Sailing to East Africa
The journey to the west, headed to Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, would mean completing one of my first goals, which was to cross the Indian Ocean. This was undoubtedly one of the most difficult mental challenges.
I have now crossed my first ocean, which is arguably the most challenging of the major oceans: the northern passage of the Indian Ocean. Departing from Mahé, we set sail with a general heading of 260° True, pointing towards Dar es Salaam.
The route from Seychelles to Tanzania
With Henry and Libor, we headed towards Dar, with the journey expected to take about 10 - 12 days. My friend and future commodore Rama had managed to get someone in the Dar Yacht Club to assist us, and I hoped this would make our entry into Tanzania easier.
We hardly used diesel during our entire journey. At the end of this passage, I’ll include some statistics on our arrival in Dar. The sail was quite comfortable, and our weather routing proved to be reliable. By this time, our weather router from South Africa was providing us with daily updates every morning. The route suggested by PredictWind and Des using the ECMWF model aligned well with one another. There is a strong westerly set current which splits and joins the Agulhas current and another which splits towards the Red Sea. There is a notorious point where these currents diverge north of Madagascar, which has become known as the Devil’s Cauldron. The seas around there are confused due to changes in current and waves too. Sailors will generally steer away from the north coast of Mada. This is what we did, and I put almost 300 nm distance between this land mass.
Despite this, we encountered some uncomfortable seas. The wave periods ( time between each wave) were short, resulting in rolling, which made sleeping difficult for all onboard. It was not dangerous, but it was uncomfortable for about two to three days.
We arrived at the Dar YC anchorage on June 20, 2023, just 7.5 days after leaving Seychelles. It was a fast sail! Dropping anchor in front of the yacht club felt incredible, marking the completion of my first ocean crossing. Destiny and I have successfully crossed the Indian Ocean.
Sunset arrival, and the view from DYC
How we got ashore from Destiny. The famous VHF Radio call “dinghy dinghy
Distance Travelled - 4000nm
Diesel used - 150 ltrs ( mainly between Langkawi till we passed Andaman, in Maldives during the rally) at least 120 ltrs here.
1ltr of fuel was used every 27nm, which in vehicle consumption - 1 ltr almost 50kms. Quite a green way to travel!
