Around this time every year, you can always count on at least a few Nordhavns making their away across the Atlantic to Europe. Last week Nordhavn 68 Elusive One arrived in Azores where it will spend a few weeks exploring before continuing on to Amsterdam. Meanwhile, an N43 finished its crossing in mid-June after reaching Spain before continuing on to the UK where her owners are now exploring.

Elusive One left West Palm Beach on June 2^nd and arrived in the Azores last Wednesday. Delivery captain Assen Alexander of SD Captains, who is assisting owners Chris and Vicki Eichorn with the crossing, said the run from Bermuda to Horta took 11 days, aided by good sea conditions and warm winds. Rather than simply using Bermuda and the Azores as fuel and provisioning stops, the owners are taking their time to explore the islands and so will take more than two months to cross the Atlantic.

The first leg of their trip was summarily uneventful. They reached Bermuda looking to replace the hydraulic cooling pump and refuel. Alexander said conditions were good with not much more than 12-15 knot winds coming at them from the south.

Once the owners are finished exploring the Azorean islands, they plan to make landfall in Spain first before continuing on to Amsterdam.

Lyle Nelson had originally intended to join the Nordhavn Bahamas Rendezvous in April, seeing it as the exclamation point to a wonderful time spent wintering there. Bad weather and timing diverted those plans and instead they started getting their N43 Algonquin ready to steam across the Atlantic, embarking for Bermuda on May 6^th. They spent two weeks enjoying the area and then departed for the Azores, on the 25^th. The route was more than 1,900 nm, greater than the Great Circle route typically used, because they needed to venture south in order to dodge some weather that had developed. After a week in the Azores, they went 974 nm to Coruna, Spain on the June 17^th.

Says Lyle: “We used Bob at OMNI for weather routing and had fairly good conditons for the whole crossing. We had one 18-hour period on the long leg where we got clipped by a front to the north and had 12-15 seas from the starboard rear quarter that gave us a couple of breaking waves into the cockpit and some big rolls – even with the stabiilzers – up to 30 degrees. We didn’t get much sleep that night! But the boat handled it perfectly. Mechanically the boat was perfect. We had one minor leak at a stabilizer hose fitting but it was easily resolved by tightening it.”

As for cruising this summer, Lyle says the plan is to spend time going up the west coast of the UK and then wintering in the south. The following spring they plan to head to the Med or go up to Scandinavia. Either way, the next few seasons call for European itineraries “until we tire of it.”