Mallorca – Part 3

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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

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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

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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)

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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

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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!!!

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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 !!!)

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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

Off to Valencia via the Costa del Sol and Costa del Blanca

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

It was a bit overcast and stormy when we left Gibraltar. We put a couple of reefs in and headed out through the boats and past the rock. Turning west we had the wind right behind us and we had to jibe a few times to get a good wind angle. We saw dolphins and whales as we exited the straits of Gibraltar and made our way down the Spanish coast. There was still snow glistening on the mountains of the Sierra Leone rising up behind the coastline. Jessica and Mario were busy trying to get to grips with La Mischief, whilst at the same time both feeling a bit seasick – they were both a bit unsure about what they’d signed up for.

Our first stop was Benalmadena, just outside Malaga. This was a huge marina with boats tucked away amongst masses of high-rise buildings. As we were leaving early that morning, they let us stay where we were on the reception jetty, only to ask us to move 15 minutes later when the ferry arrived. Then it was off to see if we could find a town. No town but instead a mass of tourist development with Pommy accents everywhere. We even found some of Jess’ favourite German beer in the one and only supermarket.

Next morning we were up early, with a plan to do some big miles. The wind had deserted us so it was back to motor sailing. It was a long but productive day as we made it to Roquetas De Mar in the late afternoon, having knocked off over 100nm. On the way, Mario played travel guide pointing out a heap of things, including a section of the coast that was literally covered with wall to wall green houses – most bizarre – evidently one of the major food bowls of Europe.

We anchored off the beach, just outside the swim buoys that cordoned off the beach and tried some of Jess’ beer. By this stage, Jess and Mario had taken over the galley – something that’s evidently not too hard with only me on board – and once more in my boat life I was being spoilt with deliciously yummy food. Jess was a vegetarian so vegetarian it was and was managed to save a few cows that trip.

Next day, Mario talked us into visiting a little bay called Cala De San Pedro. We left our anchorage early in thick fog, as the sun came up and motor sailed around the Cabo de Gato, which was simply awesome scenery. We got to San Pedro about 11am and dropped anchor in the clearest water of the trip. The beach is a famous hippy beach, and is simply stunning. Being a hippy beach meant clothing was entirely optional, and not wanting to distress anyone I kept mine on. There’s a permanent fresh water spring here and just a walking track in. There’s also an old fort on the hill and lots of caves where the locals used to hide from the pirates. These caves have been taken over by the hippies and we got invited into one of them by a German hippy who’d been living in his cave for 16 years. As caves go, it was rather up market, well furnished with a TV and electricity and quite a bit of furniture. He was busily making bread – German style – because they hate the Spanish white bread. Jess struck up quite a conversation with him in German and he filled her in on the history of the place, which was originally a fishing village plagued by fluky winds and bad seas. The widowed women of the village decided one day to up and move down the coast to a place they named Las Negras because all the women were in black.

Having checked out the place and had a swim (water still a bit cold), we upped anchor and headed off for a night sail. The winds were once again light so we motor sailed into the evening. About 8pm the sea became alive. Everywhere you looked you could see dolphins and whales. The dolphins here love to jump completely out of the water so we got some great pictures. Several groups came and played on the front of La Mischief, darting from hull to hull. We sat up the front and watched them for at least half an hour.

We had expected light winds for the whole night, but it did blow up a bit and at one stage we had a couple of reefs in. It was a good experience for Jess and Mario and they were both rapidly picking up a lot of skills and knowledge. Jess had done a Day Skippers course in the Greek Islands and Mario was about to undertake some professional certification so him and his girlfriend could work on boats. Considering their lack of experience, they both did pretty well and the 400 sea miles they got under their belts will hold them in good stead.

They were also great company. They had both travelled extensively and it was interesting to hear the opinions and experiences of a couple of young Europeans. Although Jess was only 28, she had already worked in Afghanistan, Washington DC and Rwanda, and gave an interesting perspective on what it’s really like in these high-profile areas of the globe. Mario n the other hand was born in Slovakia and had worked in Australia. He’d learnt his bar craft in Hugo’s in Sydney, and was equally adept behind a bar or in the galley. We had some fun times in the few days they were on board.

Next stop was the inland sea of Mar Menor. It reminded me of Lake Macquarie in NSW, right down to the traffic bridge that needed to be lifted to let you through. Then again it also reminded me of Surfers Paradise, with its row of high-rise skyscrapers built along the narrow strip of sand that separated it from the Mediterranean.

We picked out one of the islands inside the inland sea and had a lovely sail on a flat sea to get to our destination. Then we dropped the anchor whilst we relaxed and Mario cooked up a wonderful spinach and potato dish. By the time we’d finished lunch we had left it a bit tight to make the 2pm bridge opening so we had to fire up the engines and make a mad dash through fleets of racing yachts to make our appointment with the bridge keeper.

Having successfully made it in time it was out once more into the Med, setting a course to Alicante, this time with the geneker up. Beautiful. We had a great sail up the coast, getting to Alicante about 7pm. We anchored off the beach at Puerto de San Juan and made our way into town by dingy and then Metro.

As luck would have it we arrived just before the festival of St John’s bonfires and the whole city was alive with people – families, old people, young people – all wandering the streets late into the night. We stumbled across numerous elaborate floats that were big, bold and colourful – all being paraded before they were to be burnt a few days later. We found somewhere to eat and then sampled a few bars. It was about 2am-ish (maybe 3 – I really don’t know) when we hopped in a taxi and headed back to the boat. Now the unfortunate thing about where we had parked the boat was that there was a bar right on the beach – right there. Perfect for a roadie (or a dingy-ie). The next unfortunate thing was that they was a Slovakian lady drinking at the bar and evidently when two or more Slovakians are found at a bar they drink Tequila shots. After finishing my beer, I took up the offer of the first, but not the second thank goodness. My excuse was that I had to drive the dingy. Mario and Jess were excuseless so down the second shots went.

Back at the boat, we sat and talked for a while and I left the young members of the crew to watch the sun come up, as the old bloke had done his dash.

10am was the designated start time for the next days sail, a leisurely 50nm around to Cabo de Nao. !0am came and went. The genset went on to make coffee and I discovered Jess outside sleeping on the back seat. She didn’t make it to bed. The coffee kicked in and we were off. We had a good sail right up to the cape, when the wind came up and we suddenly had 40kts on the nose. The wind instruments were playing up again, with the wind direction not registering.

Rounding the cape, we made our way into Cale Sardinera. As we pulled in, Jess managed to arise from her sleeping position – to be fair to her she was suffering from an upset stomach as well as a hangover.

The bay was full of boats, I guess from Javea, which is just across the bay. It was a lovely protected anchorage, set right against stunning white cliffs and clear blue water. And the best thing about this bay was a couple of guys in a cute little boat they had called Dom Pepito, serving cocktails, Mojito’s a speciality. Their blender was ingeniously powered by some bicycle pedals and their Mojioto’s were indeed to die for. Mario was in heaven – thought t was the best thing since sliced bread. A great hair of the dog. As the sun began to go down, the bay emptied as everyone headed for home, leaving just us and another yacht to stay overnight.

Next day was to be our last sailing day together, as we headed north towards Valencia. Another 50nm day, but overcast and gloomy just like the first day. I left the boat largely to Jess and Mario who were really getting the hang of things and had both come along way in a few short days.

We got to Valencia at about 3pm and checked into the Marina Real Juan Carlos One, which was both good and cheap. We had an interesting time berthing as we had to Med moor against a finger jetty. It was difficult for Mario in particular as he had had no training but we all got there in the end. It was a friendly marina and a few of the yachties came and gave us a hand as well as the guy from the marina. Then the yacht next door came and gave us a great big paella dish, half full of wonderful paella. What a welcome!

For photos see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4784834471682.1073741857.1620379103&type=3

Between a Rock and a ….

~ stull61 ~ 2 Comments

Sailing from Marina Smir to Gibraltar would be Stan and Judy’s last sail. They’d been great to be on board as we sailed down from Lisbon to the Med.

We ended up completing our exit paperwork at the Marina Smir and leaving about 15min after Kevin and Di. Trying to put the sails up into the wind, we found our wind direction had completely gone potty. So we’d have to sail, judging wind direction the good old fashion way. The 12nm sail up along the East Coast of Morocco was very pleasant, but as we neared the Straits of Gibraltar, the wind started to pick up and we had 35kts on the nose in no time at all. One minute we were sitting on the bow watching the dolphins play between our hulls, the next minute we were rushing to put in a couple of reefs.

Approaching Gibraltar provided us with spectacular views of “The Rock”. The latest theory is that the Rock rolled there from Corsica (don’t ask me how and landed there upside down. Our tack took us slightly east of the Rock so that meant we got a really good view of it coming in.

We hadn’t got anyone to commit to giving us a berth in Gibraltar because Ocean Bay marina was undergoing major works and that was severely limiting the number of berths available. Our strategy was just to call in and see what we could get and then go round to Le Linea (which is just across the border in Spain) as we knew they were pretty empty.

But we were in luck as Queensway Quay marina had a berth for us. This would be our introduction to “Mediterranean Mooring”, where you either hook up to some lines that the marina supply out the front (or drop your anchor if no lines are supplied) and back in between your two neighbouring boats and tie off to the jetty. Then you get out your very expensive paraselle, which gets you from the back of the boat to the jetty. Lets just say it was good to get the first one out of the way.

Next morning, it was time to say goodbye to Stan and Judy, who headed off home to Canada, via Savilla and Lisbon. Then it was off to get the lay of the land. Gibraltar works off Gibraltar Pounds, which are worth the same as UK pounds. Coins are the same, notes are different. It was interesting to find myself secretly liking the fact that it’s so much easier doing stuff in a place where (nearly) everybody speaks English fluently. The supermarket felt like an Australian supermarket – even had vegemite!!!

After a few days, I discovered that all the workers are pretty much Spanish, but chose to work (and sometimes live in Gibraltar, although a lot of them cross the border each day to get to work). I made it across the border a few times in search of phone credit for my Spanish pre-paid SIM cards as you can’t buy credit online unless you have a Spanish credit card – figure that?

Kevin and Di were two boats down and kindly pointed out the ins and outs of Gibraltar. They also make a mean Mojito, which is rapidly becoming my cocktail of choice. But best of all, they took me to Le Bateau, which is a lovely little French restaurant at the marina.

Gibraltar is all about the Rock so the next day, up the Rock I went. Took the Mediterranean Steps which wound its way first around the frond for great views across to Tangiers and then across the back. It’s quite a climb and I was happy to get to the top where I shared the spectacular views with the resident monkey population.

Thursday came and so did the guy from Raymarine. He replaced the ITC5 transducer, and that seems to have fixed the wind speed problem, but the wind direction sometimes misbehaves. I reconfigure it out at sea and that seems to fix it for a while but its gone again since.

The stainless steel guy on the other hand is still coming. You would think 11 days is enough time to organise a tradesman but work seems a little optional in these parts. So still no gas bottle holder for my BBQ.

My last task was to get crew for the passage to Valencia and this took a bit of organising. Eventually I found Mario, who was working in Gibraltar, and Jessica from Frankfurt, both of which were new to sailing – Mario had no experience and Jess had done her day skippers course.

With the crew in place, it was time to say goodbye to Gibraltar and head into the Mediterranean.

For photos of Gibraltar see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4758118043788.1073741856.1620379103&type=1&l=37f661cd3b

The Land of the 240D

~ stull61 ~ Leave a comment

Morocco. It was good to finally get here. I had originally planned to spend more time here, but the delays waiting for repairs had meant our time here would be squeezed.

Marina Smir was more than half empty so we picked a nice spot and moored up. Our first job was to locate an ATM as I’d spent all our Euros on the marina fees – their EFPOS machine wasn’t working. A regular occurence I suspect.

So off we went looking for an ATM. There was one at the marina but it also wasn’t working.

So we called into the hotel at the marina and got some local coin before hopping on a local bus to M’Diq. That was a quick emersion into the land of Arabs. The bus was jam-packed and kept on stopping to pick up yet more people. I was still getting used to the culture shock when I got off.

We wandered around M’Diq and found a few ATMs, none of which took our cards. They would do a cash advance on Visa but not on our normal bank cards from Australia and Canada.

Eventually we did find a bank that did the trick and got some dirhams (dh). Stan at this stage was getting hungry (or should I say hungrier) so we found a local street with lots of Moroccans eating and picked out a restaurant. We all had local fish and Stan ordered a Paella for good measure. It was beautiful, lots of wonderful Moroccan flavours. I think Stan was in heaven.

Next morning, we went in search of a driver to take us to Fez (or Fes as the locals spell it). We found Mohammed, via Rashid, the same driver Ooroo had. We paid Mohammed €300 to drive us to Fez and Tangiers over two full days (and nights).

It took us 4 hours, plus a stop for lunch, to get to Fez. It was a beautiful drive, Morocco had experienced a lot of rain and it was very green and lush. We passed through lovely little villages, with the new and old combination of Massey Ferguson’s and donkeys. Lunch was interesting at a restuarant outside a petrol station, with its own “modern butcher” attached. The moroccan lamb was delicious. The goat was ok – an experience.

We got to Fez about 3 and Mohammed hooked us up with a local guide, who calls himself Sammy, because of his pretty good resembalance to sammy davis jnr. He turned out to be a pretty good name dropper, saying he’s taken the real sammy davis around as well as our mate, ray martin.

The medina at Fez is a real rabbit warren and I reckon a guide is a necessity. There’s 350,000 fezites living in this ancient walled city and a whole heap more living outside – just over a million in total.

Walking around with sammy, we went through a maze of small alley ways that openned up into beautiful architecture. Its like going back in a time machine. The whole place is a maze of shops, all serviced by donkeys. Its said to be the world’s largest contiguous car-free urban area. We managed to cram in all the major ancient sites, including Al-Qarawiyyin, which was founded in AD 859, and is claimed to be the oldest university in the world – although now its a huge mosque.

The old world tanneries were fascinating – and smelly. There were people sitting in shops hand spinning silk, shops full of moroccan spices and the obligitory carpet sellers. I managed to

Sammy also took us to one of the beautiful guesthouses, it was amazing, 6 star luxury and exquisitely decorated with a lovely pool in the centre of the courtyard. Everything you imagined about staying in an exotic location. At €160 a night, it seemed very reasonable.

Then I stopped dreaming and went off to my €20 a night actual accomodation. Successfully checked in, we got Mohammed to drive us around to a few of the moorish castles that guarded the entry to the town for some sunset photos. Then it was back into the medina for dinner, to savour some more moroccan spices. Yum. As we ate, Mohammed filled us in on life in Morocco. He was proving to be an excellent driver and excellent companion.

Next morning, it was up early for a walk to the jewish quarter. Along the way we came across one of the Saharan nomads who was walking into town to sell his rugs. Needless to say, La Mischief now has a new rug and Stan has a new moroccan hat. And best of all, we managed to avoid the medina marfia as he called them – all the people who get their cut along the way.

We never did find the jewish quarter, and with time against us, we headed back to the medina, albeit the other side to where our hotel was. We had the choice of walking around the outside or straight through the middle. We chose the middle -of course We ended up breaking up and Stan beat us back to hotel by quite a mile. I worked out my mistake was to take directions from the locals and these directions ineveratibly lead past a relative’s shop, and not necessarily to our particular hotel.

Anyway we eventually found the hotel and checked out, and then we were on our way with Mohommed down to the coast and along it to Tangiers. Another magnificent drive, passing through an old disused border crossing from the days when morocco was divided into spanish and french colonies.

After a lunch that cost us about $25 for 4 of us (make that 5 – Stan eats for 2) at a packed restaurant in a coastal town, we headed for Tangiers. Our first stop was the Pillar of Hercules, where thee was a cave that opened up underground to the coast. Very spectacular. Parts of it had been chiseled out to mine the marble, which could still be seen.

Then it was onto the famed Kaspar in Tangiers. Mohammed dropped us at the top and we walked down the narrow winding streets to the bottom. Couldn’t really get lost as all you had to do was to keep heading down until you got to the port. After an ice cream and some freshly squeezed orange juice, we found Mohammed and headed back to Marina Smir. No time to find a bar owned by a guy called Rick. Maybe next time.

The drive back was equally impressive as we drove along the cliff tops overlooking the Straits of Gibraltar, before cutting across the mountains and dropping down onto the East Coast where Marina Smir was located. Mohammed dropped us off well after dark after a couple of amazing days.

Next day, Stan and Judy went off driving, whilst I stayed around the marina and did some chores. After, or maybe it was during, I found time for the obligatory camel ride with the equally obligatory pictures of Steve on a camel in front of La Mischief. What else can I say.

As the chores involved the internet, it was also obligatory to visit one of the bars/cafes that run along the front of the marina. Now if you are going to run into other Australian yachties, then there is a fair chance you will do in in such an establishment. And sure enough, I did run into Kevin and Di who’d just bought their Benneteau about a week ago. I also ran into David and Jenny Pakes off Windjammer, who happen to be related to an old lawyer of mine. Great to catch up with other Aussies in far away places. Especially guys who are far more experienced and knowledgeable than novice sailor Steve.

Next morning, we followed Kevin and Di back to Gibraltar, as they were heading for Queensway Quays marina and they suggested we did too.

For photos of morocco see https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.4711059467353.1073741855.1620379103&type=1&l=f23cb048b3