Arrived Bilbao Sunday after a fantastic sail from a beautiful town Lequeitio, Northern Spain where we spent the night tied up to the town quay with lots of onlookers, don’t think they get many visitors!

We are anchored in Bilbao inside the sheltered bay waiting for the stormy weather to move on. Think we might be here until Friday looking at the grib files. We finally found somewhere to tie the dinghy to today where access to the town is not inhibited by locked gates! I think they don’t want cheap skate anchorers, they would much rather you paid for a mooring!

Jez ran out of beer today so an urgent trip for provisions tomorrow in between down pours is required before mutiny sets in…….

We have a quick update on our ARC plans.  We have transferred to ARC+ which leaves earlier than the main rally on 10th November with a group of about 50 boats, sailing 850 nm to Cape Verdes Islands first for a couple of days exploring, then catching the trade winds for the 2100 n. miles to St Lucia.

We are very excited and thought that this slight change of plan would be a great opportunity to visit these beautiful islands on the way.

So, 10th November is our new departure date from Las Palmas, Gran Canaria…   then 20th November from Cape Verdes, arriving St Lucia probably around 18-20 days later.

Bye bye for now from a very rainy, gloomy, windy Bilbao.