March 28, 2007 - Salalah to Eritrea, Day 4
by George & Merima

Hi Everyone:

On our fourth day out, we enjoyed a nice day of sailing as we passed the port of Aden. Reports from cruising friends who had called in there were that it was dirty, difficult and unless one wanted to travel inland to the capital of San'A', it should be given a miss.

Other than a case of DDW syndrome, meaning that our mark was dead-down-wind of our position, we enjoyed a nice day of sailing. When the winds dropped below the 20-knot mark, we put up the spinnaker for a few hours. Unfortunately, we weren't making the sort of forward progress we had hoped for as we were gybing across the course line, and we would have missed passing through the Gates of Sorrow in daylight.

We decided to take a break and took anchorage for the night at a small Yemeni fishing village called Ra'S Al'Arah about 30 nm from the Gates, to proceed again at first light in the morning.

Shortly after we anchored, we were approached by a long open fishing vessel with about ten Yemeni men aboard. They were very warm and friendly. I gave them a few packs of cigarettes, which they immediately began to enjoy. While they were mostly in traditional dress, two of the men indicated that they were military. They asked for our papers, so I gave them a letter of introduction (in Arabic) and copies of our passports and ship's documentation. They were very polite and asked if they could keep the paperwork, which I agreed to. They also asked if we needed any services from their village. I explained that we just wanted to rest there for the night and would move on in the morning. We said our goodbye, and they moved on.

After a very restful night, we got under way at 0600 this morning for the last leg of our trip to Assab Bay in Eritrea, about 75 miles to the northwest.

Cheers, George and Merima