Here we’re are in Cape d’Agde, South of France.
After 5 trains, 1 bus and 13 hours travel last Tuesday 10th November I finally landed on Mina, the boat that will ferry us to Caribbean islands (Antigua).
She’s amazing and completely different from any boat I’ve been till now. Designed and built by CNB (Construction Navale Bordeaux) she’s a super luxury 60 feet (20 meters) fully equipped. The line is elegant and aggressive with the deck entirely done teak, a fine wood used in naval ship boats. I step on board stepping on the opened door of the garage in the aft of the boat, just below the cockpit.
The 18.60 m mast supports the main sail, a Jennaker and a staysail all hailed obviously through four electric winches.. these will help and save us a lot of energies! 😉
Going below deck left me wide mouthed! The space is huge in the saloon where the open kitchen is furnished with all the comforts: 3 fridges, 1 freezer, ice machine, washing machine and even a dishwasher! To supply enough fresh water a desalinator unit and a power generator, while the AC unit provides heating and cooling depending on the season. Comfortable beds in the three cabins have dedicated bathrooms with amazingly hot showers.
In summary is one of those boats that you could only succeed to visit in a boat showroom if you’re lucky while I will live on her for the next month to sail across the Atlantic Ocean!
It just sounds a unique amazing Life experience!
We planned to stay 5 more days in Cape d’Agde port focusing on Mina, to take care of her and prepare her for the long sailing across the Ocean. Collecting the overhauled sails, issuing the staysail and main sail, testing the tender while doing some general maintenance and fixing all the small problems that always pop up from time to time.
It’s Saturday morning, one day to go, when we unfortunately find out a problem that need to be fixed before we sail away. With the weekend and the specialist travelling here from north of France on Monday morning we have now to postpone the sail away to Wednesday the 18th when also the rest of the crew will join us.
We will take the opportunity to do some extra cleaning and food provisioning.
Was enough yesterday to leave the mooring lines for one hour to do gasoline refuelling and the breeze of adventure fill us with excitement and desire to sail away!
