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8 // FALKEN: Trans-Atlantic! Bermuda – Azores // 2,000 Miles & 18 Days // $10,000 // WAITLIST


$10,000 // 18 Days

Synopsis

Join FALKEN in beautiful St. George’s, Bermuda to start her second trans-Atlantic of the year! One of our classic 59º North trips, this will be an open ocean passage, in deep Atlantic the whole way.

We'll sail from Bermuda over the top of the Azores high to Horta, a magical landfall 900 miles off the coast of mainland Europe. The Azores archipelago is part of Portugal, and the Portuguese culture is mesmerizing—the locals are friendly, the mountainous scenery is majestic and the food is natural, fresh and inexpensive. We’ll make landfall on the island of Faial in the old sailors’ haunt of Horta.

FALKEN’s next passage will start from the nearby island of São Miguel. For those of you wanting to carry-on and help with the 155 nm delivery to Ponta Delgada on São Miguel, you’ll have the option to either leave the boat in Horta, or continue on to São Miguel.

Note

We now reserve two spots for women on all of our passages! Learn more here.

All 59º North passages are led by qualified RYA / MCA Yachtmaster Ocean certified skippers & mates, and all miles sailed onboard BOTH of our boats will count towards your own license mileage requirements. We are happy to provide certificates to this effect as well towards your RYA Day Skipper, Yachtmaster or other countries’ sea time requirements.

The Route

Expected Weather Pattern

Winds commonly range from the southwest this time of year in the North Atlantic. Occasionally, a cold front may pass over us, bringing heavy weather with its passing. Generally temps are cooler as we’re still in Atlantic springtime, so expect to wear layers at night. The Azores are generally wet and cool with a temperate climate.

Tentative Itinerary

  • May 23: Join the boat in St. George’s, Bermuda at 1300. Dinner with the group either ashore or onboard.

  • May 24: All-day safety briefing & boat orientation

  • May 25: Departure! (Weather dependent)

  • Option to depart the boat on arrival in Horta, -OR- continue on to São Miguel

  • June 9: Depart the boat in São Miguel by 12:00 (Noon)

Travel Logistics

  • Fly into L.F. Wade International Airport (BDA), Bermuda’s only airport

  • Fly out of Horta, Azores (HOR) or São Miguel

How to Join

To register, complete the Offshore Passage Registration by clicking the 'Sign Up' button above, or at the bottom of the page. You'll be asked to complete the form - make sure you hit submit. Indicate '2024 // FALKEN: Bermuda – Azores' as your preferred passage. 

Once we receive your registration, you'll be sent an invoice for 50% of the balance, due immediately. The final 50% of the balance will be due 60 days prior to the passage date. Terms and conditions are in the registration form, and you'll be asked to agree to them before submitting your deposit. Please read them carefully.

Featured
Travel Logistics
Travel Logistics

Click here to read in general about the best way to get to & from the boat. Specifics on each trip will be emailed to you in a series of newsletters once you register. It's ocean sailing - be flexible in your planning!

What's Included in the Crew Fee?
What's Included in the Crew Fee?

Click here to read about what you get - and what's not included - when you sign-up for this passage.

How to Book & What Happens Next
How to Book & What Happens Next

Click here to read more about how to register and join us offshore!

FAQs
FAQs

Click here to read some of our most frequently asked questions from crew who have sailed with us in the past.

What to Expect Onboard
What to Expect Onboard

Click here to read about what you can expect on an ocean passage onboard ISBJORN or FALKEN.

Related Blogs:

Featured
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 12/Finale // Re-Entry
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 12/Finale // Re-Entry

This is different. ISBJORN’s been at sea over 20 days now. The world we’re about to re-enter won’t be the same from the one we left. Three weeks is enough time to guarantee that. We’ve been well and truly cutoff. Not so much as in the old days - I can text friends and family and we get weather reports of course. But no email. No news. I have no idea if the US government has re-opened yet, nor do I know anything else about the world outside our little bubble. Sailing across oceans is like traveling in a steam-punk time machine. In slow-motion, we’re moving into the future with no knowledge of what’s happened in the interval.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 11 // Oops. There Goes the Spinnaker...
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 11 // Oops. There Goes the Spinnaker...

Welp, we did it. Mia & I got complacent and paid the price of letting our guard down. I figuratively kicked myself the first time I was at the top of the mast in the dark, freeing a horribly twisted spinnaker halyard, and then promised myself I’d not make the same mistake twice the second time I was up the rig cutting the wrapped sail down from the forestay and swinging around in the swell like an idiot.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 10 // Fixing Broken Things
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 10 // Fixing Broken Things

About a week ago I had found a broken screw on deck, and had quizzed the crew at dinner to figure out where it had come from. I knew of course that it had come from the pole track on the front of the mast (it’s never good by the way to find broken screws that have fallen out of the rigging!). At the time we noticed just that one and two others - three, total - that had succumbed to the shearing forces of the sail on the pole. We just repositioned the car higher or lower on the track and figured that’d be fine.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 9 // Time!? You’re Talking Time Man?!
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 9 // Time!? You’re Talking Time Man?!

A whale came to visit on my mom’s birthday, after I had written that tearful post about stargazing early in the morning, before dawn. Later that day the rains came while I was on watch, again alone, and RIGHT next to the boat a 20-30-foot minke whale made his presence known with a puff of air and a glimpse of his dorsal fin. He stayed with me for over an hour, diving and playing under the boat.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 8 // A Pre-Dawn Cry to Celebrate Mom's Birthday
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 8 // A Pre-Dawn Cry to Celebrate Mom's Birthday

My mom would have turned 69 today had she lived. Today marks the second birthday I’ve celebrated at sea on this trans-Atlantic passage - mine, with Mia’s birthday balls dessert on Jan 25; and mom’s this morning, where on my 0200-0400 early morning watch I shared a quiet cry and contemplated the sea and the stars for two hours by myself in the cockpit, gazing out at the vastness and just being.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 7 // 50 Knots on Gilligan's Island
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 7 // 50 Knots on Gilligan's Island

The weather started getting rough,
The tiny ship was tossed.
If not for the courage of the fearless crew
The MINNOW would be lost! The MINNOW would be lost!

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 6 // Turn the Wind On!
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 6 // Turn the Wind On!

Note: The title - and gist - of this post will come back to haunt me in the next installment…

So much for the January Trades. Shortly after my birthday balls celebration the weather pattern took a turn for the weird. A not-unheard of cutoff low spun up at the tail end of a strong cold front much farther north and began meandering around to our north, just west of the Canary Islands, disrupting the classic easterly tradewind pattern we were so very much enjoying prior. By sunrise on the 25th, the wind had started veering into the SE, then S, and getting lighter...we dropped the spinnaker that evening as the apparent wind moved forward, and have been fighting for every mile since.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 5 // Birthday's at Sea
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 5 // Birthday's at Sea

In the days before accurate longitude at sea, trans-Atlantic skippers followed the by now cliched “sail south until the butter melts, then turn right.” Once the New World was discovered, and in turn mapped, sailors knew where the different islands in the West Indies lay, north-south anyway. They’d have known the Virgin Islands were about 18º30’ N, for example. Or that Nelson’s base on the south coast of Antigua was at exactly 17º N. They’d have known too, with a good trade wind blowing, roughly how many days after the butter melted it would take to get there. But they wouldn’t have known exactly.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 4 // Roll the ol' Chariot Along
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 4 // Roll the ol' Chariot Along

We’ll roll the ol’ chariot along
We’ll roll the ol’ chariot along
We’ll roll the ol’ chariot along
And we’ll all hang on behind.

ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 3 // Rut or Groove?
ISBJORN Trans-Atlantic p. 3 // Rut or Groove?

NOTE from Andy, Feb 14, 2019: I’m hesitant to publish this, for risk of it being too personal, causing too much interference with the public persona I’ve created about myself and of the business. But you know what - f&%k it. If I don’t publish this, anything I do publish would just feel like propaganda. Yes, there are certain things I’ll never publish - to this day there doesn’t exist an online photo from our wedding, for example, and while I talk all the time about the decision to have kids or not, you can safely bet that if the day comes, you won’t read much about it here. That said, re-reading this now, which I wrote over 3 weeks ago while tired and just getting started on the trans-At…well, as I sit on the new Swan 59 publishing this, all the feelings I describe below are basically gone - I’m STOKED! But, this is how I felt then…here goes.

Earlier Event: May 2
6 // ISBJØRN: Lofoten – Faroe Islands // 700 miles & 14 days // $6,500 // 3 AVAILABLE
Later Event: May 23
7 // ISBJØRN: Faroe Islands – Bergen // 400 miles & 10 days // $5,500 // Waitlist