Oct 09 08 Ibiza
We left Rome on the 15th and headed for Isle di Giannutri arriving at 16.30. There were a number of large thunder storms in the area and we had seen a couple of water spouts. These are similar to tornadoes but on the ocean. So after some heavy rain and being anchored in poor holding we gave up and left at midnight for Elba arriving there 0830. The weather reports we had were not that good so we decided to push on for Monaco. We had a full moon and that sure makes sailing at night a lot less stressful.
Arriving in Monaco was like arriving on a different planet. We were smaller than most of the dinghies here with super yachts all over the place and going fast. We anchored up for a few days in Ville Franche which is just outside of Nice, and a cute little town. The baguettes, cheese, wine, and for me the moules frites are wonderful as are most things we have found in France. We took the bus over to Monte Carlo and Monaco for a day. Beautiful city state with manicured gardens and buildings. Even spent an hour in the Casino in Monte Carlo. Marian lost her five euro. Yea the last of the big time gamblers!!
After a couple of days here we went up the coast to St Tropez. A nice place with again lots of super yachts. From here we went to the Porquerolles islands and spent a night there before proceeding for Hyeres the next morning. This was the main reason we have headed up to France as Amel yachts have there second main base here.
We wanted to have the boat gone over by Amel so that we would be confident that every thing would be in top shape for our Atlantic crossing. Amel (Jean Sebastian) met us on our arrival at 0900 and by 0930 we had three men working on the boat as we had emailed them our list of parts and things needing fixing. All our fixes were of the minor nature and just talking to them about the boat they identified a few other problems we didn't know about. One of the new things we have added to the boat is called "AIS" which identifies commercial shipping on the computer. This now allows us to see ships that are 40 miles away and gives us their name, speed, direction, destination and a whole bunch of other information. It makes sailing, especially at night more relaxing knowing the shipping in our area. Up until now we have been using the radar which is good to about ten miles out and works well but not nearly as good as the AIS. Also we put a new Mizzen sail on as the old one had been repaired and we did not have confidence in it. The rigging was all tightened up so now we are ready to go. We were here for a week and met some other cruisers and enjoyed meals out and drinks on each others boats.
From Hyeres we left for a quiet night in the Porquerolles, then at first light we were off to Menorca in the Balearic Islands. This leg of the journey is about 210 miles long and the weather reports were for winds up to 20 knots. For the first part of the crossing this was what we had and we were sailing just fine at 7.5 to 8.0 knots. Coming off a wave, about 30 meters ahead of us, was a whale, about 50 feet long, sleeping on the surface!!! By the time I had disconnected the auto pilot, turned the boat hard to starboard and yelled to Marian, we were less than ten meters to the whale. At the speed we were going we were still closing on the whale and holding on expecting the collision as it had now gone below the bow. At this point the whale sensing us, woke up, rolled away raising one of its flukes which was well over our bow rail and sounded. I don't know how we missed him or him us but it was just by inches!!!!! As we turned to look behind us to see the whale all we saw was a hundred by hundred foot slick of whale poo. We scarred the ____ out of that whale, and us.!
So we thought that this was going to be our excitement for the trip but then the winds started picking up into the 30's, 40's then around midnight up in the 50's. (force 10) This is not fun. Thankfully by 0300 the winds were dropping and by 0800 we had the motor on and powered the rest of the way into Mahon. The area we crossed is called the Gulf de Leon or in English the Gulf of Lion which is very apt as we have learned this is the nastiest piece of water in all of the Med. The winds here come pouring in and are felt from Spain all the way to Malta.
We stayed in Mahon for a few days until the 5th of Oct as the weather was against us. We had a weather window of three days and then another big blast from the north. We had a nice trip over to Mallorca and anchored in a beautiful little bay with gin clear water and even managed to scam a web site. The next day we sailed down the entire south east coast of the island and again anchored before setting off at daybreak for Ibiza. We spent a short night at anchor then moved into the marina. Just in time as the rain started and the winds last night were up to around 50 knots so were very happy to be safe and sound here. The weather is supposed to stay this way for the next couple of days then calm down. We then plan to go to Campello, on the east coast of Spain, for a couple of days to see Sandy and David.
