World ARC: Peaceful Jacare
by World Cruising Club 10 Mar 2018 20:53 PDT
9 March 2018
On their way for the rendez-vous in Jacare Marina Village in Cabedelo the 10 World ARC boats sailed together from Salvador for a 3 days up wind challenging passage, on arrival participants were happy to get in the quiet little fisherman's town and tie up onto the pontoon at slack tide to avoid the strong current on the river.
They got welcome by Francis & Nicolas the 2 French manager of the Marina helped by Thiago and Attilo who allocated each yacht a berth on one of the 2 main pontoons. The yachts arrived 1 week before the official date of the rendez-vous, therefore some boats rented a car to explore and travel around the region of Paraiba, going to Pipa a very nice beach up north close to Natal, when Take Off took a flight to spend few days in Rio. At the end of the week the Rally team joined the fleet for the rendez-vous after they left them 2 weeks earlier in Salvador.
A busy few days ahead with the preparation of the yachts for the last Leg of World ARC taking them back to the Caribbean on a 2255NM passage, but also clearances and farewell dinner was on the programme.
The participants decided on the Monday to get on a tour to visit the beautiful city of Olinda and it's surrounding. The following morning every crew had to be present for the Immigration officer to check individually every passport before preparing the exit pass paper work clearance. Once ready each skippers were taken by car to the office to sign and collect their clearance certificate while the team arranged the rest of the clearances on their behalf with Customs and Port Captain.
Once check out 48hours before the start participants had plenty of time to get ready, doing provisioning, refuelling and gas refilling. Also Take Off took this opportunity to organise a party for Ines birthday in the afternoon just before the farewell dinner. All the boats attempt to the birthday party, and took part to the little challenged games organized by Take Off crew.
After the birthday party participants stayed for the farewell dinner, enjoying caipirinha and traditional Brazilian food "Fejoada" made of black beans, white rice, orange and baby spinaches. After dinner participants relax and enjoyed the live band music playing traditional song from Recife call Frevo.
On the next morning the last skipper's briefing was given for the last Leg of World ARC taking the boat back to the Caribbean. The boats had to wait for the slack tide in the afternoon in order to be able to manoeuver the boats out of the marina without problems.
After nearly a month spend in Brazil all the boats are now well underway to Grenada, mark for some of them of the start of their circumnavigation that started 15 months ago or more.