Illegal Boat People

~ stull61 ~ 2 Comments

Our trip back from Australia was via Dubai and Rome flight, followed by a 3 hour bus ride to Pescara, where Adrian and Anita had left the boat with Steffi’s assistance.

We spent the night at Steffi’s recovering and catching up. Next morning it was down to the boat for an engine service, which took most of the morning.

Brad and Bec arrived by train from Bari at lunchtime, and after a large shop, it was off to Steffi’s to enjoy a swim and a relax before we did the restaurant on the beach night, the last of the season.

Next day, we took Steffi, Adriano and Sarah for a sail along the coast to one of the bays they often went to. Unfortunately it wasn’t a very nice day, with a bit of a swell running, and some dirty water being washed down from Venice, so we didn’t swim much. Still it was nice to be back on board La Mischief putting her through her paces, and it allowed Brad and Bec to get acquainted with La Mischief before we headed off to Croatia.

And next morning we were off, 115nm straight across the Adriatic to Vis Island. We left just before 6am and got great winds. We put up the geneker and took off. By lunchtime, the wind increased to 24 knots and down came the geneker. We needed a reef shortly after but we were going along at 7s ad 8s on flat seas. And we needed to as we wanted to get there before it was completely dark.

We passed the first of Croatia’s islands before sunset and closed in on Vis town as the sun set. We had just enough light to navigate into the harbour and pick up mooring.

By then it was 9pm and we presumed everything would be shut and we would need to wait until the morning to check in. So we stayed put on the boat – the lure of the water front bars would have to wait.

We had a leisurely morning, not wanting to go in too early and find things shut. So we went in t 9.30am and after a bit of a hunt around we eventually found the harbour master at the back of a building up two flights of stairs. We congratulated ourselves for not attempting that the night before as we would have never found it.

We filled in a new vignette listing the crew details and showed them our cruising permit. Then it was off to find the police station. It was equally as hard to find and after asking several people we found their office – no sign except for a note on the door saying to ring 192 if it was unattended.

We went inside and saw the nice looking police woman, who took our passports and then proceeded to tell us we had a problem. It seems we should have checked in with the police as soon as we got to Croatia.

Not sure what the problem was but the cell just around the corner made me hope it wasn’t a big problem.

We were then told to wait outside, which we did. We waited and drank coffee and waited some more. Then she appeared and locked the police station and disappeared somewhere. We waited some more. Then she came back and went in side. We waited some more. Then she asked me (and not the others) back inside.

She explained that I had to pay a fine of 1000 kuna (A$200) but if I paid it straight away it would reduce to 667 kuna plus 100 kuna tax. This was evidently a new rule brought in 2 months ago and I was the first person to be fined in Vis. Great. I had a go at pleading my case but she just kept saying I should have come in and found the police station and rung the number on the door. Yeah right.

Anyway, I paid the fine at the Post Office and then had to take the receipt round to another police station. We decided to head there by dingy but were quickly intercepted by the police boat who were very keen to see we had paid our fine and add to their revenue raising initiative. We gave them our receipt and all was good.

Now that we weren’t illegal boat people, it was time to celebrate our new-found freedom.

For photos of Vis see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10200268972839891.1073741868.1620379103&type=1&l=e930ae623d

1000nm is Not That Far if you say it quickly.

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

The EU welcomes yachties from all over the world, provided that they only stay 90 days every 6 months. Great!!! Other that Gibraltar and Morocco, I’d been in the EU since arriving in France on the 17th March so now it was time to leave.

Although Croatia has just joined the EU, it still wasn’t hooked into the Schengen immigration zone, which is the thing, so therefore Croatia is okay for the moment. So Croatia it is, 983nm away as the crow sails.

Our route took us down the bottom of Sardinia, across the top of Sicily, through the Messina Straits, around the bottom of Italy’s foot, and up the Adriatic Sea to Dubrovnick. I had a place to catch on the 9th August and we left at 5pm on the 31st August.

My super smart GPS had us arriving in Dubrovnick on the 7th August if we sailed straight through at an average speed of 6 kts so we had a day to effectively spare. Nothing like a bit of pressure.

The first couple of days and nights we ran 3 hour watches, with myself in a consultancy role, checking at the start and end of each watch and generally being available on a break glass if needed approach. After that I started to miss my night watches and we started rotating through four 2 hour watches.

It took us nearly 48 hours to cover the 290nm to Sardinia and we spent all our time motoring into a fairly light wind. Occasionally we would head off and get a decent enough angle to pull out all the genoa, but not often.

On the way to Sicily, we were entertained by dolphins and whales. Usually around 6pm, the dolphins would head over and play between our bows for 30 minutes or so. We even got to pull out our Geneker and sail for a couple of hours.

Sitting here at 5.30am in the morning on watch, the temperature is 27 degrees. Balmy nights and warm days.

We got to Sicily at midday on day 4, and halfway along the island, we celebrated our half way point. We passed inside some impressive looking islands as we motored along the coast. It would have been nice to stop and have a quick swim but we were racing to get to the Messina Straits to catch the tide through (4 and a half hours after Gibraltar HT according to guide book), so there was no time to dilly daly.

We made the straits just after dark and kept to starboard of the designated shipping lanes. Watched a passenger liner slip in front of us at 15kts.

The straits are narrow – really, really narrow. 1.6nm narrow at a couple of spots. As well as the ships going up and down, we had a constant stream of ferries crossing back and forth from the mainland to Sicily and back. Thank god for AIS.

We eventually made it through all the traffic and popped out the other side as the straits began to widen. And then the wind started to lift from the 10 knots we had entering the straits.

I’d been sleeping and the crew woke me as we needed a reef – two actually. This was more like the winds in the Strait we had read about. Still sleepy we turned into the wind and started to put in a couple of reefs. Normally reefing is easily on La Mischief, but still half a sleep I managed to balls it up and ended up snapping a lazy jack. Bugger.
Without the lazy jack in place the bottom of the sail spilled out and we ended up dropping it completely and lashing it to the boom.

Next morning, we assessed the damage and lifted the main sail to its full height without any reefs – this being the only configuration that we could manage without lazy jacks. The next day was spent motoring along the bottom of Italy’s foot in light winds.

We hadn’t been able to do a lot of sailing, with the motoring being on pretty much all of the time. With a broken lazy jack and running a bit low on fuel we decided we would pull into Italy to refuel.

We picked out Santa Maria di Leuca, right on the cape. We arrived there early in the morning and Adrian went up the mast to fix the broken lazy jack. Then we took on enough fuel to make it to Croatia as fuel is a lot cheaper in Croatia than Italy.

Then it was into the Adriatic. We had a bit more luck with the winds as we just had enough angle to motor sail north. Next morning we sailed past Montenegro and into Dubrovnik, just over 1000nm from Palma. It had taken us just under 8 days and I think we had the motors off for less than 12 hours during that time.

We decided that we would stop in Kavtat, as this was quite close to both the airport and Dubrovnik and looked nice, easy to enter and quite protected. We got there at about 11am and pulled into the Q jetty. Adrian backed in and asked how much insurance cover I had as he went stern to beside a beautiful 150 foot yacht – I told him it didn’t matter how much I had given how expensive the boat next to us was.

Checking into Croatia involves taking a crew list along to the harbour master and getting a cruising permit for the boat (1765 kuna = A$335) – valid for a year) and visitors tax (720 kuna). Even though Croatia has just jointed the EU, they are still keeping their own currency – must be a good thing given the problems Greece etc are having. Next stop was the police who stamped us in and then we were done.

Leaving the Q jetty, we went and picked up a mooring right next to another Australian cat. The Croatians are mad keen on water polo and that night, we found a water polo game going on in an outdoor pool not much more than 50m from our mooring. We dingyed in and watched a bit before having a farewell meal with Roger who was flying out the next morning.

Next day, we dingyed in and said our goodbyes to Roger before heading off on a ferry to Dubrovnik. We could have caught the bus but some Poms we met the night before said we should definitely go to Dubrovnik by boat and they were right – it was so the right way to go to this very impressive city.

But before any sightseeing could be done, we needed to find a replacement impeller for our genset,which we eventually did out at the ACI marina the other side of town. Then it was back to town where we did the walk around the city wall that goes right the way round this magnificent old city. I’m sorry Sevilla, but I think I’ve just got a new favourite European city. The walk took a good couple of hours as we savoured both the city and the seascape from multiple brilliant view points. It was very hot and a bar half way round that sold fresh orange juice was a welcome pit stop.

Back at the boat it was time to pack, ready to head back to Perth for Cas’ 50th.

For photos of Dubrovnik and Kavtat see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10200112301283200.1073741865.1620379103&type=1&l=e143951a3e

Haulout Checklist

~ stull61 ~ 2 Comments

With summer officially over at the end of this month, its time to start thinking of putting La Mischief to bed over the Mediterranean winter. I will do this out of the EU in Turkey but haven’t decided exactly where as yet.

I’ve just come across a good checklist at http://www.nannycay.com/news/2013/6/28/nanny-cay-boatyard-a-checklist-for-boat-storage.html. I’ll use it for a basis for my own checklist. Here’s a cut and paste with some mods and additions to get me started….

• Prior to haul out, thoroughly flush all heads and ensure holdings tanks are empty and flushed through.

• Clean and dry bilges as much as possible.

• Fill water tanks, treat with chlorine and close off valves.

• Fill and treat diesel tanks.

• Check engine oil and water, top up if required.

• Wash and spray engine with CRC.

• Spray all hose clamps with CRC anti-corrosion wax.

• Check battery levels, clean terminals and grease with Vaseline.

• Spray behind the electrical panel with CRC.

• Remove bimini and frame if possible and stow.

• Remove all main sail battens and then remove all sails and stow. Take down Genoa in water as its far safer to do it there than up on the hard.

• Run mouse lines and remove all lines and stow

• Tie boom down to deck.

• Remove cockpit cushions and all other loose deck gear and stow.

• Check boat for oily rags, old paint and solvent tins, lighter fluid etc. and dispose of.

• Secure and lock all lockers.

• Remove batteries from hand held equipment.

• Remove all foodstuff including spices, packaged soups, cereals and tins etc.

• Treat interior cupboards and areas with Cockroach and pest deterrents. (Max Force or Combat Roach Control).

• Close curtains.

• Vacuum pack clothes and linen.

• Buy de-humidifier and turn on.

• Lift interior cushions to allow good air circulation.

• When in yard, remove and stow fenders and dock lines.

• Tidy and secure all loose lines and remove flags.

• Ensure solar panels are charging.

• Fit instrument covers.

• Close all seacocks????.

• Ensure cockpit drains a are clear.

• Turn off all battery switches.

• Turn off propane bottles and disconnect.

• Ensure all hatches and ports are securely locked.

• Spray door lock and padlocks with CRC.

• Ensure lifeline gate is closed and secured.

Another useful website is http://www.livingaboard.net/tag/haul-out.

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Thank you for your response. ✨

Mallorca – Part 3

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

The sail back from Menorca was great – just enough wind from the right direction to put up our geneker. For the first time since Cas was on board, we had the wind coming from a decent angle (and just enough of it as well). We were heading back to our favourite beach at Playa del Trench for two more nights. It was a long 60nm sail back, down to the bottom of Mallorca in a bit of swell, which stopped when we rounded the cape and the last 10nm to the beach was exquisite with the wind behind us on flat seas doing over 7kts.

The beach was as we left it – one of the best ones we’ve ever been to. Kevin and Di, who I met in Morocco and then again in Gibraltar were also there, and it was good to catch up with them again and have drinks and dinner at one of the two beach bars.

The next day was Saturday and we watched as the bay slowly filled up with boats, with each available piece of space being taken up by boats of all shapes and sizes. We had one of those idyllic days lazing around – anchored in 2m of water just off the swim markers; thinking we would start our boat cleaning chores the next day whilst anchored at this idyllic spot.

The weather report looked fairly benign, winds 6-9kts, light but coming from the SW which did put us on a lee shore – but with the winds light it should be fine. And nobody else seemed to be too worried as a lot of boats stayed for the night – being a Saturday night.

By early morning things were starting to get a bit rocky and rolly. The dingy was down and was chained to the boat. I got up at 6am and lengthened the painter and removed the chain, using the anchor rode as a safety to stop the dingy banging against the back of La Mischief.

By 7.30am things seemed a bit hectic and i got up to see waves breaking either side of La Mischief. I suggested Cas get up as well and we looked around to see one mono beached just up from us; and another six either beached, or on the rocks off in the distance. As we contemplated our next move, we watched the dingy on the monohull, closer into shore than us, detach itself and drift in the surf towards the beach. Later, Cas saw the guy surf his way to the beach and then row it back – thats quite some feat.

My party trick involved getting on the dingy (with a safety harness on) and lifting it onto the davits. That was fun as the waves came through. Then it was time to get our trusty anchor up and get out of there. I took one look at Cas and decided i’d better go up the front and leave her at the engine controls. Waves were pushing us everywhere and we got ourselves into a bit of a tangle as I asked Cas to apply more power to an engine, when it turned out she had more than enough on. This caused the chain to bend the anchor roller and jump off. Time to take a breath and get things organised. I managed to straighten La Mischief up and get the chain back onto the roller that was still semi-functioning. Then I took the controls and Cas sat up front and things worked a lot better.

Anchor up and we started the long 25nm pound straight into the 25kt wind back to Palma. We picked out one or two places that would provide us some shelter and off we went. We got to Las IIlettes and decided it would do. There was a dingy dock over at a small yacht club just up from Puerto Portals, about half a mile away and from there we could get into Palma.

Which we did and Palma did not disappoint. What a beautiful city, dominated by a huge cathedral, which was started way back in 1230AD. Behind the cathedral is the old city, with its delightful lane-ways, with great shopping and bars and restaurants.

We could have lingered there a lot longer than we did but we had boat chores to do.. The chanderly at Real Club Nautico de Palma was brilliant and we picked up a few things – trip line for the anchor, an anchor ball and a two-man inflatable kayak (which we’d decided on rather than a second stand up paddleboard that was our original intention). Then we had to find some electronic charts for the rest of the Med as our Platinum ones did not extend beyond Spain. I decided on the Gold ones as a single one covered the whole of the Med pretty much. The nice Swiss lady at the chanderly gave us directions to a marine electronics business, which had them and was 15 minutes away by foot.

Jobs done, it was back to the boat to do some cleaning and await the arrival of both Adrian and Anita together with the delivery of our new kayak. Adrian and Anita caught the bus from the airport and we met at the very swanky marina at Puerto Portals, where all the shops struggle to sell anything under 1000 euros.

After introducing them to La Mischief, we all went into Illettas Beach for some cocktails at a beach bar followed by some paella at one of the restaurants. Not a bad intro to Spain.

Next morning, before sunrise I dingied Cas into shore, so she could catch her plane home. Then it was food shopping time and repair the anchor roller time. After a few enquiries, I found a good stainless steel company out in the industrial area and now the anchor roller is as good as new.

Next morning, we had a bit of time before Roger turned up; so after going round to Palma harbour to fill our diesel tanks to the brim, we anchored to the east of the harbour, near a neat cafe with a breakwater, which we could tie the dingy to. From here we went into Palma and showed Anita and Adrian around,as well as doing some last minute shopping as we wouldn’t be stopping for the next 7 days straight.

Shopping done and back at the cafe sitting down with a beer, we noticed some kids in our dingy trying to start it. They weren’t getting too far without the key and it was locked to a ring on the breakwater, but even so, stern words were required. They turned out to be just a couple of naughty kids, and once I sorted them out, I offered to take about 10 of them for a dingy ride, whilst we were waiting for Roger. Its always good to do a bit of community relations.

A short time later Roger arrived and a very short time after that, we were off, heading towards Croatia 1000nm away.

For pictures of Mallorca, see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4861729794017.1073741860.1620379103&type=1&l=1c46223673

Cala Heaven

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

Leaving Mallorca, we motored the first bit in pretty calm water and then even managed a bit of a sail as we neared Menorca, the most easterly of the Balearics. It’s a lot smaller than Mallorca being only 26 miles long and 11 miles wide.

The south coast of Menorca is one cala after another. We played pin the tail on the donkey and headed for the double cala of Cala Macarella and Cala Macarelleta. Unfortunately, being early afternoon on a Saturday, there were lots of other participants and no room to swing a cat (haha).

After that, we headed East and engaged in a bit of Cala hopping, going a half mile or so each time from Cala to Cala checking them all out. As we got to Cala Trebalujer, a couple of boats pulled anchor and left so we were able to slot nicely into their spot. And here we stayed for a couple of nights. It was simply stunning, surrounded by high limestone cliffs with what we imagined to be pirate caves from the days of Barbarossa, the famous Turkish pirate of the 15th century that frequented these parts.

As well as the usual swimming, sunbaking and paddleboarding, I also took the paddle board up a small freshwater river that flowed a mile upstream with heaps of fish and bird life. We also took the dingy exploring and checked out the caves and a few of the other calas.

Our next stop (read cala) was Cala Santa Galdana. We left about 10am so we could catch the gap in the traffic when everybody left their anchorage but had yet to drop anchor at their new one. That strategy seemed to work pretty well.

Whereas the previous cala was pure wilderness, this cala had a couple of whopping big hotels just back from the beach, together with shops and restaurants. Despite this, it was still a very pretty anchorage and we enjoyed our stay there. We ran into a Pom who had been coming to the same hotel here for the last 16 years for 2-3 weeks a year. He even left a small inflatable here to go fishing on.

After our days of Cala’ing we decided it was time to hit the big smoke and check out one of the two major towns on the island. So west we went towards Ciudadela, which used to be the old capital until the British moved it to Mahon, when they occupied the island for most of the 18th century.

In order to see Ciudadela, we needed a parking spot and we checked out a few, none of which were all that ideal, if you don’t want to pay up and stay in the town’s marina.

In the end we decided we would park in Cala Santandria, and by park I mean drop anchor in the middle of the narrow cala and then dingy a rope to shore to keep us swinging onto the boats either side of us, that had done likewise. Sort of Med mooring – without the use of a boarding ladder.

Cas had done a great job picking an anchoring spot, because when i snorkelled over to check the anchor, there was a nasty looking bit of metal/rope right next to the anchor, which would have snagged it big time if we had dropped the anchor there. Time to buy a trip line, given all the junk that is on the bottom of the med.

The Dingy was soon down and it was off into town. We decided a walk was in order and 40 minutes later we were there. The town was quite picturesque with narrow walkways and impressive buildings, with lots of shops to browse in – some built into caves in the rock walls – now that was cool.

The waterfront was particularly impressive and we enjoyed a great seafood lunch. It was getting pretty hot by that stage, so we worked out the local bus system and caught one back to the boat.

Our final two days on Menorca were spent in Cala Macarella, the one that was full when we first got there. The water was once again clear but the beach was sea-weedy with a lot of rubbish washed up and not cleared away. So the boat was definitely the place to be.

The beaches in most of the popular calas had yellow buoys denoting the swimming/no boating zone and I managed to get myself told off by the local life guard for stand up paddleboarding in the no boating area. Well there you go.

With our time running out, it was time to say goodbye to Menorca and head back towards Palma de Mallorca to be closer to the airport for crew handover. We hardly scratched the surface of this island, some say the north coast is the best and we never even made it anywhere near there.

Definitely needs some more time on the way out of the Med.

For photos of Menorca see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4932339959227.1073741861.1620379103&type=1&l=261ce680b6

Mallorca Part 2

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

Safely back in Palma, we hopped in a cab and headed for Carreforre to stock up on some groceries, and Vodaphone to stock up on some internet credit.

Then it was back to La Mischief at La Rapida marina. Once we packed away the shopping, we left our last marina until La Mischief gets to Pescara in mid-August; and headed off a whole two and a half nautical miles to our favorite beach at Playa del Trench.

And there we stayed for three nights, swimming in the crystal clear water (29 degrees) over a beautiful sandy bottom. Occasionally we’d swim into the beach and back again. Or take the dingy in and go for a walk along the long beach, checking out all the nudists that came in all shapes and sizes, guessing which one were defying gravity via a previous visit to the plastic surgeon.

But all good things must come to an end and we eventually pulled anchor – although we could have quite easily spent the whole remaining two weeks there. We placated ourselves by penciling a couple of further nights at Playa Del Trench on the way back to Palma.

So off we went, right into the wind as seems to be our way. Even when we went round the Cape at the SE of Mallorca, it seemed to bend and still be in our face. We tried a few calas on our way but they were all either pretty well crowded out or pretty exposed. In the end we headed for Porto Colom and anchored in weed and sand off Sa Panta at a nice beach amongst 10 other yachts and boats.

After a run of 25nm, Porto Colom turned out to be a very pleasant fishing harbour, well sheltered on three sides, with a maze of mooring buoys and a smallish marina. We spend a couple of nights there, checking out the town, having a nice seafood lunch on the wharf and doing some clothes and shoe shopping. Returning to the boat we discovered a couple of fellow Australians and invited them over for a drink on La Mischief. Then a German guy swam up, so on he came; followed by a topless french girl and her boyfriend. At this point the G&Ts and champagne was flowing pretty damn well. As it began to get dark, the swimmers left and we hopped in A Little Bit of Mischief and headed to town. Here we found a bar with a singer and a guitarist and proceeded to dance to all hours of the morning. We ran into some crew off a chartered Lagoon 620, who told us the going rate for a weeks charter was 24,000 euro. Mind you a night in Ibiza marina costs them 1,500 euro.

Next morning, after a swim and a paddle board, we headed north once more and did a bit of Cala hopping. We finally found one called Cala Barcas that had space and dropped anchor in 2m of crystal clear water. We swam and relaxed the afternoon away.

But it was not a place to stay overnight as the swell was rolling in as the wind started to build a bit from the East, straight into the cala.

So it was off to Porto Cisto, where we anchored right behind Paradise and went and had a drink with Paul and Ness, before hitting town for a lovely meal overlooking the marina. It wasn’t the greatest anchorage in the world, as it was off to the side of the narrow channel with swell rolling in from the sea, and wake from the ferries as they passed close by.

Next day we headed further up the coast looking for a suitable cala to stay the night and get out of the swell that was building. We thought the anchorage just outside the marina at Radjada looked promising, but on closer inspection it turned out not to be the case. So we kept pressing northward, having identified Cala Molto as a possibility.

We got to Cala Motho quite late at about 7pm and it turned out to be pretty good. There were three other Lagoon Catamarans and a couple of monos already there already but there was plenty of room sheltered by a nice natural breakwater that we could tuck behind and anchor over beautiful clear sand. A great find in the end.

Next day it was up early and off towards Menorca, 20nm away.

For photos of Mallorca see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4861729794017.1073741860.1620379103&type=1&l=1c46223673

Off to Italy (By Plane)

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

After leaving the boat in La Rapida Marina, and saying goodbye to Jamie, Lucy and Nick who were staying on for an extra day, it was off to Palma airport for a slightly different European adventure.

The first surprise was Palma airport itself – it was huge. Half of Europe seems to descend here for holiday season. We got there in plenty of time to catch our 29 euro Ryan Air flight to Girona, which is an hour out of Barcelona. We’d bought Ryan Air flights from Girona to Pescara much earlier when we thought we’d be near Barcelona, so we just got flights to the same airport from Palma.

What we didn’t realise was that Ryan Air have this thing about their on time arrival record, and to keep their record intact they close the gates a good 30 minutes before the flight leaves. Being in the dark, we were the very last ones to get to the gate as it closed and we were in the air 15 minutes before the scheduled flight time.

Other than that we found Ryan Air to be pretty good and were highly amused when they got to Girona on time and played the horse racing tune you here all the time when placings are confirmed. Then everyone on board clapped. Hilarious.

Cas’ research on google suggested that it was a petty that lots of people flew into Girona without actually visiting the city itself. We thought about going to the coast but in the end we’d done a lot of coast and an inland city sounded like a pleasant change.

So Girona it was and we weren’t disappointed. We had two nights – one on the way to Pescara and one coming from Pescara. The old town is quite beautiful, with its narrow streets and outer wall overlooking rolling green hills.

The politics of the place was equally as interesting. There were Catalonian flags everywhere, with big posters proclaiming Catalonia as the new European State. There was not a Spanish flag to be seen. We chatted with one of the waiters at the restaurant we ate at and he made it clear that everybody around these here parts thoughts they’d be better off without Spain. Especially with the European financial crisis as their take on it was that they made all the money and funded Madrid. Now, where have I heard that one before???

The next morning, we hoped onto Ryan Air once again and headed off to Pescara. 2 hours later, we were collecting our bags and being greeted by Stefi and Min – Cas’ two partners in crime, going back 25 years ago when they gathered on a beach in Pescara.

Steffi and her husband, Adriano have a beautiful house and land in the hills overlooking Pescara, where they grown their own produce and make their own wine, and rarely have I encountered better hosts. Cas and I stayed 1200m down the road at a cute little guest house that Steffi had arranged for us – but most of the time we were up at the house or out and about with Steffi and Adriano. Min and Matt and their kids stayed at the house.

We had a whirlwind few days sampling some great restaurants, hanging out at Steffi and Adriano’s house, eating beautiful food and drinking wine and beer, swimming in the pool and spa, visiting the (private) beach, and doing a bit of shopping. And listening to the First Test on the internet. The highlight for me was undoubtedly the dinner we had on the beach, where the beach gets transformed at night with carpet laid down and tables coming out to seat 2000 very well dressed Italians for a beautiful meal under the stars, with the sea lapping on the beach just a few metres away.

It was good to see the three girls reunited and it will be good to get back to Pescara on La Mischief in late August and hopefully take Steffi sailing to Croatia which is only 60nm away. It made saying goodbye much easier knowing we would catch up in a month or so.

Back on Ryan Air, we jetted off back to Girona and this time we picked a hotel right in the old city. We had another nice night there, albeit Sunday when everything was shut, and headed off to the airport at 10am in the morning.

What I should have said was headed off to the airport with the passports at 10am. But I didn’t because it would not be a true thing to write!!!! We made it all the way into the actual airport before it dawned on us that the passports were still in the safe at the hotel. Ooooops!!! Into another taxi and back into town – 20 minutes away. A phone call to the hotel ensured the passports were waiting at reception. Another phone call to the local city council would have been good saying please don’t sweep the narrow laneway in front of the hotel until after we’ve left. And please don’t get someone on foot to sweep in front of the street sweeper with a broom to really slow things down. Three corners later, after what seemed an eternity, the taxi driver and myself stopped swearing at the slow-moving sweeper as we got on the main drag.

Meanwhile, Cas was at the airport doing what all good girls do in a crisis – shop. One handbag later – and hopefully no speeding tickets for my very helpful taxi driver – we managed to check in with minutes to spare and made our plane back to Palma.

For photos of Girona see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4932344999353.1073741862.1620379103&type=1&l=56e932df38

For photos of Pescara see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4932346719396.1073741863.1620379103&type=1&l=e177bd34be

Mallorca – Part 1

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

After a dingy ride into shore to look around, we left San Vincente
and pointed La Mischief at the SW corner of Mallorca, 50 nm away. After motoring for a while, the wind picked up and we had just enough angle to sail most of the way. We were doing 6-7knots but this wasnt fast enough to shake off a new beneteau sense 55 that gradually caught and past us, close enough to shout across to one another.

We picked out a bay called Palma Nova, which was reasonably close to Palma as we needed to pick up Jamie and Lucy and their son, Nick the next morning.

Anchoring was tricky as we got there after 6 and the sun was too low to pick out a sandy patch in about 5 metres. As it turned out there were no sandy patches, but the 25kg Rocna held firm in the weed. Finding it to be an excellent anchor, when combined with the 100m of 10mm chain.

We parked up next to some more Australians and once again had them over for drinks and nibbles and never made it into town.

Not that town was anything to write home about. It was another Little Britain (but without a hint of the authenticity of Gibraltar) – the only spanish word we could spot was Paella and the restaurants ranged from Burger King to very average English Pub fare. And the beach was very average.

Having successfully picked up the Rankin clan (sans Georgia who was busily preparing to win a world championship gold medal in Slovakia), we headed off to Santa Ponsa on the west coast, said to be one of the most picturesque harbours on the island.

Along the way we past the massive super yacht marina, Port Adriano, where we found out later the Maltese Falcon was berthed. Would have been worth calling in the see.

Then we spied a water bomber doing some training by landing on the sea and scooping up massive amounts of seawater then taking off and randomly dumping it somewhere. The seabirds loved it. At one stage it did a scoop and go run right between us and another yacht.

Santa Ponsa is a beautiful but narrow anchorage, and there must have been 40 boats anchored up. It took us a couple of goes to find a spot. After a swim and a beer, we dropped “A Little Bit of Mischief” in the water and went off for an explore. The town was quite touristy, with big hotels over the other side of the bay, and a row of restaurants out the front. Lucy was fascinated by the live fish foot massage but didn’t partake.

We found a nice restaurant on a hill overlooking the anchorage
And celebrated catching up with Jamie, Lucy and Nick.

Next morning, after a swim, and a visit to the free wi-fi, we headed off past Palma and towards Playa del Trench on the south coast. This beach is the longest and quite possibly the finest in Mallorca. Miles and miles of clear sand.

After a day of trying to sail, with intermittent small successes, we arrived about 4pm and found a nice anchorage in 3m of water, adjacent one of the two beach bars. After seeing all the development, it was nice to anchor off somewhere with no development, excepting the somewhat obligatory beach bars.

This beach is fantastic, calm water and lovely clear blue water over sand that looks close enough you could stand on it.

Whilst nick took off on the stand up board Jamie and I swam to shore to check out the two bars. Unusually for spain, one closed at 8pm (when the beach started to thin out), the other not too bad at 10pm.

Reporting back at the boat, we decided on a round of cocktails at the first and dinner at the latter closing one. Another nice meal with the Rankins.

Next morning it was up early (ish) and off to the marina 2nm back towards Palma at La Rapida. Cas and her girlfriends were having a 25 year reunion/birthday celebration at Pescara and we were travelling Ryan Airlines via Girona to join the celebrations.

It took us a million phonecalls and emails to find a reasonably priced marina to leave La Mischief for the 5 days we would be away, and La Rapida quoted us €119 a night, whereas most others were €155 a night and upwards. The Balearics are expensive in high season. In the end they only charged us €89 a night so we really ended up with a bargain.

And we ended up berthing alongside, rather than Med Mooring so we were more than happy. We said our goodbyes to Jamie, Lucy and Nick (who were staying on board for a few more days) and headed to the airport, on our way to Italy.

For our photos of Mallorca see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4861729794017.1073741860.1620379103&type=1&l=89fdc4ab37

IBIZA – This could be interesting!!!

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

With La Mischief ready and waiting, it was time for Cas and I to go sailing together. Having successfully extradited ourselves from our Med Mooring, it was time to backtrack 50nm south to Capo de Nao, the nearest point on the mainland to ibiza.

The wind was on the nose and steadily built to 30kts so it was a pretty unpleasant motor sail. But we made it for cocktail hour and successfully managed to hail over dom pepito (see previous blog) for a cocktail or 4.

Next day, we pointed our nose out to sea and headed for ibiza, not knowing what to expect. We had visions of music blaring out of every bay with lots of drunken teenage english pursuing a hedonistic holiday experience.

After yesterday, we thought we would geta good wind angle, but once again it was on the nose, albeit very light. We made it to Cala Badella at about 3pm only to find it pretty well full of moorings and boats of all sizes.

So we headed a short way north to cala tarida, which is described in the RCC Pilot Guide as a long bay with sandy beaches – perfect. And perfect it was!!!

We weren’t there long when we got asked to move as we were a little close to a submarine cable, but once settled we stayed for a few days. Far from the hedonistic partying teenagers, we found a bay full of families, with a huge kids club at the resort in the bay. We found a few nice cocktail bars and a nice restaurant to celebrate our arrival in the balearics.

After a thoroughly relaxing few days, we dragged ourselves away from the clear blue water over a perfectly sandy bottom and headed over to formentia to find another anchorage with clear blue water over a perfectly sandy bottom.

Our original plan was to anchor up off Isla Espalmador, which is the picture on the cruising guide. Unfortunately looks can be deceiving and it was full of moorings with very little nice anchoring. So we quickly left and anchored off the top of formentia. We dropped the dingy and went exploring and went in search of the perfect skin by finding the mud baths that we had been told about.

Boy – the things I do to maintain my Adonis – the mud was really stinky and a bit rough. By we managed to cover ourselves in mud and had the obligatory photo taken, so I could be ridiculed by my friends suggesting I looked like a grey smurf. Some young people asked us to take their photo also – a young naked guy from Madrid and his six female friends, all in various stages of undress – you’ve got to fancy his chances.

Back on the boat, we decided we needed to move down the island a bit where it was more sheltered. We ended off in the perfect spot right opposite a narrow spit of beach that stretched across both sides of the island. It was evidently a famous nudist beach in days gone past but now it’s reverted to largely a topless beach, which is pretty well normal for around here.

The bay was full of very big boats as evidently there’s an iconic restaurant on the beach where you can pretty well be assured of spotting someone famous. Cas had a badly bruised toe from a boat injury so we never did make it onto the beach to do any people spotting. However we did lots and lots of swimming in the beautiful clear water, marred occasionally by jellyfish who came in on the breeze and then disappeared as the breeze switched.

We did however make it into the one and only town on the island where all the many ferries go and visited a supermarket. That was a pretty cool spot.

With formentia done it was time to hit some night life and head for old ibiza town.

It was a pleasant short sail across to Cala Tabernera, which is adjacent to the port of ibiza town. The cala gets quite shallow in towards shore and there are a few moorings around but we managed to find a good spot, where we dropped the anchor on a sandy patch amongst the weedy bottom. Not quite as nice swimming as Formentera but not bad none the less. And much cheaper than staying in the marina – it cost a 62 foot Lagoon 620 cat €1500 a night according to its skipper.

We hopped in the dingy and went exploring the shoreline, quickly finding the dingy dock in the north-west corner. From here we headed 5 minutes over to Marina Botafoch, here we caught a ferry across to old ibiza town, otherwise known as Eivissa. Perfect.

Ibiza town is fascinating in so many ways. With its narrow streets and citadel on the hill behind, it is quite pretty.then there is the people – Cas and I loved sitting at an outside bar just watching the people walk by – a combination of incredibly well dressed people interspersed with a whole heap of bizarrely dressed folk.

And the shops. Full of beautiful expensive stuff – Cas would have had so much fun with a spare €1000. As the night progressed, we made our way up a narrow winding street past interesting shops and restaurants, past a whole gay section, with its own mix of shops and bars, and then back to the waterfront, where we stopped again for some expensive cocktails and more people watching. It was getting towards midnight and the people watching was becoming a lot more interesting as people were coming out before they hit the nightclubs that don’t open until midnight, with their €70 entry fees.

Suddenly there was a whole lot of glamorous girls dressed straight out of a Robert Palmer video clip, marching down the street, with banners promoting Space, the trendiest nightclub at the moment judging by all the billboard adverts

People watching over, we headed back to the ferry which was full of interesting people, groups of twenty somethings from all over the world, heading out to a night club near one of the ferry stops. Kids just having fun, not fall down drunk, not obnoxious – nothing like we had imagined.

Next day however we took a bus ride to San Antonio and saw pretty much what we had imagined. Or at least the after effects of the night before. Glad we picked ibiza town to go to rather than San Antonio.

After another interesting bus trip back to ibiza town, we found another cool bar with a 2-4-1 coctail happy hour that went from 6.30 to 10.30pm. We did some more people watching, which quickly restored our faith in ibiza and erased all those san antonio images, whilst we sipped on 1…2….3 cocktails each. As we went to leave, the waiter informed us we still had a free cocktail to go. Ahhh – not that sort of 2-4-1 offer.

So four cocktails later we crawled back to the ferry, with thoughts of continuing on to some salsa dancing. Unfortunately we met these poms from the boat next to us and one drink back on La Mischief before going out dancing didn’t sound like too bad an idea. And besides, Australia was playing the Lions tomorrow, and I thought a night of baiting a couple of Poms would be fun (boy have a learnt my lesson now – going to keep a very low profile when it comes to australian sport – especially when it involves the English).

Well we never did make it dancing and the one drink turned into a lot more. The next day was a write off, but I did well to drag myself to a beach bar with 4 poms to watch the rugby. Mmm. Enough said.

After being thoroughly demoralized and lampooned, it was back to the boat and off up the coast to Cala de san Vincente, which would be our hopping off point to Mallorca.

This Cala proved to be both picturesque and sheltered. The whole bar was one big resort, but a quiet reasonably sedate one, as all the noise at night seemed to come from another bay miles away. Glad we didn’t anchor there.

As we spent our last night on Ibiza, we reflected on what a beautiful and interesting place Ibiza is. Ibiza is certainly not at all what we imagined. A great place to go cruising. We wished we had a bit more time there but we needed to move onto Mallorca.

The water was crystal clear and warm – 28 degrees. And not a shark in sight. Actually it was pretty devoid of any sort of fish life at all. If you could criticise Ibiza for one thing,it was probably that it wasn’t very spanish. Lots of germans and french and english and cetera. But then again its hard to criticize paradise.

For our photos of Ibiza see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4827766144947.1073741859.1620379103&type=1&l=290f76f3d5

Off to Barcelona (and back again !!!)

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

After celebrating Jessica’s and Mario’s maiden 400nm passage by eating paella, washed down with some local wine; it was up early and off to the train station to catch a train to Barcelona in time to pick Cas up off her plane .

It was a simple matter to get off the train and onto the metro and in no time at all I was at the airport. Don’t you wish Perth could do public transport half as well as the cities in Spain?

It was good to see Cas after quite a period apart. It was a long flight, so we hopped Into a cab and headed for our hotel; where we had a great view looking straight at the Sagrada Familia Basilica.

Then it was time to intoduce Cas to a Tapas bar or two, as thisvwas her first time in Spain. There was no need to stray far from the hotel , and as we were sitting at one of the aforementioned establishments, who should walk along the street but Jess and her flatmate. The funny thing was that I thought Jess was In Valencia and Jess thought we were catching a train back to Valencia straight away as well.

Next day, after a bit of a late start, it was off on an open top bus tour of Barcelona. Given Cas’ jetlag, this was a great way to savour a quick overview of Barcelona. We did manage one stop where we caught an old historic tram followed by a vehicular railway up to the top of a hill/mountain, with strangely enough, a church and an amusement park and great views of the city. Barcelona could do with a much more thorough examination but sailing here is a little bit problematic given that you head north away from the Balearics and into the Bay of Lyon, which lots of people aren’t that thrilled about weather wise. Therefore we made the decision to leave the boat in the cheap, well run marina at Valencia and do Barcelona by train.

The train trip is just on 3 hours and we got back there in the early evening. Once there, we spent a couple of days checking out the sights of Valencia and getting La Mischief organised.

Valencia is the home of Paella and the beach front is jammed packed with restaurants. So it seemed logical to put the two together and celebrate being back on the boat together. Not sure where the cocktails come in but they did anyway.

Valencia was also home to the last America’s Cup (before Larry took it back to San francisco) so there is still heaps of infrastructure about. All the teams’ buildings are still there along with press centres and race centres – all now pretty much a ghost town.

We broke out the fold up bikes that I had bought off stan and judy and off we went exploring. Valencia, like most spanish cities, had great cycleways, including one that dropped you right in the centre of the city, with its marble paved sidewalks and impressive square.

We also rode along the foreshore that goes on for miles, with it lines and lines of beach umbrellas and sand volleyball and soccer pitches. We stopped and had a swim – a bit cold but not too bad.

La Mischief was sadly lacking in toys so we made it our mission to find a blow up stand up board – preferably two. Well we eventually found the only one in valencia. It came in its own bakpack so that was sort of ok to ride with. The paddle also had its own bag and this was a bit more problematical – especially when you passed riders gong the other way – but we eventually made it back to the boat.

With our boat chores sort of complete and the balearic islands beckoning, it was time for an early morning start as we backtracked towards Cabo de Nao, the nearest point to Ibiza, and the now legendary Dom Pepito floating cocktail bar.

For photos see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4826578195249.1073741858.1620379103&type=1&l=57b297c476