The ultimate shakedown

Belle was completely new to me and unfortunately I did not have an opportunity to learn her lines from the previous owner.

Buying her was a long and complicated process; the previous owner was not very cooperative and left me some surprises on her. One of them was 6 months of botyard park to pay. To be able to buy her I had already made a huge financial effort and now after a couple of months working on dry, painting the bottom and servicing trougly her saildrive, she was finally ready to return to the water. As usual, I booked the Travelift in the Marina reception, and only then was I informed by them that there was a big bill to be paid

before I could use the Travelift services. I was stuck with Belle on Land until the boatyard parking was paid. I contacted the previous owner, but he was not very interested in setting things up with the Marina. There was some complaint from him about their services and he was trying to skip this last pament. Ok, but I do not have nothing to do with this dispute. the debth is not from the boat it’s obviously from the owner….. I took all the right steps informing all the buying progress and leaving in the marina copies of the sale agreement, all documents and the date I assume the parking costs but they didnt care, no payment no travelift. I ask for help to my colleages from my Yatchmaster Offshore class and the help came in by Daniel, He’s a lawyer and helped me deal with the Marina and the previous owner. Fortunatly the pressure on the previous owner prove to be usefull and after a couple of weeks he setlet things with the Marina and Belle was finaly free to be back on water.

Finally afloat, it was time for Belle's first proper sailing shakedown. The plan was to sail her south to Culatra in the Algarve. For this, I was accompanied by Daniel and Alexandre, a Brazilian skipper and friend, who was moored next to Belle in her first berth at Sines Marina. Alexandre was heading to Brazil after purchasing Elise a beautiful Halberg Rassy 312 from Denemark. We met in Sines Marina, , he was always close by to help me with Belle. He happily agreed to take her sailing with me and Daniel to Algarve. So Belle's first crew was made up of two lawyers. At least we were legally protected against anything. Fortunately, their skills as skippers were much more useful than their legal acknowledgments. Alexandre was a very experienced sailor, since he had been sailing Elise from Denmark to Portugal all by himself for the last few months. Daniel spent his youth summers in Ria Formosa, so he was the perfect pilot to navigate the shallow waters. Besides that, Alexandre is an excellent chef, and Daniel is restoring his own boat in the Açores, so he knows a lot about sailboat systems. I need to learn all the Belle systems , they are all new to me. So I can say I had the perfect crew for my first sail with Belle.

Unfortunately, even before we started sailing, I noticed that the steering system was broken. As soon as I got out of the Travelift, I realized that only one of the wheels was working, while the second one was completely loose. Fortunately, I was able to drive her to her berth with just one helm, and then I found out that the second helm was connected only with a small steel cable, which snapped immediately when pushed by the quadrant. It was likely one of those temporary fixes that only the previous owner would know about. After a thorough check, I found out that the port helm was functioning properly, so I reached out to hanse.boatoon to learn more about Belle's steering system. I was glad to find out that Belle is equipped with a strong and dependable steering system made by Jefa Steering Systems. I figured out that with my crew, we can sail Belle south with just one person handling the helm while we wait for the new parts to arrive.

We left Sines on at sunrise with calm seas and a light north wind, called the Portuguese trades, which usually blow from the north along the western part of the Iberian Peninsula throughout most of the year. In Portuguese, this wind is known as Nortada.

Unfortunately, for this first shakedown, we only had a storm jib available, which was mistakenly stored in the jib labeled bag. So, we had to motorsail along the coast with just a full main and a small storm jib.

The journey along the coastline was relaxed and comfortable, giving plenty of time to test out several systems, furled and unfurled both sails, and take in the sunny day., always staying close to the 20-meter depth line to keep away from orcas.

We “conquer” Sait Vicent Cape” the southwesternmost point of Portugal and of mainland Europe. Strabo, the ancient Greek geographer, calls this cape the most western tip of the known world and reports the place was considered magical. Common people believed the sun sank here hissing into the ocean, marking the edge of their world,

We round the cape at sunset and anchor safely in Baleeira, protected by the northwest cliffs between the cape lighthouse and the Sagres Fortress. It was just a perfect day even if we didn't have strong winds to sail properly. Belle cruises comfortably at about 7 knots using just 2500 RPMs, and both the engine and the recently overhauled saildrive worked perfectly. Even with almost no wind, we were able to easily furl and unfurl both sails. Alexandre gave us a delicious dinner, and Neptune a very comfortable night's sleep on anchor.