We have said a wistful goodbye to Madagascar. It will remain one of our favorite, most memorable places, but we had a window and a buddy boat going with us to boot. The weather window was not dangerous, but looked like a couple days of discomfort motoring into wind, plus more motoring overall than we would have liked. But after weeks of watching the weather for crossing the Mozambique Channel, we knew this was likely as good as we could hope for. Plus, if we stayed, we would be waiting for at least another week before we could leave.

The forecast held and we did just as much motoring into the wind as was promised. At times we struggled to maintain 3 knots as foul current and wind did a number on our SOG. But the winds also died as promised, allowing us to motor in flat water for much of the actual channel crossing. We even sailed about 36 hours more than we expected thanks to our hero, the Code Zero, which had us sailing around 6.5 knots in 10-12 knots of wind for almost an entire day. Unfortunately, the swirling currents of the channel never seemed the go much in our favor.

After seven days—which felt much longer with an average speed of 5.8 knots—we arrived. In Mozambique. We’re still—frustratingly—two and a half days away from our intended destination of Richard’s Bay, South Africa. We had to bail out to one of the “safe” anchorages along the way when an encroaching southerly blew up. We arrived and anchored about 24 hours before the weather swept in. We had just enough time to get ashore to the cruiser-friendly resort (above) that we were anchored in front of, to let the kids run on the beach while the tired parents gratefully indulged in cold beer and excellent pizza. By mid-morning the next day, rain was pouring and the winds were howling, with bands of steady wind in the low 30s and gusts to almost 40.

It got especially interesting at the change of the tide, when the wind went against the outgoing tide, creating steep choppy waves hitting the boat, which was pinned beam-to. All four boats in the anchorage were moving in different directions, in ways we had never seen boats behave at anchor. We timed our runs to shore for a few hours each day when the wind and tide were the same direction and the water smoothed out.

The weather in the Mozambique Channel getting to South Africa is no joke and we’re learning—again—that we need to be patient. It’s certainly hard to do when you’re already three weeks behind your intended schedule and tantalizingly close to where you want to get. We’re now eyeing a brief window that would have us leaving in leftover swell that is rougher than we would like, but forecast to smooth out about 12 hours into the passage south. This would get us into Richard’s Bay about 12-16 hours before another big southerly is due to blow up.

We would have one other safe bailout on the way, about 24 hours from here if the forecast evolves in a way we don’t like. Our other option is wait here a week and see if another window opens up. We’ve gotten pretty good at waiting for weather windows over the last three years, but these passages to Africa are shaping up to be our most difficult for planning and waiting so far. We’re certainly looking forward to getting past Cape Town and back into downwind sailing across the Atlantic. We hope! If you’d like to follow our progress, you can at saillogger.com/svatlas.