(Editor’s note: Tom Hay and Dawn Biggs are Americans, personal friends from our hometown of Louisville, Ky. This is Pt . 1 of their adventure sailing across the Atlantic from the Caribbean to Europe. Jump to Pt. 2 here, Pt. 3 here and Pt. 4 here.)
We could have chosen an easier way to cross the Atlantic and begin our expat life in Europe. We chose to sail there in a small, three-decades-old boat named Kairos. It wasn’t exactly an impulsive decision. It had been our dream for 15 Covid-interrupted years. First we found a sturdy, affordable boat in the Caribbean. We sold our home in the United States and for the next four years lived aboard her, accumulating 6,000 nautical miles while cruising from one end of the Caribbean Sea to the other.
But the centerpiece of the dream was always to sail across the Atlantic and see Europe.
Now we are anchored in a lonely Puerto Rico bay on the very cusp of the dream, checking in with each other once again to make sure we were ready.
Day (-) 2
Neither Dawn nor I are those people who grew up with saltwater in our veins. In her early adulthood, Dawn lived aboard a small sailboat and sailed to the Bahamas, the Virgin Islands and Haiti. But that was many years ago. I was the Jon Snow of sailing – I knew nothing.
So, I must say that even after all the training and four years of preparation, we were uncertain we were up for such a challenge.
The prime time to make the west-to-east passage is in May, but in March we found ourselves in Panama, the wrong end of the Caribbean to start an Atlantic crossing. If we had any chance of crossing this year, we needed to be at the north east end of the Caribbean as soon as possible. So, we pushed our way almost 1,000 nautical miles eastward, against the trade winds, to Puerto Rico.
Now time was running out but there was still work to do. We scheduled a marine professional to inspect our standing rigging. Dawn worked to identify and plug the source of some topside leaks. I installed new instruments and clammered several times to the top of the mast to adjust them. We provisioned for a long passage, filling the refrigerator with frozen and fresh food, and extra diesel cans were strapped to the deck.
One of our biggest concerns was that it would just be the two of us. Conventional wisdom says there should be at least three people aboard to assist in long night watches and in case one person becomes ill or injured. We were also interested in having someone aboard with more experience than we.
But finding just the right person to join in the tight quarters of our boat never happened.
If we were going to go, it was going to have to be just us. And if we were ever going to go, it had to be now.
It was time to look each other in the eye to agree on five simple things: Is the boat ready? Is the time right? Do we have the right community of support? And is it still the right dream? Yep, we finally decided, we’re going to do it.
Day (-) 1
On our last day before departure, we moved the boat to Ensenada Honda harbor near Ceiba, Puerto Rico. Once a massive U.S. Naval Station, it is now mostly abandoned. For us it is a spot where we can take a quiet breath and get our U.S. exit papers.
As the sun set that night, we decided some kind of ritual was appropriate. So, we sat together on the boat’s sugar scoop-shaped stern. We looked at the water, the sun and each other. We took a ceremonial last swim in Caribbean waters. We pulled out a small container with some of my deceased mother’s ashes. She had died at 98 years old, just a month before we moved onto the boat. We each put a small sprinkle of her ashes in the water, trusting that she would be with us on this journey. We allowed each other to get lost in our own thoughts and prayers.
Then we stood up and made ready for Day 1 – lifting anchor.
Day 1
0 nautical miles. Variable winds.
When we lift anchor, Dawn is in the cockpit at the helm and I am in the bow controlling the windlass. Being preoccupied with minding the anchor means I miss the feeling of first movement when we depart. But I do intimately feel that profound moment when the chain pulls tight, the anchor breaks free and we are no longer attached to solid earth.
It is May 14, and we are now untethered from the land. Our dream is no longer a dream. We are committed.
Each year a few thousand small boats like ours sail across the Atlantic. In late fall they move east to west, riding the Trade Winds from Europe to the Caribbean. In late spring, boats move eastward like us, following a route that takes them basically on a line from Bermuda to the Azores Islands of Portugal. It is a pattern that has changed very little since the earliest days of ocean exploration.
Each year a very few who start the passage don’t make it, sometimes with tragic results. We leave trusting that we will be among the many who do.
Day 2
37 Nautical Miles. Winds 1-3 knots.
Even though our journey is to go east, our first task is to go north – at least 300 nautical miles north. It’s all about the shifty, semi-permanent anticyclone called the Azores High.
This is how an anticyclone like the Azores High works. First, imagine those satellite photos you have seen of a hurricane. Hurricanes are well organized cyclones of low pressure with winds blowing counterclockwise around a calm eye.
The Azores High is its opposite. It is an immense, less organized area of high pressure where the winds blow clockwise around a winless center. The Azores High stretches across most of the North Atlantic in what are called the Horse Latitudes – around 30⁰ N. latitude.
The way to cross west to east, like we are, is to position yourself to the north of this high and ride the moving sidewalk of winds to Europe. Unfortunately, the Azores High – like reading glasses, bottle openers and memory – has an infuriating way of not being where we want it to be when we need it.
We started our journey in Puerto Rico, latitude 18⁰ N. latitude. If we had tried to go east from there it would have put us straight into the winds below the Azores High. These winds, of course, are blowing from the east. Never choose to sail great distances into the wind.
Our only option is to head due north, cross the calm center of the high and find the westerly winds at about 25⁰ N. Where exactly? That is the great mystery. We have some good weather routing advisors, but even then, this shifty high has already shown us some nice hide-and-seek moves. That is why we go north to go east. We have an appointment with the northern part of the Azores High, whether the high cooperates or not.
Isn’t it a kick to learn something new at 70?
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See more about expat adventures here in Dispatches’ archive.
Tom Hay
