- Fernando de Noronha to Grenada
For the final leg we were down to Stacey, Eric, Dinna, Bernard, and me.
Current Status
I am back in California, slowly acclimating to land life and focusing more on work. Stacey and Eric now live on the boat and are hard at work fixing what we broke. Dinna and Bernard are off for more adventures.
More writings to follow along with new adventures.
Unlike you, I have no words. You have had adventure and experiences of a lifetime. Not even in my dreams, did I think the ocean could be that beautiful. How do you stab a dinghy, by the way?
That is a story for another blog post.
Wonderful journey. Interested in your watch rotation, maintenance activities, voyage planning considerations, and other operational details, if you have time to add these to your posts.
Amazing is an understatement! I can’t wait to hear more!
So glad you’re back – we missed you! I have many questions but we’ll see if you get them answered on your next few posts!
Awesome adventure. Glad you shared it.
Thank you for sharing this adventure! I am glad it was a safe trip. I look forward to hearing more!
Congratulations on your great adventure! Look forward to hearing more. Glad to hear it went safely minus maybe a few heart in your throat moments.
Congratulations my friend, what an amazing adventure you had! I am so happy for you and I am glad you all made it there safely 😍
What an amazing adventure and accomplishment by all. I am so happy you made it safe to Grenada.
Wow what a fabulous story, trip and adventure not to mention accomplishment. Glad you are home safely and can’t wait to read of your next adventure!
Love your story thanks for sharing what an amazing trip it must have been. What adventure are you already planning for your encore, can`t wait to see.
Well done, it would be great to have a more detailed post. I am planning this route with hull #26 in 18mths time…..so all info and tips welcome!
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Cool stuff. Love the style of writing this. Just for interest of others, a nice shake down cruise leaving South Africa is to sail up to Luderitz in Namibia before cutting across the big pond to Snt Helena. Always moderate Westerly winds up on the West Coast and from Luderitz its set coarse to Snt Helena.
Plus always cold beers in the Luderitz Yacht club..