Itinerary

Velvet Moon was built in South Africa in 2010, at the meeting point of three Oceans. Her owners, Peter and Karen Moffat imagined the comfortable and well-equipped boat that can sail across every sea. Since then, the call of big blue water was part of her story. She sailed the South and North Atlantic back and forth to the Mediterranean. Since 2011 she has been cruising Eastern Med and Adriatic seas.

In 2013, the time had come to draw a new long line on the map, with the final waypoint in Japan, where she was happy to sail, fulfilling her owner’s dream. We sailed the Moon until the Pacific coast of Costa Rica, flavoring all the remarkable spots on the way, alone or with people that took part in knitting the story about this beautiful voyage of 10 000 miles that lasted for about 18 months.

We started in May 2013 in the Adriatic Sea as a warming up. Then we moved south to Greece and cruised first Ionian and then the exiting Aegean Sea in mid summer. From there we steered mostly to the west, with Sicily and Aeolian islands at the spectacular entrance to the western Med. Late summer culminated around Sardinia and Corsica united in their uniqueness. Balearics came as a perfect spice to the tasty season in the Med.

Continuing to the west, in Gibraltar, Velvet Moon said good buy to the Continent for a while. From that point she hopped from one island to another. Canaries were inevitable, not only to shorten the Atlantic crossing, but also as a breath taking cruising ground, famous for the whale watching and mild climate. Same stands for Morocco and Cabo Verde as tiny bites of Africa on our way.

Best time to cross the Atlantic was the first half of December. The trade winds brought us in 13 days to the endless summer of the Caribbean where Christmas and New Year’s holidays had a totally different dimension.

We cruised the different parts of Caribbean from January until June 2014 always trying to reach the variety of every region.

After a short period around the ABC islands, the North of Colombia and San Blas, we stopped in Colon for a couple of weeks, then passed through the Panama Canal in June to join the Pacific coast, cruising the gorgeous Panama islands until Golfito in Costa Rica, the country that we fell in love with at first sight. There we put Velvet Moon on the cargo ship that sailed her until Yokohama in Japan. During that time we were on holidays and joined her in the begining of September, for a couple of months cruising and chartering in Tokyo bay and its surroundings.