The Road to the Horizon

"Finding Dory", is a social community of cruisers who plan to cross the Atlantic (East-West) next winter (2025-2026 season). It is "free-to-join" and "contribute-as-you-wish" group of yachties, bonded by one common goal: to cross the Atlantic safely. "Finding Dory" is organized in collaboration with Helena and Steve from "Noforeignland". You can read about the background, purpose and setup of this group, and planned free webinars in this post on Noforeignland - which will also guide you how to join this Whatsapp-based community.

So,... we are ready to kick off our third free webinar on August 26 at 20:00 Rome time, 18:00 GMT. This time we will tackle a common challenge many of us will face, as we are sailing from Northern Europe or from the Med towards the Canaries as we are preparing to cross the Atlantic:
We will all pass areas where in the past years, there have been multiple interactions between different orca pods and sailboats, in the the Bay of Biscay, on the West and South coasts of Spain and Portugal, and around the Gibraltar Straight.

Several of these interactions have resulted in significant damage to the yachts' rudder, rudder shaft and hulls. On some occasions this resulted in the yacht being disabled, and there have been occurences where the yacht sank.

Since a number of years, the "go-to" place for cruisers to get up-to-date information and guidance has been "orcas.pt", a citizen-funded and crowd-source initiative, sustained by the very community it serves: sailors, maritime enthusiasts, and concerned individuals who recognize the urgency of this situation. It is a free, volunteer-driven platform dedicated to providing real-time assistance and crucial information to help sailors navigate safely in orca activity areas.

"orcas.pt" is coordinated by Rui Alves. Rui not only maintains and updates the website, but he also coordinates several Telegram chat groups, assisting cruisers as they pass through "orca territory", all on a benevolent and volunteering basis. In some occasions, Rui also assisted cruisers who had sustained damage due to orca interactions.

Rui graciously volunteered to join us in our next webinar to introduce the "orcas.pt" platform and its chat channels. Based on his years-long experience in coordinating this community, he will also share the key "do's" and "don't's" in avoiding the orca hotspots, but also, what to do and what not to do, if - in the worst case scenario - you encounter an orca pod.

I have sailed through the orca hotspots several times in the past years, and personally, I found the "orcas.pt" information and community, SUPER helpful. Actually, last year, in the Bay of Biscay, we had an orca pod swimming towards our boat, dive under it, and - luckily - continued on their merry way without interacting with our boat. But I can tell you, we were sitting on the edge of our seats for a few minutes!

Our webinar will be held on “ZOOM” and consist of +- 60 minutes of presentation, followed by 30 minutes (or more if needed) of open Q-and-A/discussions/shared experiences amongst the participants.

Our webinars are free for all “Finding Dory” members. We will record the session and publish the link to the recording afterwards to all members of our community.

The instructions on how to join this webinar, are distributed to "Finding Dory" members only, rather than widely distributing the link via social media, mainly to avoid spammers to join in, and disturb our webinar.

So, if you want to join in for the webinars, first join the "Finding Dory" community, and via our Whatsapp group, we will send you details on how to join each webinar. Instructions on how to join the growing "Finding Dory" flotilla on Whatsapp, you can find in this Noforeignland blogpost.

About Rui:

My name is Rui Alves, and I love sailing since I was a young kid. I am the creator of orcas.pt, a project born from a deep personal concern: Observing the rising number of interactions between orcas and sailing vessels along the coasts of Portugal and Spain, I felt compelled to take action, not just for the safety of sailors, but also for the well-being of Iberian orcas.

About Peter:

I will be the moderator for this webinar, as part of my role as "house keeper" for the "Finding Dory" flotilla community. I grew up on the coast of the Northsea, and spent most of my childhood holidays on the water. My mum says I don't have blood but rather have "salt water" running through my veins. :-) As part of my pro-bono work, giving back to the sailing community, I train "newbies to yacht sailing", and mentor more experienced sailors who are new boat-owners or first-time open ocean crossers.

Top picture courtesy of orcas.pt.

Read the full post...