Our seventh wedding anniversary!
We were woken in the night first by mosquitos, then by a rising wind. John came to at about 0700 in time to see the sun hit the town, and watch the white water.
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| White water and bouncing boats |
We awoke having had a peaceful night, initially to a flat calm day. John busied himself with the web site as we are still in touch with the free wifi from the hotel opposite, although out of effective range. The wind started up again, this time from the WSW gusting F6. We decided to fill the water tanks with the proceeds of the raid last night, in preparation for another, but first lost the funnel as it blew overboard. As this took off downwind, John jumped in after it, but with the high wind and wavelets, swimming back (funnel in hand) was daunting. Mo set off in the dinghy, also downwind, when John managed to haul himself on board and start the engine. Later that evening we stole back into the marina, and filled up our containers again. There was a rather raucous party on the boat anchored nearby.
The morning broke without any violent wind, in fact it promised to be a beautiful day. We stowed all the water containers, and went ashore to the supermarket. Mo surpassed herself with food to start stocking the freezer for the impending family visit, and the bill came to the same as our last two forays. When we got back to Fuga we stowed the food, and Mo started cooking! I finished off (that's a joke!) updating the web site, and when we were ready we set off across the harbour and anchored off the hotel, so that I could upload my work. Needless to say there was more still to be done. Long phone call with Jacqui at her expense, and another with John's sister on Skype.
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| The ominous partly cigar-shaped cloud that announced windy weather |
We switched on to Classic FM. Sheer luxury to hear music punctuated by news from home. The traffic reports make you feel particularly happy and superior. Managed to get a lot more 'nerding' done, researching toilets, marinas in Rome, and all manner of things. Mo launched into more cooking, tackling some emaciated 'salmon' that we had bought in Menorca, which might make fishcakes. In the end it was abandoned to the waste: sorry, John and Sharon, this is what we gave you for dinner! The day started beautifully, but towards evening as we were going to settle, the wind freshened from the west. This meant we were on a lee shore again, and had swung too close to the hotel's private moorings, on one which they had a smart motor boat. We raised anchor and returned to the anchorage just off the marina, where we hoped to get a lee from the town. Once more we abandoned going ashore for a meal, as it piped up.
It blew hard during the night. In the morning John was feeling feeble, so set about trying to sketch the view of the town from the mooring. The foredeck, with a clear view, was untenable, so it had to be done by peering around the canopy as the boat swung from side to side in the wind.
Meanwhile Mo was busy on all kinds of domestic duties, and managed to cut John's hair. Only really in the evening after a couple of scotches with dry ginger for medicinal purposes did John recover. We convinced ourselves the wind was dropping, and went into the town for a meal. Climbing to the old town, we found it was heaving with people. Everywhere either the prices were unrealistic, the food too ordinary, or the restaurant was full. Eventually we were heading back to the harbour when we stumbled across a family run restaurant in the style of Fawlty Towers. It too was full, but we accepted the recommendation of a bottle of Chianti and sat in the gale outside until a table was available. Service was almost non-existant, as we had been engaged by grandpapa, who spent his time hand writing bills and chatting at length to his guests. When we eventually caught the eye of one of the waiters, his son presumably, he refused to take the order but got grandpapa to come and get it. The food, however, was superb and well worth the wait. The boat was still there when we returned, but the gale (now forecast by Navtex, Rome) blew all night.
At first, as so often it does, the wind had died down and this encouraged us to embark on the unfamiliar process of getting ready to go to sea. The dinghy was retrieved, Willy was brought down from the rigging, and Mo went around stowing things more securely. John also had some 'essential' nerding to do to update the web site and reply to e-mails, before losing the facility of the free wifi. As it happens, the connection was good enough to do what was needed from the anchorage off the marina, without moving closer to the hotel. By the time we were ready to leave, Mo was hungry, and the wind had piped up again. We put in one reef, and set off hopefully. The wind was westerly and therefore from behind, but gusting badly. As we performed a slalom down the harbour, a ferry came in and constrained us from gybing when we wanted to, and so we were forced around the far side of the light marking the rocks in the entrance channel. Conditions were now uncomfortable, and we put another reef in. The wind appeared to back as we got out into clearer wind, so that we would not be easily able to fetch our course. We decided to abandon the voyage, and sought shelter in an anchorage on the south side of the entrance, near a small jetty. We anchored there, and would have been settled apart from insinuations of a NW airflow, and the constant howl of the wind. John spent a lot of time playing with the SSB etc. to try to pick up Navtex as well as Fax. It is a remarkable feature of the Rome Navtex that they only put out warnings about tree trunks and the like, not weather forecasts or gale warnings!
The wind howled but remained westerly all night, so we were at least spared having to move. In the morning it had dropped, and so we prepared to set off immediately after a cup of tea and a bite of cereal. As we eventually set off, the wind was picking up, and we kept 2 reefs in the main, and held back a bit of the jib. Life was peaceful, until we got around the corner, when we started to spank along. The forecast had been NW sevens, and as our anchorage would not have been happy from that direction, it seemed better to find somewhere that would be more suitable. As we went along, the wind died down at one point and we unrolled the jib, and when it returned we found ourselves pointing up well into the bay. This did not last long, as it swung back and increased to force 7 with gusts. The sailing was exhilarating, but only for a limited time. We soon made our goal, a beach Plage de Balisti, in G. de San Amanza, and anchored off the northern end. In sorting out the water that had welled up into the sink (no we hadn't remembered to shut the seacock), Mo found two rusty cans of beer lodged up under the cooker. These were of Belgian origin, and can be attributed to the previous owners. One had leaked all its contents, but the other was leaching away a foul brown fluid into the bilges. Its an ill wind that blows no one any good: unfortunately on opening the can it blew back all over the topsides and cockpit!
We had spent the remainder of yesterday and much of the night hunkered down with a Force 7 blowing around us: the shelter at the other end might well have been better being behind cliffs. In the morning it had (as usual) become quieter, and John fancied using the opportunity to move on to Bonifacio. In his imagination this was about 5 miles away, although once the route was entered into the computer it was evident that 11 nm was more the mark. We planned to use the Passage de la Pianterella, since this offered the shorter route behind the islands to Bonifacio. As we set off the wind began to freshen, so we decided to keep both our reefs in. We had no problem in locating ourselves at the entry to the Passage, but a little more difficulty in identifying the distant leading daymarks, which required the use of binoculars. As this leg proved to be directly into the wind, we furled the jib and motored, and the remainder of this transit was uneventful. Once we were out of the Passage, and in the Straights without a lee, the seas built up, as did the wind. The prospect of a 5 mile beat to windward in these conditions and a questionable welcome when we arrived was less attractive than a slightly longer reach to one of the refuges on Sardinia, and so we changed course in that direction. We arrived uneventfully in Porto Liscia, and anchored just before noon. Much of the afternoon was spent first chuckling at, then sympathising with three charter boats in a group that were trying to anchor. One of them re-anchored perhaps 7 or 8 times before abandoning the attempts and left the anchorage. A second tried almost running up the beach to land crew, for reasons we didn't understand. They too gave up, and the smaller yacht who appeared to have eventually stabilised herself then followed suit. We began to suspect inadequate ground tackle for the conditions was more to blame than the rather curious anchoring style - rush up and rush back.. Denied our recreation, we were left with four other yachts, one being of the mega super variety, 5 spreaders and a mizzen to match.. We laid out our kedge as a second bower. The wind was sustained all night, and we did not get a lot of sleep.
In the early hours, we measured the wind at 43knots, or Force 9. It then eased for a while before building back up, and Mo saw one brief gust hit 50knots or Force 10. All our anchors have so far held, but two of our companions have dragged - one slightly and one had to re-anchor. We had to intervene to secure the bimini, the sound of which coming adrift Mo had identified. By the morning the main drop cover had become unzipped along the entire length of the boom due to wind blowing into the mainsail from the front. The lashing securing the danbuoy had come adrift. Mo decided to bake a pizza base from base ingredients, despite the fact that the boat was bucking under the continuing Force 9 gusts, and very good it was too. Although we are no distance from the beach, white horses are everywhere and spume drifting over the water. On the beach sandstorms have been raging, and only a solitary windsurfer today. We are passing the time as best we can by reading. Had a frustrating time with e-mail: we are no longer in Corsica and have no credit on our Italian phone. The roaming O2 phone got our website update and mail away and two in, before the queue became blocked by a mail with attachments. I was unable to get into Yahoo to park it, and the result was £20 down the drain with no progress!
The wind continued all night, but by the morning it was only blowing F6 and gusting F7. We had a relatively peaceful night, as everything that could come loose or frap had done so by now! Gradually the wind eased and perhaps more important stopped gusting so much. After lunch we started the business of recovering our kedge. At first the anchor (a Fortress) would not break out. When we got to the chain, shackled through a large spliced eye, it would not come over the bow roller and seemed very heavy. I had observed Jarrod recover K8's kedge, and so we pressed the spinnaker halyard into service to winch the anchor and chain up alongside. The anchor arrived at the surface with a large block of hard sandy/clay mud firmly attached to it. Eventually we got away, and setting the jib only ran down to Palau at anything between 4 and 6 knots. We anchored in the bay west of Palau, and having had a rest, we launched the dinghy. By this time the wind had eased more, and we motored around the point and landed on the beach. We had a productive session, picking up cash, a telephone recharge card, fruit and veg and some other supplies, and stopped at an internet cafe (wifi available) near the marina to access our mail and park the e-mail with attachments in order to get the remainder.
The wind was forecast to be a northerly F5, although fortunately it had not materialised in the night as we would have been exposed from that direction. It had been great to have a quiet night with barely any wind from the west. We decided to head west while we could, and motored out of the bay. As we did so, a magnificent (old?) classic ketch, the Victoria from London, left her mooring off what we supposed was a smart hotel and followed us out. Mo liked the smart deck loungers. She obviously did not want to spill the G & T's, as she motored off to Bonifacio. The wind materialised, but not from the North, more East than North, giving us a dead run. Temptation set in, and we enjoyed a very pleasant sail across to Bonifacio ourselves. We first of all tried to anchor in Cala de Fazziuola just west of Bonifacio. This proved impossible, as space was very restricted far enough in to be assured of some shelter, and we were constantly hassled by tourist boats, canoeists, ribs and by a small fleet of jet skis that sat stationary in our path in the only deep water. We gave up, having had the depth meter bleep and yell as it hit zero under the keel. We then tried the two anchorages in Bonifacio itself. The first was too small and shallow by inspection, and the second was obstructed by numerous boats that looked as if they lived there. Just west of Fazziuola is Anse de Paragnano: it is so close to Bonifacio that had we realised it we should have used it right away. We anchored there, and although we re-anchored to appease an Italian who thought we were too close, there was actually plenty of room. The only problem was the jelly fish population, who were so numerous that it was impossible to go for a swim.
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| The old walled town of Bonifacio on top of the cliffs | |||
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| Cala del Fazzioula, just west of Bonifacio, | Bonifacio entrance only opens as you get there |