Grand Slam

Sunday 31st May, Vulcano still and it hasn't errupted yet!

No sign of an eruption yet! The sun is warm, the sea is blue, the beer is cold and the sand is ......black!!! Well it is a volcano. Personally I don't like black sand. It looks dirty - although I don't think it is. We've moved round to Porto di Ponente around half a mile across land from Porto di Levante (where we were yesterday) - but we sailed round - a lot further - probably 2 miles. Levante is open to the east and Ponente is open to the north west so as the forecast was wind swinging to the E -SE, we thought it best to move.

Ponente is a nicer bay with a beach and a lot more room to anchor although it was busy last night (Saturday) with 20 odd yachts in (all local boats from the mainland come over for the weekend I guess). There is not a lot ashore but it is only 15 mins walk back to Levante - where we will walk this afternoon to post this blog at the internet cafe - and have a beer.

Nice place to anchor but open to the NW which is where the slight swell is coming in from. Fine when there is wind to hold you at the right angle to it but last night the wind died to zero and we had a very uncomfortable night being bounced by the swell with everything creaking and groaning (and the boat as well).

This morning I put on the diving gear and went under to have a good look at the prop. The anodes are fine (no wear at all) but the prop was not opening in both directions so that explains why no "overdrive" (very technical unless you know a 3 blade gori prop). I loosened it up so we will see if that has fixed it. Just a bit of over enthusiastic sea life made a home in the gear cogs. The bottom of the boat is starting to look quite dirty so a lift and a wash is certainly in order. It's probably costing us at least half a knot in boat speed!

There are not many British boats around and not many people understand any English. The odd waiter does - but that is about it. Very similar to the Spanish Rias in that respect. It will be nice to hear some English spoken again. One guy who did speak some English managed to communicate that Untd had lost to Barca - what a shame!

One big bonus of Vulcano seems to be the lack of mozzies. We got hit with them in Palermo with some nasty reactions to some of the bites, but since we left, none! I wonder if it's the sulphur in the atmosphere? Being slightly off the beach helps though. I am taking some interesting photos but without a good internet connection on the boat, it is impossible to upload them. All our connections have been via internet cafes - not easy to post pics. Sometime soon there must be a place we can get a connection on the boat?

The plan now is to stay here at anchor tonight and then ahead of the forecasted strong NW winds on Tuesday, head round tomorrow to Lipari, the main town on the biggest island and go into a marina for 3 nights to ride out the winds and to have a good look in the "must see" museum with relics dating back to 5,000 BC (and everything in between) - bet they don't have a woolly mammoth. If the winds and sea state are ok, we will then go and have a look at the island of Salina later in the week. The anchorages on Stromboli are only any use in very settled weather and there has been too much swell for that with constant gale warnings for the seas 100 mile north of us. We will give Stromboli a miss but may try and sail around it if the winds are the right way.

Friday 29th May, parked by an active volcano

Internet connections recently have been as scarce as Woolly Mammoths. I think I saw one (a Woolly Mammoth that is) but it turned out to be a bush. Don't hold your breath awaiting posts. I will write up the posts as I go and then load them all up when we get a connection. Anyway, the active volcano. Yes, we are parked next to an active Volcano which is venting smelly gas. Eeek!!! Now Pam usually sees the blackest picture when anything happens but was a bit perturbed when I asked what we do if the volcano erupts! (the answer of course is have another beer). As you might have guessed we have made it to the Aeolian Islands or the island of Vulcano to be more precise.

We left Palermo on Wednesday morning and headed east aiming for an anchorage at Porticello about 10 miles away (only the two of us on board as Martin had flown home). It was good to get away from the dirt and grim of Palermo. One thing to watch out for is the dirt on the ground. You pick up a thick oily deposit on shoes walking around town which mark the deck with oily black marks which are very difficult to remove. This is much worse when you go "bow to" so are walking down the deck each time you come back from being ashore. We must remember to take our shoes off.

Porticello turned out to be a bit naff. The anchorage was well protected but a bit industrial and the water not too clean. We had planned to go onto one of of the two harbours further east if this one was no good but instead we decided to go on a further 25 miles to Ceflau, an old town with a harbour and anchorage. We arrived around 6ish - a trip of 8 hours of which we managed to sail for 4 hours (that's a record then!!). Ceflau harbour was relatively empty with what looked like lots of room for visiting boats. Loads of room on the outside of the pier. We decided to anchor in the south east of the bay which was fine. There was also a boat anchored in the north of the bay. The whole of the harbour seemed well protected from the NW swell but it might be a different story if the wind was in the east.

The doom and gloom book wasn't too helpful saying "but not everywhere good holding". Why not be positive and say mostly good holding - it was anyway! Ceflau is meant to be a nice town but the anchorage was not the clean water we were looking for so we decided to just stay one night and head off for the Aeolian's the following morning. We made an earlyish start and 8.30am and headed North East for the 50 mile motor sail. The wind was mostly NW around 5 knots (I did see 7knots once) so we had both sails up but motored. We arrived at Vulcano around 5 ish and set about finding somewhere to anchor. Our plan was to go to Porto di Ponente on the north west side but the swell was around 2 metres (left overs from a storm far to the north) so that put paid to that. We motored round the top of the island and into Porto di Levante, the main harbour. The anchorage is to the north of the ferry quays.

The doom and gloom book is now a little out of date as there is a visitors pontoon to the south of the ferry quays - where the diagram shows "moorings". There were 3 or 4 boats on the pontoon but it was empty by midday. There was also a second pontoon totally empty. Price is 40 Euro per night for a 12m boat.

There is a small village with lots of restaurants and tourist shops but a good supermarket (surprisingly cheap given it's a small island). We have decided to stay a couple of nights so plan to leave Saturday morning. We had a nice meal ashore last night (less than 35 Euros for 2 but the beer was expensive - the wine very cheap). Highlights of the place are the huge volcano cone, steaming away that dominates the place and the funghi - a sulphurous mud pool - smelling strongly of hydrogen sulphide (!!!!!) - which people bathe in to get rid of their troubles. The tourist book we have says that it is also radioactive!!! Anyway that doesn't deter the scores of people plastering themselves in mud. The smell from the mud pool gets to most places but you learn to live with it.

One problem we are finding is that our Nationwide debit card is not working in many of the ATMs. We are getting about a 2 in 10 success rate. I rang them and they said there are problems with Visa internationally!! My Nat West card seems to be working fine. Both times the Nationwide card worked was at Banco Di Sicilia - so that is the one to try - if you can find one!

Now we are in the Aeolian Islands, we will try and spend at least a week here provided the weather is settled. Tomorrow is Saturday so we will probably head for one of the smaller islands further away from the mainland in case we get overwhelmed by tourists! - but then it all depends on which way the wind is blowing.

Tuesday 26th May, Palermo (still)

The prop is now free of rope and the engine back together and running ok so we can now leave! Instead however we decided to stay and have a look around the town - the biggest city we are likely to see for a while. It's a real hustle and bustle place and where we are moored is a good place to see it from. Lots of restaurants that are quite cheap

We are just about to go out again and have a look at some more sites and dodge a few more cars (the traffic is something else here). There is a big supermarket in Piazza Marina, about 10 mins walk away, selling most things you would expect especially mozzie repellents - they have returned with avengence - with me as their main food source.

An update on where to moor in Palermo. Where we are now is right down the end of the pier but is reasonably well protected from swell. The wifi doesnt work though so I went down to the Yacht club del Mediterrraneo (half way down the pier). They have given me free access for a couple of nights - very well done! They charge around 45 Euro per night for a 12m boat (same as here - Florio yacht club) - call them on 091 581837 to arrange a berth. I am not sure they have showers or toilets but they could be an option if you come this way.

Overall I would recommend coming to Palermo if only to see the city for a couple of days before you get back to tranquil anchoring!! No more than a 5/10 for this marina but well done to the boss (Alex) who got guys in to sort the engine and prop in quick time - obviously a well connected man if you know what I mean.

Tomorrow we will head off east to find an anchorage away from the smog, dirt and noise!

Monday 25th May, Palermo

This could be a long post. A lot has happened in the past couple of days! 200 feet of floating line wrapped round the prop and an engine pumping sea water into the bilge. Both happened as we motored into Palermo harbour on Saturday night but fortunately are now well on the way to being fixed.

Let me go back a few days to when we were in Castellammare del Golfo and describe the mooring arrangements here for anyone following. The harbour is undergoing a big change with major reconstruction work on the sea wall. Don't let this put you off - it's not too noisy! The most norther pontoon is run by one organisation - but I am not sure of the name. The guy will come out and meet you in his rib and guide you in. If he doesn't show then just go and pick up a berth (bow/stern too with lazy line). There were only a couple of visiting boats when we were there with space for at least 20.

The doom and gloom book also quotes a club - Lega Navale - with a phone number that doesnt work. Their pontoon is the 3rd from the north end and was completely empty. I managed to catch their office open once and asked if they had berths. They do and only wanted 20 Euros a night. I would be very tempted if I went back to just tie up on their pontoon but dont expect anyone to take ropes. Most of the pontoons had the feel of the harbour being emptied while the work on the wall was taking place so there is stacks of room here.

We paid 30 Euros for the first night and 25 for the second. I think we could have negotiated a much better rate for 3 nights at the start. Worth negotiating! Overall it was a nice town with a nice feel to it. The meal we had out was the cheapest and nicest since Lagos - although there are no nearby supermarkets. The two "hole in the wall" I tried to get cash from didnt work! Internet was just possible by going to various bars, although in one, I was able to register with "free-hotspot.com" which is meant to function all over Sicily (....oh yeah?) and the other I was able to register with another free via an sms message. Whether we will see these networks again is another matter. In Sicily though it seem important to register for any free wi-fi and that meant a photocopy of a driving license or passport. I got 5 made in case we have to register with more services.

Finally about Castellammare there were no showers or toilets - so I will give it 7/10 !!!!!!!!!! I really did like the place even though facilities were limited.

We left on Saturday morning to head east, potentially to anchor for the night and then into Palermo to drop Martin off for his flight Monday. We motored for a while and then tried to sail, beating into 10-12knots of wind - the most for days. We ended up motorsailing but unfortunately the marine reserve that usually means good anchoring looked pretty naff so we pushed on for Palermo. Round the final headland and the wind died completely giving a few good anchoring options but on what looked like very crowded beaches. I decided to push on and see if we could get into Palermo so Pam and I had a chance to see around the city.

Now earlier in the day I had tested the engine to see if our Gori 3 blade prop was functioning correctly (blades opening) and found it wasnt (only one speed instead of two). That meant something was fouling the prop, maybe a few barnacles stopping it opening properly. As we got near to Palermo, we accelerated to follow another yacht in and with half a mile to go, Pam started shouting that the holding tank was gushing water. A quick check revealed water coming out of the engine header tank and filling the bilge. This had happened a few years back when the engine was almost new, so I knew the cause. We slowed down a bit and the problem stopped. Turning into the area where all the club berths are, we were surprised to find plenty of space and a nice guy calling us in. Great - we can stay here - and then put the engine into reverse and ......thud, thud, thud etc. Into forward and no forward drive. Oh Really! We were lucky there was a guy on a boat next to where we were going who jumped into his tender and rushed over to rescue us. We managed to park ok and tied up. Pam almost walked off the boat to go to a hotel. Relations were very strained!!

The club here is Club Florio (use channel 71) and they have a number of transit berths but most of the boats are very big (60ft+). There pricing is based on big boats with 12m the smallest they give a price and that was 50 Euro per night. I managed to get them to agree to 45 per night if we stayed 3! The guy who runs the place (Alex) is very helpful though and organised a mechanic to come and sort the engine and a diver to do the prop. As I write this, the diver has just come up with a handfull of floating rope so the prop is done (and the anodes are fine!!!). The mechanic came at 9am and stripped down the top heat exchanger and took it away to clean out. He also suspects the thermostat is a bit dodgey. My guess is the rope was around the prop all day and when we accelerated coming in, the engine was doing too much work with the rope around the prop, coupled with a few blocked tubes in the heat exchanger and allowed sea water to flow into the fresh. The diver only charged 50 Euros. I was too chicken to do it myself as it was a bit dark under the boat - and I didnt have enough weight to take me down. That's now sorted - I found the other weight I had mislaid and got another off the diver.

There may well be other club moorings further down the dock. The club meditteranian were very helpful giving me this wifi connection but club Salpancore (mentioned in the doom and gloom book) had no berths available and were not helpful at all.

We should be ready to go tomorrow but think we will hang on for another day to have a good look around town. There are no showers or toilets (60 foot boats have their own) and the internet for the club is down - as usual.It's a bit of a trek into town but restaurants seem to be reasonably cheap.

Martin left this morning to fly back to the UK, so its now Pam and I on our own. Pam is now gloating that I have not heeded her words about lines in the water although it is a mystery to me where we picked this one up. In future I should be able to sort it out myself.

Thursday 21st May, Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily

As we have had a dire shortage of internet connections, I will be up-loading a few blog entries at a time. If you haven’t done so already, scroll down the page to get the previous entry that you will not already have seen – that way you will not miss any of the exciting episodes on Grand Slam’s journey to the sun!

..... Well we have arrived in Sicily, just over a month after leaving Lagos. It’s been a long hard slog and now time to slow down and have a rest. I guess we will do at least 4 weeks here before we head off for Greece.

We left Marina de Capitana on Tuesday morning and headed south for the southern tip of Sardinia to anchor or use the marina at Villasimius. It was another windless day so we motored the 12 miles or so after a busy morning of re-provisioning the boat and topping up with fuel (and Martin scrubbing the water line of the boat to get rid of the green stuff that is now growing with wild abandon). On arrival at Villasimius, we decided to anchor in an exposed bay (exposed to the west) but with a glassy sea, this didn’t seem to matter. We went ashore in the dinghy to look at the marina but it was very much as the doom and gloom book had said, big and empty with not a lot there. It had obviously been a good project but not enough boats have come to fill the 700 berths and a lot of the services have vanished. There was a chandlers and a supermarket but both looked expensive.

We ate on the boat (too expensive on shore!!) and then held the world championship of shooting star spotting. Only Pam, myself and Martin turned up for this and Pam didn’t want to play. I won 1-0 and then we finished giving me the world title. It turned out to be a great anchorage – given good wind direction. Some excellent beaches (where people wear some clothing – unlike a couple of beaches on Menorca where they didn’t – and got up to things that cant be described – I digress....) and a hotel set up like a concentration camp. We can’t decide if this is to keep tourists in or out. We have seen a few like this. 8/10 for this one if the weather is nice. Don’t bother going into the marina with the boat. Easy to get water or dump rubbish.

The forecast for Wednesday and Thursday is almost zero wind so we decided to head off early Wednesday morning – well around 9am – to head for Sicily. 30 hours of motoring later, we arrived. Martin saw 8knts of wind at one stage. I only saw as much as 6knts. Most was on the beam between 2 and 4 knts so gave us some push with both sails set. The sea was glassy most of the way over. Boring!!!

There was not a lot to see in the way of wildlife. Lots of turtles and the odd sunfish and I saw a fin that was some sort of basking shark but need to look that one up. We once again cast a spinner in the water but I think the fish have gone off on holiday with the woolly mammoths as there were none about. I was thinking they may all have gone to the moon as that had disappeared as well although it did rise around 5ish in the morning of my night watch (or at least the tiniest sliver of it did). Martin saw 5 satellites and 2 shooting stars on his night watch – but I saw 4 or 5 shooting stars – the satellites having buggered off by then. I changed direction once to avoid what I thought was a yacht tricolor (or more specifically the red part – turning to white). It turned out to be Venus!

The plan was to get to Palermo by the weekend so we decided to aim for just west of Palermo into the harbour of Casttellamare del gulfo. The doom and gloom book painted a poor view of this place and it was right. The harbour is in the throws of major reconstruction so is very empty. 30 Euros a day for water and lecky with no showers – but they do have fuel despite what the book says. It does look a nice town. I will report back.

Still a total lack of wifi so will try to upload this in town tonight. It looks like the harbour is quite exposed to easterlies and there is a lot of construction to improve the sea wall. No need to radio in to get a berth. The marinier came out in his mobo to guide us in and give us a hand with the ropes. Nice and friendly but looks a reasonable stop in good weather.

More soon – if I can find another connection.

Monday 18th May, Marina di Capitana, Southern Sardinia

No, internet connections are as scarce as woolly mammoths! Not sure when you are going to get this post but I will write it on the off chance of finding a connection sometime soon.

We left Carloforte on Sunday morning after a lazy start to the day. The plan was to head towards an anchorage on the southern tip of Sardinia (or Pilchard Island as Martin is now referring to it). It was 35 miles away and we spent most of the time motor sailing. We did try and sail for a couple of hours but only managed about 7 miles in that time. The sea had settled down a lot from the state it was in on Saturday with the Mistral blowing. Pretty much a boring motor with the wind mostly behind us at 5-8knots. Tried dragging a fishing lure behind us but no success again.

We got to the anchorage at Porto Malfatano around six-ish and dropped the anchor – only to pull it up and drop it again as Pam was worried it was a bit shallow. Once again no problem getting it to dig in despite the dire warnings in the doom and gloom book about thick weed. It is very easy to see the sandy patches and then it digs in easily. The wind was a light 5knts and it remained that way all night. A very pleasant anchorage – well sheltered and only a bit of swell finding its way in. Martin and I spent a few hours gazing at the night sky with Martin winning the “spot the satellite” completion 3-2 after extra time. We were hoping there would be some reasonable size fish in the anchorage to try and catch but all we found were too small to consider eating.

There was not a lot ashore other than a really nice beach so this was one of those places to chill out and relax. A good 7/10 place. One of the nicest we have been to this trip.

Today then we pulled up the anchor around 10.30am and headed east round the tip of Sardinia (Capo Spartivento) and headed towards south east tip of the island. Reading the doom and gloom book, the description of Villasimius (where we were aiming) didn’t give us much hope of refuelling or provisioning the boat so we changed course and headed towards Marina di Capitana where at least there was a promise of a supermarket and fuel. The fuel was needed yet again as all we seemed to be doing was motor! It is starting to get a lot hotter in the afternoons to the point where Pam has not been complaining about the cold!! It was too hot for Martin and I today.

We arrived at Marina di Capitana (again no fish caught) before 6pm (another 35 mile trip – 2 hours sailing but this time we did 8 miles – before the wind died) and radioed for a berth. No answer. Now my record to date since leaving Lagos has been 100% in getting a response but today zilch – and not for want of trying. We tied up to the fuel berth and went off in search of somebody to tell us where to go. The main marina office was open and the helpful lady directed us to a berth although the marinier failed to turn up to catch ropes. Once again we were between two great gin palaces.

Seems a nice marina and is only 28 Euros a day which is the cheapest since Almerimar. No wifi though and not a lot else. There is a supermarket nearby and a big hotel with private pool and beach and a rather empty looking restaurant charging very high prices for beer and wine (11 Euros for 2 beers and a glass of wine ...eeek!). Verdict on the marina, cheap (by western med standards – but still too high!) but not a lot else. I wonder if the marinier will bother to turn up tomorrow to let us get some fuel. I’ll give it 4/10 mainly for it’s poor location.

Looks like then we will head down to Villasimius tomorrow (all of 12 miles away) and either anchor or go into the marina ahead of an early start on Wednesday to cross to Sicily. My aim for this next overnight trip is not to be overtaken by any butterflies. On our last two long crossings I have been astonished to see a number of butterflies overtaking the boat at great speed. Now I thought these creatures were fairly slow, laid back sort of animals. Down here – no chance! Turbo charging must be the norm as they whiz past you.

We will need to go and visit the supermarket and give the boat a bit of clean down – including a scrub around the waterline as it is starting to get a bit green. I will have to start thinking seriously about how we get the boat lifted and antifouled in the next couple of months.

More when we find another internet connection.

Saturday 16th May, Carloforte – Sardinia

To get on the bus you need a ticket. They don’t sell tickets on the bus. You get them from the local tobacconist shops. The shops shut between 1pm and 5pm. The bus was at 3.35pm. We didn’t have a ticket. It just doesn’t happen in the UK.

The bus in question was not going anywhere in particular – just the other side of the island. I think there are about 3 a day. So we thought we would blag it! Got on the bus. The driver asked for the tickets (I think- but not knowing any Italian he could have been asking if we had seen any woolly mammoths). I said we hadn’t got any (or even seen any). He said go to the tobacconists. I said they were shut. He laughed and said get on! Now there was no danger of setting a precedent here. There was only one other person on the bus, an old lady who got off after a mile up the hill. We were then the only ones on the ride over to the other “town” and then back again. Buses can’t be a big thing in Carloforte! I tried to give him 5 Euros for a beer when we got off but he wouldn’t take it. Our first impressions of the Italians are very good! Everyone seems so friendly.

The threatened Mistral blew up today with 25knts most of the time with gusts over 30knts bouncing the boat around on the pontoon. The med mooring is working well though with little to worry about. We had a good look around town – but not a lot to see. Martin hiked to the other side of the island while we did our bus tour. The local supermarket is not too far away and we filled up with diesel from a garage over the road – 3 trips with the Jerry cans – we needed 110 litres to make up for all the fuel used on the sail (motor) over.

We found a book shop that sold charts and managed to acquire the ones we didn’t have. (I got a row off Pam for that – we were missing all the paper charts for Sardinia and Sicily – and Pam must have her paper charts. To quote Tony (China Blue), P’s not speaking me for one hour.

The marina turned out to be 37 Euros a night but in August it goes up to 78 Euros. It’s much cheaper in April – around 18 Euros. Good facilities except the free wifi is going incredibly slowly. Barely fast enough to check the footy results – only to find Utd won the league, so I turned it off. That means I won’t be posting any pictures of the place! I’ll give this place a 6/10 on the basis the town is a bit boring and not much to do.

Plan then is to leave tomorrow (Sunday) and head east-ish. The winds look light (after this wind today dies down) for the next 5-6 days so we plan to try and anchor for a couple of nights and then try and get over to Sicily (a 180 mile passage) on Wednesday or Thursday. Probably do a couple of 30 mile sails over the next few days. I wonder if we will get a better internet connection at the next stop.

Trevor and Lesley on Kishorn are leaving Menorca tonight for the top end of Sardinia so we will not be seeing them for a while. Maybe we will catch up with them in Sicily.

Friday 15th May, Carloforte – Sardinia

Where have all the free wi-fi connections gone? Last year it was pretty easy to get connections almost everywhere but this year – even the free connection in a bar seems to be drying up and the ones that want payment are either pay pal (no chance!) or don’t work. This evening we arrived in Carloforte (out of Spain at last!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and just about have a connection. It is even slower that the speed one registers their boat when entering a port in Portugal (can anything be that slow?).

.......anyway, back to the plot. Mahon was a nice place except for two things. Firstly the marina pricing. 53 Euros per night including free wi-fi which didn’t work and lecky and water which did – and the water was very drinkable unlike what we had to put up with in Majorca. The second thing that put me off was the cars being driven up and down the promenade and up and down again beeping their horns until the week hours. And then just in case everyone had gone deaf, they drove up and down again at least 20 times to make sure someone heard. I have it on good authority that Barca had won a game of footy against some minion side and this was the fans celebrating. I mean, Menorca is 300 miles from Barcelona – don’t this lot support their local side?

So a final 6 out of 10 for Sunseeker. There are hundreds of visitor moorings here so worth a visit but then it is a dinghy trip into town.

The lack of internet made it difficult to get the detailed weather we needed but we persuaded the Sunseeker office to give us free run of their machine and downloaded what we needed. Not a lot of wind for Thursday but building to 20knts North West Friday for a good 30knts on Saturday. One of these “Mistral” that we used to get in France. It was 200 miles from Mahon to the north or south of Sardinia so we decided to leave at 6.30am Thursday for the crossing to the south. No real plan of where we would make landfall - a case of see how fast we go and were we get to.

The passage across was pretty boring. That is an understatement. Probably the most boring passage ever made. Apart from the last 3 hours when the wind got up to 19knts, it didn’t get above 10knts and was below 5knts for 80% of the time. We motored for 36 hours. Pam started worrying about not having enough fuel and that almost got me worried!! I tried fishing for Tuna (ie dragging a thing with a hook behind us at 5-6knts) but to no avail. I think there are as many Tuna in the sea between Menorca and Sardinia as woolly mammoths and we all know that woolly mammoths can’t swim so there won’t be many of them around – but I am still looking. So we didn’t catch anything and had spaghetti for tea. There were however millions (and I wouldn’t lie to you) of small jelly fish – shaped like little ocean going yachts with a small sail above the surface (only much much smaller you understand – about 1cm across – that’s about half an inch for those of you metrically challenged) – floating along to get to the places no other jelly fish could get to – unless they were directly up wind of that place. No lets not go there. After all the jelly fish are going there. Why can’t we eat jelly fish? It would end world hunger at a stroke.

...where was I? Oh yes,Thursday night was pretty black. No moon until it rose around 3 ish and then it only deemed fit to show half of it. Friday turned out to be rather grey and it rained a few times – Pam even took a picture of me in my olies (Yes – I put them on to keep out the rain!!!).

As we got closer to Sardinia, we decided we wouldn’t make the way point at the Southern tip in time for a day time entry to whatever port we were supposed to be going to. Instead therefore we decided to head for Carloforte on the Isloa Di San Petro, just off the south west tip of Sardinia. There is a marina (no anchorages) but dire warnings in the pilot book about lack of depth, bad marks etc etc. If one believed these books, you would never go anywhere. As we approached the cliffs of the island, we saw a bird of prey (which I identified as Eleonora’s Faclon) flying low and fast offshore and then attacking a small bird. After it’s first strike on the small bird, the small bird started “fluttering” but it still took another 6 attempts before the falcon succeeded in catching it’s prey. Fascinating. There – it wasn’t that boring was it!! Only the previous 34 hours! Rob had seen Eleonora’s Falcon on Cabrera but this was a good close up.

We arrived in Carloforte around 5 ish, called up the marina, got the last space (I am sure there were many more) and had a beer or two. It had been a tiring trip. As we got in the wind got up to 20knts giving us a tricky berthing and it is now blowing a hoolly – a “Mistral” is expected tomorrow. No sign of anything “difficult” trying to get into this place. The “doom and gloom” book has now been consigned to the bookshelf.

Seems a nice place. Very friendly marina staff, speaking reasonable English (my Italian is zero)..... Good showers and I think it is less than 40 Euros a night!! Plan is to ride out the storm here tomorrow and then decide whether to stay a few more nights to look around the island. We need to be in Sicily (one 200 mile sail) in 9 days so plenty of time to slow down.

We heard from Tony and Margaret who are now in Cartagena with Jacky and Rob who have now done 450 miles in less than a week (that’s even faster than we went!!!). Talking of distances we must now be over half way to Turkey with almost 1000 miles under our belt since we left Lagos. Did I tell you how good it felt to be out of Spain? Liverpool would have beaten Barca if they had had the chance.

More from Carloforte tomorrow.

Wednesday 13th May, Mahon

Internet connections have been few and far between but I am now sitting in the Maritim cafe in Mahon in the warm sunshine sipping a cold beer.

We sailed from our last anchorage yesterday (Tuesday). It was a 25 mile passage with 15-18knt headwinds and a 1-2 metre swell for half the time. We managed to sail most of the way which is a first!! We moored up on the Sunseeker pontoon which was supposed to be cheap but wasn't. At 50 Euros a night it is typical of what we have seen. Toilets and showers are the best yet but are only open when the office is open which is 8am to 6pm. Staff are also very helpful.

Mahon is very empty though. Lots of visitors mooring bouys free. We did a quick tour of the town yesterday evening, managed to download the weather forecast and the plan is to set off tomorrow early for the bottom end of Sardinia. The forecast looks reasonalby good and should have a fair amount of wind behind us. I'll get back with more info when we get there which hopefully will be Friday evening.

Monday 11th May, Cala de Algayerens

Martin turned up more or less on time on Saturday afternoon so we had time to show him the delights of the yacht club and then into town for some roast suckling pig. It was not “over crowded” at all as all the charter boats must have had their weekly changeover so were all somewhere else. I managed to keep track of the Liverpool – West Ham score by poping in all the bars on the way up, ...and they won 3 – 0.

We left around 9 ish on Sunday to do the 50 mile passage over to Menorca. Plan A was to head directly to the southern tip of Sardinia but the forecast of fresh to strong south easterlies knocked that one on the head for at least 4 days. Plan B was therefore to head over to the west tip of Menorca, head east along the north coast and then over to the north end of Sardinia. The Sardinia trip looked like being at least 4 days off (Thursday).

We were aiming for Ciutadella, the town on the western tip but with a few anchorages in mind if it was busy. We got in around 6 ish after a combination of motor sailing and sailing to find all of the port moorings no longer in use. Obviously the ro-ro ferries have seen to that! The harbour master was very helpful and tried to accommodate us but it meant waiting on the emergency wharf until the ferry left at 8.30pm and then move onto the ferry berth, then at 8am the following morning move to where the fishing boats are and then moving off by 5pm the following day. Instead we chose to anchor and went round the corner to Cala Degollador. A smashing little anchorage in a narrow cala, perfectly sheltered from the strong easterly wind blowing. We used 2 anchors (front and back) and had a very peaceful night.

The forecast for Monday was 25knt of wind from the SE so we spent the morning shopping in Ciutadella to restock the boat with beer and other sundry items and re-rigging the reefing system (an idea of Martin). We left the anchorage at noon, out into 25knts to sail to the northern coast and meet up with Kishorn in one of the many anchorages up there. It was only a 12 mile sail but one of the more enjoyable ones. Lots of wind with not much sail up – but we went fast. No problem anchoring in a huge anchorage with a strong offshore wind. Off then to the beach for a bit of sunbathing. Lots of Sullidae around (Rob if you are reading) doing things that you don’t normally see birds doing! Plan tomorrow is to head to Mahon, the eastern most town on the island and a day shopping and refuelling etc for the trip to Sardinia.

We spent an nice evening entertaining Trevor and Lesley, Alan and Holly from a New Zealand boat and Ludo and Lucinda (a French couple on a Belgian registered boat that we thought was German!!! ....don’t ask!). With the help of the binoculars and Rob’s eye spy book of European birds, we were able to spot a pair of Ospreys circling overhead to add to the bee-eater that Martin had spotted earlier in the day. No woolly mammoths though today. The “Oh Really” has now been told to almost everyone we have met – yet people are still using it in normal conversation. I must tell it to you sometime!

Both anchorages over the last few nights rate a good 7/10. The one we are in now must be great when there isn’t 25knts of wind blowing which is what we have had ever since we got here.

No sign of Tony and Margaret although we’ve not had internet for a couple of days so that is not surprising.