From Gaspé to Anse aux Meadows
Le texte suivant n'est pas une traduction du texte intitulé « De Gaspé à l'Anse aux Meadows », mais bien un texte écrit par Yann pour ses amis internationaux.
Finally at the Anse aux Meadows. Really happy to visit this hard to reach historical site where the Viking briefly settled in North America.
We have been through relatively tough seas and extremely variable weather. Sunny, cold winds, gusts, incredibly thick fog...
The first three days at sea were a good and fresh start. Getting us in shape gradually. Already we had Aurora Borealis every night, whales, dolphins, tons of new birds to me, and most importantly: great food!
We then stopped on the Labrador coast as we wanted to avoid sailing at night with possible icebergs. The village there was gloomy but the landscape fantastic. We then had this surreal route through islands and channels in a really deep fog. We sometimes couldn't see further than 30m and thus could only guess the shoals and islands we were passing by. It was a bit scary but from time to time the fog would disappear and the magic of the landcape was revealed. I am not sure the pictures convey the atmosphere so well but I definitely have great memories from it.
Later on at sea, all of sudden, the fog vanished, a strong and cold wind started to blow and to freeze us. A coast of dry cliffs appeared before us. We halted in a cute, more European/Norwegian style village. Then again it was such a drastic change from the small steamy wadded islands from the previous day.
In the following morning we had a rather sporty departure as the front sail jammed when being set up. We then proceeded to a quick sneaky crossing of the dreaded Belle-Isle strait to sail along the Newfoundland coast with the engine. It ended up being a sunny day with whales. A very cute village again but this time the landscape is completely flat (and still desolated). And there finally, in the morning we realised that we had passed the night right by... showers!! What a joy!
After a thorough cleaning of our clothes and ourselves we headed through jumping Humpback whales and dolphins to a village close to the Anse aux Meadows, where we are now. It's hilly and actually breathtaking. Especially with the whales, the Vikings were not only barbarians and knew where to crash on a new continent! We should visit some of their other settlements in Greenland.
We should head to Greenland on Wednesday in order to avoid a coming storm, however the changing weather under these latitudes is not reassuring. In a way it would be exciting to face rough weather but we will surely have other chances.
By then we have to fix the heater. We have two aboard and none of them works. Sailing Greenland without is is feasible but it should be pretty cold. On the other hand it will hopefully be less wet. This was the most annoying so far, rather than the temperature.
Anyway, it's an amazing trip so far and that was just the beginning. The serious stuff is ahead!
Yann
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