French Guyana

S/Y Yelo up ahead

We departed Lencois, Brazil at 05:30 hours of 23rd November 2014 and crossed the equator from Southern to Northern hemisphere about 150 nautical miles from Lencois. 

We were headed towards Degrad de Cannes in French Guyana when we met our friends on S/Y Yelo at the entrance of Mahury River on 27th November and decided to follow them to Ile de Salut instead.

We're so happy to meet Daniela & Rolf again. The last time we met was in South Africa about a year ago. We anchored next to S/Y Yelo on Ile Royale at 3.5m deep in soft mud. It was a rolly anchorage (N 05.16.345 W 52.35.406).

Ile Royale

3 Islands on Ile du Salut

These islands were part of a notorious penal colony from 1852 onwards for only the worst criminals of France. The main part of the penal colony was a labor camp stretched along the border with Dutch Guiana, which today is Suriname.

Île Royale was for the general population of the worst criminals of the penal colony to roam about in moderate freedom due to the difficulty of escape from the island. Today, the island is peaceful with monkeys, iguanas, peacocks roaming free..

Île Saint-Joseph was for the worst of those criminals to be punished in solitary confinement in silence and for extra punishment in darkness of the worst of the worst criminals of the penal colony.

Île du Diable (Devil's island) was for political prisoners, including Dreyfus in 1895-1899 after his conviction in metropolitan France for treason. No one is allowed on this island.

Raptor & Yelo

Île Royale

View of Île Saint-Joseph

Close up of one of the peacocks

One of the many Iguanas

Lots of monkeys swinging from branch to branch on our walk. Spotted these two watching us!

Colourful Macaws

Daniela & I

Devil's Island

Kourou

The town sits at the mouth of the Kourou River, which is 112 km long. Within the Kourou district lies the Guiana Space Centre and the European Space Agency's main spaceport.

We anchored in the river near the marina (N 05.08.852 W 52.38.689). It's a pretty small marina but we were able leave our dinghy safely and access fresh water taps at the docks.

A big thanks to dear our friends Daniela and Rolf for helping us organise tickets for the Ariane Rocket Launch. It was a once in a lifetime experience.

Guiana Space Center

Replica of Ariane Rocket

Everyone's setting up their cameras and waiting for the launch

Kinda funny we were so happy chatting with each other we missed the count down - and suddenly saw it in mid air

Trail of smoke from the Ariane Rocket

Kourou

St Laurent du Maroni

The town was founded in 1858, a penal town whose inhabitants were nearly all guards and liberated prisoners. Formerly the arrival point for the prisoners before they were sorted into different camps/prisons. Those who were lucky enough to stay in Saint-Laurent were generally better treated than prisoners in other camps. Their work was simple, they were free to go wherever they wanted inside the prison, and were given better rations.

Today, St Laurent is just like any other town with old buildings in colonial style and penitentiary architecture. There is a wonderful fresh vegetable market every Wednesday and Saturday morning where you will see a colourful mix of diverse ethnicity such as the french ("metropolitains"), creoles, amerindians, hmongs, chinese, brazilians, surinamese living here.

We anchored in the Maroni River (N 05.30.380 W 54.02.041) for almost 2 months next to S/Y Yelo and we met new friends Philippe and Chunny. A couple about to embark on their overland journey in South America in their big Green Truck Motorhome. We also met David (an Italian Aussie) who was starting up a marina right where we were anchored. 

There's not much to do/explore in St Laurent but its a great place to be for a boat! Being in the fresh water, our hulls were barnacle free! It did leave brown watermark stains just above our water line, but better that than barnacles, right?

The fresh vegetable market every Wednesday and Saturday morning

A small Carnival @ St Laurent

Scary masks

Daniela & I at the Carnival

Statue of a prisoner outside of Le Camp de la Transportation

Great place to ride our bikes

Will miss the baguettes but it's time to go!

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Lençóis, Bahia, Brazil

We anchored in Lençóis, another small fishing village (S 01.20.631 W 44.53.703) in 2m of water at low tide on 15th November 2014. Our last stop in Brazil.

Beautiful anchorage with the white sand dunes in the background.

Soft white sand

Can you spot Raptor?

 

Walking back to our dinghy

Raptor at high tide

Local houses

Simple houses in lovely sand dunes

We've got a little garden growing on our hulls

Kids on Raptor at lowtide

Seriously low tide! My favorite way to clean the hulls

Mini homemade fishing boats - So detailed with fishing nets and all

The kids and guys off to get water supply

Awesome dunes

Footprints in the sand

We took the opportunity to clean our hulls at low tide and some local kids came by to help.

We also managed to get some fresh water from a well 400m away. It was definitely hard work for the guys.

We departed Lencois for French Guyana (~650 nm away) on 23rd November. We enjoyed our week's stay in Lencois very much. Finally off to a new country after 5 months in Brazil. 

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Luís Correia, Piauí, Brazil

We anchored in Luís Correia, Piauí, Brazil on 11th November 2014. Just 68 nautical miles away from Jericoacoa, we should've known that the anchorage here (S 02.51.013 W 41.38.785) was also blowy and rolly, although slightly better than before (Jericoacoara). Not much fun on a rolly anchorage.

Two days later, we departed for Lencois.

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Jericoacoara, Ceará, Brazil

We arrived in Jericoacoara (also known as 'Jeri'), a small fishing village in Ceará, Brazil, about 300 km northwest of Fortaleza on the 9th November 2014. 

It was a 339 nautical mile passage from Galinhos. Unfortunately due to strong winds (25 kts) and poor anchorage (S 02.37.698 W 40.32.141), we departed Jeri for Luís Correia 2 days later.  

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Galinhos, Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil

We departed Cabedelo, Paraíba after clearing out on 1st November 2014. Unfortunately our plan to visit Fernando De Noronha; the beautiful archipelago of 21 islands & islets located off the Brazilian coast was cancelled because when we cleared out, according to Customs, Raptor had overstayed her visa! 💔

We've always been very diligent about our visas, so this really caught us by surprise. We blame it of course on the language barrier, afterall "nós não falamos portugues". No doubt Customs must've informed us about this at some point? But when, where, how? We'll never know..

Broken hearted, we headed off to Galinhos.. another small town in north Brazil.

It was a rough passage. 60 nautical miles northeast of Galinhos we had winds blowing at 17-20 kts. At the entrance, we had 30 kts of wind and had to put the engine up to 1900 RPM. 

Rough, but we made it! Anchored off Galinhos (S 05.05.830 W 36.16.379) on 3rd November. Lots of donkeys in this village.

We took the dinghy to explore up river, where we found a salt mine.

 

 

We also found a huge wind farm.

 

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Salvador, Bahia, Brazil

SALVADOR (photo taken on Raptor)

Salvador (just a days sail from Itaparica) is the capital of Bahia state in Brazil. We arrived at the Terminal Náutico da Bahia Marina on 15th October 2014.

Salvador is divided into 3 parts: a lower city, an upper city and seaside area. Looks pretty from afar doesn't it? 

We didn't have a good impression of the lower city (mainly due to safety) but was pleasantly delighted with the upper city (called Pelourinho) the historic centre of Salvador, the old city.. a mix of derelict and restored colonial residences colourfully painted and churches exhibiting its Portuguese architecture.

View from the Upper Level (the lift on the left)

Streets of the Upper City aka Pelourinho

More of Pelourinho

Alex & I

View from the Lower Level

SALVADOR! (at the top lift landing)

Nice view of the city from our berth at the Terminal Náutico da Bahia Marina (S 12.58.515 W 38.32.161). It is considered one of the nicest harbours in the country.

Raptor at Terminal Nautico da Bahia

We departed on 18th October for Recife.

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Itaparica, Bahia, Brazil

Anchorage at Itaparica

We anchored on a sand bank in 0.5m of water in the northern tip of Itaparica island, 10 miles away from Salvador (S 12.53.457 W 38.41.133) on 2nd October 2014. It's a calm sheltered anchorage just opposite the marina in a little town with white sandy beaches and pristine waters. 

We stayed 13 days here and really enjoyed it. The view of the sandbanks at low tide is beautiful.

Some locals walking with their horses on the sandbank

The horses were up to their necks in water at high tide but did not seem to mind. The town of Itaparica is laid back and peaceful.

Itaparica

"Treehouse"

Alex standing in the middle of a "football field"

Locals caught a green iguana on the street

One of the weirdest looking creatures we've ever seen

View of the sandbanks

Cleaned the hulls at low tide

Of course it wasn't all play and no work in paradise. We took the opportunity to clean our hulls at low tide, made a new clip for the WAECO fridge door and fixed our ICEER fridge door too. As you know, we fix and repair things at exotic locations. That's what we do!

  

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