To Summer- Sea Dragon Departs

The mental rot of being in port- close to land and in the flat water of the harbor - was beginning to set in as our time in the Azores approached two weeks. Anxious to head south and escape the wet, windy weather of the North Atlantic, the last few days have been a frenzy of preparation and anticipation. We were set to leave yesterday (2/25) afternoon, but a system error with a new fire sensor ended up keeping us ashore as Dale worked out a solution into the night. The problem was fixed and we turned in early, eager to rise at dawn and shove off.

We left the dock around 0900 today, waved goodbye to our friend Mike, and raised the sails for Cape Verde. The seas have been calm, compared to the monster low pressure systems we’ve been sitting through, and the sky is relatively clear; painted with rainbows in all directions. A pod of dolphins escorted us out for over an hour, jumping and whistling at the bow. They seemed to instill even more enthusiasm into our green crew, both of whom are staving off seasickness to pull their weight.

We’ve got about a weeks’ worth of sailing to reach Cape Verde. We are anxious for warm sun and seas, which will arrive in no time as we drop straight south. The weather reports suggest good wind and weather, warming with every degree of latitude we drop.

Sea Dragon will now push south-southwest for over 5,000nm. We will cross the equator, the infamous "inter-tropical convergence zone", doldrums, pass a set of tiny mid-ocean rocks called St. Peter and Paul, and then head into Brazil. We continue the research story of marine plastics- now sampling in waters seldom investigated. The boat is also carrying an important new CO2 sensor. Once in international waters we will activate the sensors and begin recording this important data.

On to summer!

Stephen Amato