Island Swift Travels: La Graciosa by Lochlann

La Graciosa, Canary Isles, December 2014

It took two days to sail from Madeira to La Graciosa, the smallest inhabited island in the Canary Isles. It was very enjoyable to suddenly see the islands loom up in front of us. As the sun set, we rounded the southern point of Graciosa and admired the volcano that was embedded there. After navigating our way in the dark past boats that didn’t have lights on we dropped our anchor and had a brilliant supper.

Boat kids.

The next day we went ashore and walked across the shrub land to the only town, Caleta del Sebo. There are no tarmac roads on the island and very few cars since the whole place is a national park. It is only five miles long and two miles wide and it reminded us very much of the Scilly Isles. We found a bread shop and an ice cream shop, so we had all we needed!

There are four volcanic cones on Graciosa that are all extinct. There was one directly opposite our anchorage that is exactly what a volcano is supposed to look like. We climbed up it one day but without taking the path so we were scrambling up shingle and gravel that slid under our feet. At one point, dad did an accidental backward roll while climbing. At the top we got buffeted by a wind so powerful that it could have knocked me over.

Hans’ Polynesian catamaran.

While we were at anchor we saw a strange-looking boat come slowly round the point and mum said that it looked like Hans’ Polynesian catamaran (see Algarve blog). She was proved to be right. Hans anchored in the bay and the next day he invited us to come to supper to help them eat a tuna fish that they had caught on passage. I tried some and to my great surprise it was absolutely delicious!

After a few days the wind changed direction so there was a lee shore. If our anchor dragged we would be blown right onto shore. To be safe, we went into the marina and tied up alongside a pontoon. We stayed there for four or five days while outside the wind was strong from the south.

We met a lot of other English sailors on really nice boats. There were some other sailing kids like us as well. Nick Skeats came to Graciosa so we met him and talked about plans for the Caribbean.