Sailing alone across the Atlantic. From La Palma, Canary Islands, to Dominica, Caribbean

What am I doing here in the middle of the sea? I'm thrilled, but there is also a bit some sort of anxious feeling that I do everything that I needed to do and am I capable to cross a real ocean. If you look at the weather forecast it's quite interesting because the different weather models give quite different routes. There's a northern route and the advantage of that is that it's not too much wind there. The disadvantage is that it's quite near to a deep pressure area and I might get wind from the wrong side. The southern route seems to be more stable. The problem here is that I will end up in quite a bit of wind, about 25-30 knots, maybe more in gusts. So I will decide for the southern route. I have survived the first night. I was busy because there was no wind in the beginning and I took all the sails down. Then there was little wind, I took the genoa up, then there was much wind, I had to reef the genoa and in the end now it's about 15 knots, which is perfect. I took up genoa and the jib, so I'm sailing with each sail on each side. About 5 knots, 5.5 knots speed. When I look at the map, I think, gee, it's good what I've done, but it's a long way into the Caribbean. Hard to imagine that you will ever be on the other side. Almost one week at sea. I must confess that the first days were not good. I really was intimidated by the vastness and largeness of the sea. I didn't really go out, I couldn't see the ocean, it was too vast, too big and I mostly stayed inside. One example is that I was plagued by my cups that always tended to fall down. I drilled two holes in my table, quite brutal actually, but it's working great and I have two wonderful cup holders now. Another problem was my radio, it's new, so once you put it on, it gave a sign that the energy is low, so I had to find another connection for it, now it's working fine. Third thing is my radar, that is new as well and it's gorgeous. I can erect a guard zone around my boat and if something is in this guard zone, there is an alarm and it's not so much other boats. Actually I haven't seen a whistle for the last three days, so what wakes me up is squalls since yesterday. So a squall is strong wind and rain, it looks like a thunderstorm and the radar can show the rain and so the guard zone can give an alarm when this rain is coming near to my boat. For the next two days actually the weather forecast gives stronger wind, up to 25 knots and much higher seas, actually up to 3.5 meters, so that will be new for me, but I'm thrilled to see how that will be like. The weather forecast really is good, it came exactly as they forecasted, higher waves up to 3 meters, stronger winds, gusts to 25-30 knots. One problem is the wind steering, it doesn't really keep the boat on track once the wind is stronger, so when the boat gets out of balance, the wind steering can't hold against it and the only way is to reef the sails. And the other problem is the energy, I would have a wind generator, but since four months it's at the Cost Customs in Portugal, they don't let it into the manufacturer, who should have overhauled it, and I'm deeply missing the wind generator. It means for me that I need to load the batteries every two and a half days. This is Lena's hour and Daniel's hour, they presented a bottle to me, sealed, so my interpretation is this is a bottle for the sea, and they put a map around the bottle with a big X in the middle of the ocean. We now are exactly at the X, we're in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, and even though I don't like to put bottles into the ocean, this one has to go. So here this is to Lena and to Daniel, thank you for your bottle, and I'm anxious to hear whether this bottle ever got to a shore, and what the contents of the bottle might have been. It looked like this trip would have no problem at all, at least no major problem at all, but then disaster struck at the part where the biggest sail, the Genoa, meets the sheet, that part ripped off of the Genoa, so the Genoa was flowing in the wrong direction. I wonder how I can get it into the boat without losing it. I started the motor and changed the course with the nose and the wind of the boat, so the Genoa was flowing over the boat, and then I needed to bring it down, it was a lot of ripping and it's just quite powerful stuff, but in the end the Genoa came down and I could attach it to the deck, so everything is fine now, except that it was very wet and quite shaky. It's not really a problem, I have to find someone who can repair this old 15 year old Genoa, and as long as that I will use the jib, so I have alternatives. Dominica, here at last it is. Yesterday evening, suddenly out of the clouds when the sun set, there was mountains and there was this island. So the journey is over, I did it by myself and the question is, was it worth it? I think traveling with a crew would have been a totally different journey. When you're by yourself it can be a bit creepy, especially in situations like that one where I had to get the Genoa in, but on the other hand being on yourself it's just so intensive, everything. I can't compare this to a journey with other people. In the future I think there might be routes where it is helpful to be in a crew, especially when it's dangerous, but I'm sure I will also go on other trips by myself.