Lynch Mob

Little Vathi harbour

The last blog left you about a week before Pete and Pam Lynch arrived for their visit. We spent that week doing a bit more BATI before mooring in Agios Efimia on 16 July, the day before their arrival, blithely intending to hire a car to cross the island to pick them up from Argostoli airport, before heading off to cruise round the islands during their stay.

The quayside at Ag Efimia (Rampage just right of centre with blue boom tent)

Things did not go as planned. 16 July is the middle of the first week of what is best thought of as The Busy Season out here. Very busy season. Packed out season. There wasn’t a car to be had in Efimia, nor was there one available via telephone enquiries to the next port south, Sami. Nothing deterred us in our quest for some sort of vehicle to pick up Pete and Pam, so instead we hired a scooter and headed off down to Sami to quiz the folks there face to face. Luck was with us and we managed to get Avis to rent us a car for the following day; the only downside was having to take it back there on the Friday morning.

Fishing boat in Fiskardo

Moved by this experience, we decided the sensible thing to do would be to go immediately to our final port of call, Fiskado, and book a car that evening for Pete and Pam’s return trip to the airport the following week. The crowds in Fiskado shocked us somewhat, as we’ve never been there during the height of the season but thankfully we were able to book a car with the ever ebullient Maria, then headed back to Rampage to take things easy.

Next day, having picked up the car in Sami, we made our way across to Argostoli, the main town on the island of Kefalonia. We did a massive Lidl shop and then had time for lunch before Peter and Pam arrived.

In the cave at Melissani Lake

We stopped en route back to the boat as they suddenly noticed signs for Melissani Lake, just outside Sami. Friends of theirs had told them that Melissani is one of the Must See places on Kefalonia. The water in the lake is remarkable; sea water enters sink holes on the far side of the island near Argostoli, travels underground and mixes with fresh water to become brackish and two weeks later emerges above sea level in a magnificent cave full of stalactites and stalagmites so we took a short boat trip round the cave before continuing on to Efimia. It was great to be able to welcome Pete and Pam back on board Rampage; they boat sat for us a few years ago when we flew to UK for Polly and Tommy’s wedding.

Pete takes the helm on our first sail from Kefalonia to Kalamos

After a great night catching up on gossip and making plans, we decided to head to Port Leone on Kalamos as our first stop. Going via Sami to return the hire car (J drove the car, I moved the boat) we set off into the usual windless Ionian morning. About midday, the wind started to fill from the north west and we had a cracking sail across to Kastos, stopping en route at the uninhabited island of Atokos to get a cache there before arriving in Port Leone.

The uninhabited island of Atakos

No sooner had we arrived than Pete, eager to help, somehow lost his balance on the sugarscoop, (aft end of the boat.) Next thing we knew he was in the water, testing the temperature for the rest of us, and also the water resistance capabilities of his watch! It wasn’t long before the rest of us joined him, albeit rather more conventionally clad for a swim! That evening we had a barbecue ashore on a rather ant and wasp infested beach – shan’t go there again in a hurry.

Pete takes lines ashore

Next morning, keen to prove his nautical credentials after the debacle the previous evening, Pete volunteered to recover the shore lines. This he duly did without incident, but clambering back onto the stern of Rampage, he had a rush of blood to the head and let go of the dinghy painter. While the rest of us were still registering the fact that the dinghy was now gently floating off, Pam, who had been very cautious to enter the water the previous evening, leapt in and rescued said dinghy before it could go far, thereby displaying great presence of mind.

Rampage on the stub quay at Kastos

By now, Pete was experiencing ice cream withdrawal symptoms. I should explain. When Pete holidays in warm places, there is an absolute requirement for at least one ice cream per day. Thursday was fine: we found a nice place in Efimia. Friday was not good – Port Leone is uninhabited (their spring died in the 1953 earthquake) and therefore there was no ice cream to be had. However we had told Pete and Pam of our discovery of wonderful, home made soft ice cream at Chef John’s on Kastos, so that was where we headed on Saturday morning, (solely for the ice cream, you understand!)

Pam takes the helm on a rather quieter day!

Pam helmed the boat for most of the journey, a new experience for her made easier by the total lack of wind. Arriving in Kastos around middle day, we found our favourite place on the stub quay free, so moored there. That afternoon, we walked up to Chef John’s to satisfy Pete’s craving for ice cream before returning to the boat to play Mexican Train and barbecue chicken souvlaki on the quayside. A more successful barbecue that evening!

Ice cream up at Chef John’s Restaurant

Pete and Pam share a birthday, which is 20 July so Sunday was their special day and we’d booked a berth at George’s on Little Vathi, (Meganisi.) After a good breakfast with fresh bread from the island shop, we left under motor for Meganisi. As we set our course to round the northern end of Kalamos, I noticed a boat behind us and realised it was Spring Dawn with Robbie and Jax aboard. They were headed to Vlikho but it was decided we’d stop for lunch and a swim in a cove on Kalamos.

Meeting up with Spring Dawn for a swim and drinks en route to Meganisi

As Pete said, it was slightly surreal to be swimming and treading water as we made introductions and chatted. After a swim we all came aboard Rampage for a drink or two before parting company. George’s at Little Vathi, as is common at this time of year, was packed out. We had a pleasant meal to celebrate Pete and Pam’s birthday but were glad to move round the corner to our favourite Abelike bay the following morning.

Pam relaxing in the infamous Blue Rubber Ring (which just takes up so much space once inflated!) Abelike Bay, Meganisi

While we were on Kastos, J had introduced Pam to the delights of snorkling and a great deal of time was spent peering under the water while feeding the fish with bits of bread and pieces of ham. Pam was most put out later that evening to see the guy in the next boat along capitalising on this and busily fishing!

Snorkling in Kastos!

After some discussion, we decided to go back down to Kastos on Tuesday before heading to Fiskado on Wednesday. The wind gods smiled on us with a brisk southerly wind as we left Meganisi, which let us tack our way down to Kastos, although the last few miles were done on the motor as the wind died away, leaving a nasty choppy sea. We were luck to find space inside the harbour, as the anchorage was too rolly to be comfortable. Indeed, one particularly persistent boat took some real persuasion not to try forcing its way next to us onto the already crowded quay. That evening we had a wonderful supper that night at Chef John’s where J and I are in danger of becoming regulars….

The view from Chef John’s

Sadly we had to motor all the way back from Kastos to Kefalonia. Fiskado was as crowded as we’d seen it the previous week, so we moored well outside the harbour with long lines ashore. Later we had to reset the anchor as we’d been too hurried dropping it the first time and didn’t have enough chain out; on the second attempt we ran out of chain and almost had to do it all again….. J, Pete and Pam had an afternoon exploring Fiskado and buying presents for their children whilst I had a snooze.

Pam looking lovely!

That evening we went to a new (to us) restaurant looking down into the harbour. It called Nicolas’s Taverna and the host is larger than life, very friendly and welcoming. The food was excellent but as the night went on the clouds that had threatened all day seemed to solidify. Pete made a hasty trip back to the boat and shut the hatches just before the thunder, lightening and rain arrived: cue much scuttling about moving tables into shelter and eventually into the main room of the restaurant. Nicolas was great, producing jackets and table cloths to wrap chilled ladies in and all the while the service carried on through the chaos. We finished the evening having Tia Marias and Metaxas with coffee before plunging into the darkness and renewed rain to find out way back along a dark and muddy footpath to Rampage. We had to tip the dinghy over to empty it of water before we could use it to get back on board. A memorable last evening for Pete and Pam, particularly Pam whose hatch Pete had overlooked, resulting in a somewhat damp bed!

Pam (in borrowed jacket) with Duncan up at Nicolas’s Taverna

The next morning we had to head back to the airport. For the first part of the journey we had to use the eastern coast road, as the western one with its amazing views is closed at present due to a landslip caused by the earthquake earlier this year. However we then cut across the island and used the western coastal route south of Myrtos Beach so as to show Pete and Pam some of the coastline along that side of the island. After lunch at a little place by the airport, watching planes land and take off, we bade them a fond farewell in a crowded little airport peopled by bewildered tourists and bossy types in Thompson uniforms.

Pete relaxing aboard Rampage

 

Since we had last had a car on Kefalonia, a number of new caches have been put out on the island,so we took the opportunity to visit them on the way back to the boat. We found three round Argostoli, one overlooking the airport and another two near to Sami. We placed some travel bugs and collected another three as we went, so a good day’s caching.

Since the departure of Peter and Pam, life has not been without incident. We originally planned to return to Kastos because Chef John’s now has three splendid washing machines. However, halfway there we changed course as the wind was more favourable to go to Abelike and we knew there were machines at the taverna there.

The tavena garden at Abelike, Meganisi

Accordingly, next day, J set off in the dinghy with a massive load of laundry whilst I tackled the speed log, which has developed a slight leak; nothing serious but enough to try to stop it. J then couldn’t get the outboard to start for the return trip and to compound the problem the starboard rowlock decided to come unstuck so she phoned me for help. It took a hot, scratchy push through dense undergrowth to get up to the dirt track after a swim ashore, then a long walk round the head of the bay to join her. After a large, ice cold beer to console me, we made our way back to Rampage after I’d threatened the outboard with being used as an anchor if it didn’t behave itself.

Next day we went together with the remainder of the washing, and while we were sitting quietly in the taverna garden reading our books, an evil wasp, (there are a great many about this year, due, we are told, to the mild winter,) snuck in between J’s foot and her sandal and stung her fairly comprehensively when she, all unwitting, stepped down on it. Much excitement ensued and she sat for a while with a piece of lemon and a lump of ice on her foot, missing only the gin to make her feel it was worth all the discomfort.

Big hole in outboard casing

Yesterday we moved to Vlikho Bay on Levkas, as Barry from Sioux Sails wanted to to start the process of making a pattern for our new sprayhood. We were woken at around 02:30 this morning by a loud thump. We both rushed up on deck but could see nothing, only the sound of a high speed engine heading towards Vliho Yacht Club giving any clue as to the cause. Unable to see any damage, we assumed at the time that what we had heard and felt was the wash from a fast moving vessel. This morning however, we realised that something had driven over our dinghy leaving blue, anti-foul skid marks and bashing a hole in the outboard casing before hitting the pushpit on our port stern quarter, distorting it considerably and completely redesigning the kedge anchor. It is not yet clear whether the toe rail has been damaged at all. Suffice to say we have had a jolly time with the Port Police, making a formal statement for the insurance claim. Barry was unable to work on the sprayhood today either, as it was far too windy, so we must hope that tomorrow our luck will improve. This evening we hope to meet up with Jax and Robbie at Vliho Yacht Club for a cider and drown our sorrows…

Bent kedge (spare) anchor

Domestic Improvements

We’re currently sitting in the ‘conservatory’ or cockpit tent to give it its proper name, J knitting furiously and me writing the blog. The weather has taken a turn for the worse, with heavy clouds appearing from the south and a spattering of rain, after several days of lovely sunny weather.

The last post left you as we were looking at the second night of high winds and stormy weather; it arrived as predicted and dumped another small sea of rain on the place, joining the lot that arrived the day before and creating an inland sea in places as the rain water failed to run off in time, leaving us to paddle to the loos.

Rampage in her new berth and minus her sails

We’ve met up with another couple, Alan and Bern, who also have a Bavaria 38, although theirs is the 2 cabin version. After a couple of evenings out drinking together and meals on each other’s boats, we decided to move berths so as to be closer together, as Bern and Alan were going to be going home over Christmas whilst we are going home in the new year – we could therefore look after one another’s boats. So we moved over onto M pontoon, away from the centre of the marina and we’re now facing north/south, with the stern to the south. This means we get the sun all through the day, a great bonus at this time of year, as it make the conservatory nice and warm.

Initially, we expected to be able to share Alan and Bern’s company for a few weeks but they had to change their plans as Alan’s Dad was not well and they needed to return to UK to help the family resolve care issues. They left on Saturday morning, dragging us from our sleep (well, beds) somewhat earlier than usual to say farewell.

Now, we need to bring you up to date on a few things. Firstly, the cooker on board Rampage has died of old age and general decrepitude. The final straw came when I nudged one of the rings and the screw holding it all together disintegrated; no matter what I did, it wouldn’t stay lit after that (the rings have a flame failure device, which stops the flow of gas when they cool down, thus preventing a buildup of gas in the boat, which would lead rapidly to an explosion). J and I conducted a lot of research into a replacement cooker, expecting to put off buying one until we were in UK in the new year, as boaty things tend to be a lot more expensive out here.

A hole where the cooker ought to be...

I asked for advice about the type of cooker as a replacement on the liveaboard forum on the internet and the answer that came back was to buy an Eno cooker (it’s French but I can just about live with that). As it happens, Alan had just replaced his cooker with an Eno, so we could have a good look at one already in situ in the same sized hole on their boat. So we priced them in UK and then trotted off to the local chandlers, expecting to pay 25 – 50% more over here. To our enormous surprise, the cooker was actually cheaper out here by about £200. Needless to say, we ordered one on the spot! Delivery was promised within a couple of days, so we sat back to await the call from the chandlers announcing its arrival.

In the meantime, as well as moving on to M pontoon, we’d taken the sails down from Rampage. This is partly to prepare for the winter and partly so as to be able to measure the sails up for replacement. The current suit is the originals supplied with the boat and they’re getting a bit long in the tooth. Rampage is now looking a little bare without any sail bent on to her rigging. We’ve asked a number of sail lofts to quote for the supply of a new set and we’re now sorting through the replies before deciding on which one to go for. One thing we have discovered is that there isn’t any such thing as a simple ‘suit of sails’. There are more options than you could get with a new car and the spread of costs is astounding: quotes have varied from an all singing set that Ellen McArthur would have been proud of to a more pedestrian set which will suit us!

Anyhow, back to Saturday and our disturbed lie in. We popped out to the shops to get bread and stuff for breakfast and called in at the chandlers to see if the cooker would appear that day; we were assured it would, so after breakfast, I removed the old cooker and dumped it on the pontoon. J has been trying to persuade me to fix the immersion heater in our water system for some time now (like, ever since we got Rampage….) so on Saturday, I finally gave in to the repeated suggestions and started to work on the thing.

The first thing we had to do was to clear all the ‘stuff’ out of the port cabin, so I could get at the water heater after which I had to remove some pipes and tilt the cylinder up a bit so I could get at the heater element. I then had a great time actually extracting the thing; as it came out, all the water in the cylinder (about 20 litres) came with it! With no real hope, I then trailed off to the chandlers, hoping that they might have a replacement: to my delight that had one, which I then brought home and fitted, restored all the pipe work to its original state, refilled the water system and turned the immersion on. Now, the thing is only 500 watts (the one in your domestic system is in the order of 2,000 – 3,000 watts) so it takes time to warm up about 40 litres of water and a nervous time was had waiting to see if I got it right or if I would need to do anything else to the thing. Needn’t have worried as ½ an hour later, we had water that was hot enough to scald yourself coming from the taps. Result.

The cooker, however, was another matter, as it didn’t turn up before the chandlers shut on Saturday, so we wound up going out to eat that evening as we only had a camping gaz type burner to cook on. On Sunday, we made a bean stew with a pack of dried beans we’d bought in Gibraltar last September!

J admires the new cooker

Monday finally saw the arrival of the cooker; it had arrived on Saturday but just as the shop was closing. It took me about ½ an hour to fit it: it is such a close match in size that it needed no work on the mounts at all, just a new gas connection hose. J is thrilled to bits with it, as it has electronic ignition and is all lovely and new…..

Anyhow, the weather on Monday was so nice we decided to cycle into Corfu town and have lunch there and do a bit of window shopping. Off we set at about 1.30, got to town in about 30 minutes and had a very tasty gyros for lunch. Things were beginning to shut for the afternoon break by this time, so we strolled back to the bikes, only to find that J’s had a puncture. I therefore cycled back to Gouvia (5 miles), picked up the repair kit, cycled back to town and fixed the puncture and then cycled back again to Gouvia. I’m feeling a little stiff today after all that unaccustomed exercise! J used the time while I was gone, to further explore Corfu town. Everywhere was shut but she was delighted to find a “Christmas shop” and also that the M&S here sell crackers. Christmas is far more low key here and we certainly won’t be attempting to roast a turkey in our new cooker but she is keen to have a few seasonal decorations and bits of food.

Right, that brings us pretty well up to date – watch out for the next “exciting” episode!

Preparing for Winter

I know that this will surprise some people, but here we have a second entry on the blog within a couple of days of a previous post. The reason is pretty simple – once J had finally put finger to keyboard and caught up with her trip back to UK and Ireland, there was a still week’s worth of news to let you know about since her return to Rampage, so here goes:

J got back to Gouvia on Friday 29th October at about 11pm, after a boring but on-time flight on an almost empty plane. It was great to have her back and she didn’t do an immediate inspection of Rampage to see if she’d been kept up to scratch in her absence. The one thing that J did spot immediately was that I had washed one of the seat covers whilst she was away and the difference between that one and the others was amazing.

The net result of this was that we decided to take all the covers off and get them washed and dried in the laundry. The resulting return to a proper blue set of upholstery was great and a complete surprise to us both – we had thought they were faded and stained and had been expecting to have to replace them all this winter but the trip to the washing machine had resolved the matter for at least the next year or so. Result!

The pontoon with the flotilla boat's tenders being cleaned before being put away for the winter.

J returned to a marina that was a positive hive of activity. The final charter holidays of the season finish with a race around the islands just off Gouvia Bay. All the charter boats were gathered in the marina so it was very full and there was great excitement. After the race, there was a big, noisy party in one of the marina bars. As we weren’t invited, we stuck our noses in the air and went off to “Zorba’s” for supper with Andy and Sue from “Curly Sue.” Next day all the holiday makers had gone – flying home on virtually the last Sleazy Jet flights of the year out of Corfu. It was then that the army of workers sprang into action, cleaning and prepping the vast fleet of charter boats before they are lifted out of the water. At one point there must have been 80 to 100 boats with their sails out drying in the sunshine prior to being taken down and stowed. I really regret not getting a photo as it was quite a sight to behold.

Although the weather forecast was good for the next few days, we had decided not to go anywhere as James and Chrissie from Bear Necessity were hoping to come out to put their boat ashore for the winter and I’d agreed to help them do the preparation work. We didn’t know when to expect them but were happy to await developments. In the interim, we cycled into Corfu town and did a bit of shopping for a picture frame – turned out that the local supermarket had some so we needn’t have bothered – and visited the local hardware shop to buy some more floor mats for the winter.

James and Chrissie as Bear Necessity heads for the fuel berth.

Tuesday brought James and Chrissie, so we cracked on with the job list to get their boat ready to hibernate through the winter. I spent most of the next couple of days working with James to take down the sails, get the engine serviced, the holding tank flushed through and countless other tasks sorted before Bear Necessity was lifted out of the water on Wednesday afternoon in a fairly horrid downpour.

On Thursday evening, we gave James and Chrissie fajitas for supper and next day joined them for a trip round the north of the island in their hire car. They flew back to UK the following morning, whilst we set off to spend a couple of days out of the marina, as the weather forecast was good for a couple of days.

James meets a fajita for the first time.......

Initially, we were going to go to Gaios on the island of Paxos but we were a bit late leaving so went back to Platerias instead. We moored up there on the quay and were all settled in for a pleasant evening when the boat suddenly started to shake in a very worrying manner. Dashing up on deck the cause became obvious; a large motor boat was attempting to leave and had fouled our anchor. I don’t think the skipper realised what he’d done and was trying to free himself by using the power of his motors; the result of this was that he was trying to pull Rampage off after him. Thankfully, the mooring lines held and he eventually realised what had happened and was able to free his anchor and leave us in peace. However, his efforts had broken our anchor out of the bottom and left us insecure, so we had to cast off, lift the anchor and reset it. This didn’t take long but it did break into our peaceful evening.

Rampage in Platerias - note natty new Blue Ensign.

The following morning we set sail back to Gouvia into threatening clouds and a nice wind, which enabled us to sail just about the whole way from Platerias to Gouvia, which was a great feeling. The new compass fitted to the autopilot also worked once it had been properly calibrated, so that we had a nice leisurely sail without needing to steer all the time.

Ouch - sailingholidays.com boats playing at being dominos.

The main reason we had come back to Gouvia was the poor weather forecast, which showed strong winds and rain due to come through during Sunday night/Monday morning. In the event, the winds were a good deal stronger than forecast and the rain was torrential. It hit about 5 am this morning, with winds gusting to 70 mph, sheet lightning and rain by the bucketful. We were kept awake by the winds and noise and by the motion of the boat as the winds battered away at the marina. This morning it became apparent that there had been some damage caused in the marina – apart from the usual lack of electricity. Some boats in the yard had been knocked down by the wind, some of the outer pontoons had broken their joints and some of the lazy lines had parted company from their mooring blocks. All in all, an entertaining time. And the winds are due to reappear tonight.

It's meant to be straight and level....

Anyhow, that’s us up to date and if there’s any further news after the wind tonight, we’ll put up another post!

.... so's this one as well!

Julia goes visiting!

Grand-daughter, Lily Byrne aged 7 months

 Well our ambition to produce short posts every few days has been spectacularly unsuccessful but not to worry. In view of the fact that I took a pop at the Skipper for being dilatory in posting anything up in my absence, I think it is my turn to write something now. I have been back in Corfu for just over a week after a wonderful trip to the UK and Ireland and will bring you up to date with what we’ve been doing since then in my next post. First though, a short resume of my trip:

The first few days were spent at the home of Duncan’s sister, Jinny. She had invited her daughter Anna, to come and stay with her little girl, Eleanor (just 1 year) and at the same time invited Naomi and her three: Charlie (nearly 6,) Jessie (4½) and Lily (7 months.) I felt that this was far too much fun to miss and therefore asked if I could come and join them. It was lovely to spend time with them all and Jinny’s husband, Charlie (aka Big Charlie) coped remarkably well with so many women and children invading his peace. It probably helped his sanity that he needed to be out working on the farm most of the time! The weather was beautiful for this first part of my trip – a real Indian summer and Naomi’s children loved the big rambling farmhouse and enormous supply of lego! On the Sunday Jinny and Duncan’s parents and their other brother, Mike and sister, Susie joined us for lunch and then most people went for a walk in the autumn sunshine. Sadly I have no pictures to share with you of my time at Bank Farm due to poor admin on my part (the memory card on my camera was full so I couldn’t take any pictures while I was there.)

As well as the time with the family, I also managed to see our great friends and former neighbours, Jean and Al Mossford, Sally and John Pollard and other “drinking friends” from the Red Lion in Malpas, some of the ladies from St Joseph’s UCM and my friend Paula from my days at M&S Money.

Jessie in her favourite "Sleeping Beauty" outfit

Naomi and I then travelled back to Ireland together with her three littles. The journey was longer than it need have been due to the fact that we managed to miss the train from Chester and as a consequence, also the ferry from Holyhead, but apart from that all went well. I spent nearly two weeks in Ashbourne, playing and looking after grandchildren, meeting some of Naomi’s friends and generally having a really lovely time. The house was decorated for Halloween and on several occasions so were the children! Lily learnt to blow raspberries while I was there, (an invaluable life skill,) Jessie and I decorated one another with face paints one day and Charlie managed to get into the most indescribable mess eating spaghetti, aided and abetted by Granny. It was fabulous.

Susie also had a trip to Ireland then and we were able to travel back together, stopping briefly to drop off baby things for my nephew Rob and his girlfriend Katie who are expecting a baby later this month.

Mr Spagetti Face!

The last part of my trip was spent staying with my dear friend, Maggie and her mother, Betty. Polly, bless her, drove all the way up from Cornwall to join us for a couple of days which was just fantastic. Mags’ brother, Richard, together with his wife and daughter came over for lunch one day and my last night, Maggie’s sister, Helen, came up from her home in South Wales so I saw most of the Williams family while I was there! As well as that I managed to spend an evening with other friends from M&S Money and Maggie and I even met up with our friend and fellow “Stunning Ruin” Kath. Kathryn lives outside Newcastle but came over with her daughter, Josie, to visit her parents who live in the Wirral, where we joined them all for lunch. On my last morning in UK, Maggie drove me over to Wrexham to visit Mike’s wife Jane who is recovering from an operation and then it was off to Manchester and the flight back to Gouvia. Packing to return had been quite a challenge as I had been doing a bit of shopping while home and in addition, D had been shopping online for the boat. Among other things I had to find space for 35 metres of rope to make new Genoa sheets which alone weighed 5 kilos! However I managed to get it all back safely and with no excess baggage charges and received a warm welcome from the Skipper on my return.

Lunch at "Clifton", the Williams' family home

I had a wonderful trip and it was just so great to see everyone. A very big thank you to everyone for their hospitality! My only regret is that Duncan was quite surprised that I had not spent more money while I was away. I’m sure I could have done better if only I’d known ….

Lunch with the Mannix family!

Zen and the art of coarse sailing

You may remember a book called ‘Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance’ (J’s stunning comment of the day – always useful when playing charades).  It told the story of a bloke exploring life, interpolated with bits about Zen Buddhism and how to keep an ancient motorbike on the road.

Over the past few days, I’ve started to feel that perhaps I should emulate the chap, especially in view of our need to summon patience as we wait for the wind to stop/move round/abate to a reasonable level.  There’s a limit to the number of times one can visit the local café for a coffee, walk to town to do the shopping or simply loll about on the boat watch videos or reading.

The internet offers some relief but it can be a frustrating business.  At present, we rely on picking up wifi networks in the marina.  In Coruna, for example, it was pretty good with a nice strong signal and it functioned most of the time and it was FREE.  Other places, there was a cracking signal but the marina was trying to charge 5 euro an hour for access – hence a break in communications. 

Anchorages are the most problematic, as there is rarely an insecure network we can get into.  Most places, you just live with the fact that you can’t get online but occasionally we did find a wifi site in a café or bar in the town near where we’d dropped anchor.  But, you know, for the most part we’re really not too fussed about being on line, as it doesn’t matter too much if we don’t update the blog for a few days.

Here in Barbate, we have the state of the tide to thank for our access or not.  There’s a pleasant little café in one of the buildings in the port which has a wifi net up and running.  We’ve been there quite a lot and have the log in details for the net.  However, we’re tucked away about 150 metres away from the café with a quay wall in front of us.  At low tide, we can’t get the wifi antenna high enough up the rigging so no internet but at high tide the antenna is able to ‘see’ the café and get access onto the wifi net.  I suppose I could add another USB extension lead into the system and get it a bit higher but the signal loss along yet another lump of wire would probably defeat the object.

Last night we were having a glass of wine after supper when Rose and Brian came round to return a bit of chart plotting software we’d lent them.  One thing led to another and we enjoyed a convivial evening putting the world to rights.

Today we aim to leave at about 4pm, as the wind has moved a bit to the north and has dropped to manageable levels.  No point in going earlier, as the tide will be against us in the straits, so we’ll be arriving at Gibraltar about 10pm.

J & I had some good news yesterday.  James Aiston from Strutt and Parker, our letting agents, has found us a tenant for Chapel Cottage.  James has had a struggle to find someone to rent the place but has now come up trumps.  We’re delighted, not just because it will give us a bit of income but also just to get the place occupied again.

The wait of the past week has been interesting in that it has given us the opportunity to just sit and do not a great deal.  We’ve cleaned the boat, had the genoa repaired, gone for walks and read a fair amount.  The limitations of living on board a yacht have begun to emerge and be dealt with.  J and I have started to do things on our own, rather than living constantly in one another’s pocket.  You will be aware that there isn’t a lot of space on the boat but most of the time that’s not a problem.  Once we’re stopped somewhere it can, however, be a little irritating not to be able to establish a little bit of your own space.

To counter that, J has been for a long walk round the nature reserve, as has David.  I’ve avoided any such hasty actions but have done the shopping on a couple of occasions and spent time contemplating the whichness of why in the saloon whilst the others were doing their own thing in the cockpit.  No doubt, if I hadn’t had to remain on board yesterday waiting for the sailmaker to bring the genoa back I might have felt obliged to toddle off somewhere on my own.

Instead, I’ve been able to write this sort of drivel for the blog.  Perhaps one could call it the maunderings of a lonely skipper but I prefer to dignify it by calling it philosophical reflections on the art of waiting for the wind. 

Saturday 12 September

Ah well, it’s as well to be philosophical about things, as plans seldom come to fruition as we hope.  We left yesterday afternoon at about 4pm, aiming to catch the tide through the straits.  The wind was still from the east but had dropped in the area of the harbour to about a force 4, which we could reasonably expect to make ground into by tacking.

Our first tack took us down to the area marked on the chart as having a flow to the east from 3 hours before high water Gibraltar to 3 hours after it.  This 6 hours of flow would let us reach Gibraltar……

In the event, we made our first turn on to a northerly tack and managed to get the boat heading north east, making ground towards our goal.  Our next tack saw us running back down to the south, holding our ground but not making any headway to the east. However, the wind was increasing and we didn’t seem to be picking up any help from the tide; looking at our positions plotted on the chart, we were not really gaining any ground at all.

Our next tack to the north should have seen us gaining a good deal of ground but the wind was such that we couldn’t hold a course with much east in it at all.  All in all, we decided that whilst we could happily spend the night beating back and forth, we probably wouldn’t make enough ground to be worthwhile, so at about 7pm we set course for Barbate again, coming back on to our old berth at about 8pm – having covered the ground we’d taken 3 hours to make in just over an hour.

Now that we’re back alongside again, we think that we’ll wait until Sunday morning at about 7am before setting off again, as the wind is forecast to drop to nothing or slightly westerly.  We shall wait and see if the forecasters have got it right, as they haven’t been spot on so far, at least as far as the Straits are concerned. 

I use a website called UGRIB which provides wind forecasts in the format of GRIB files.  These files are based on ‘cells’ which are 20 – 30 km squares and the wind inside each square is predicted in both direction and speed every 3 hours.  Put together on a map overlay, you can see what the wind will be at any position at any time up to about 5 days ahead.  On our trip across the Bay of Biscay and down the Atlantic coast, the files were pretty accurate, both in terms of direction and strength.  However, the local winds through the Straits are proving to be more than the software can cope with (same as our sails).  The direction is correct but the speeds are all to pot; the forecast yesterday was for 10 – 15 mph, but the actual speeds were in the region of 25 – 35 mph, just too strong to make much headway against.

Today, the frustration of not being able to get on the internet when and where I choose has become too much.  I’m going into town this afternoon to visit the Vodafone shop, where I understand I can get a pay-as-you-go mobile broadband dongle for a reasonable price.  Hopefully, this will mean even more of this level of stuff on the blog in the future.  I’ll let you all know how things pan out by putting a post up on the blog once I’ve got the new bit of kit.

Waiting for the wind.

As you are no doubt aware (and you should be after reading this blog), a sailing boat such as Rampage is dependent on the wind for her motive power.  What you may not be quite so aware of is just how dependent we are.  Our account so far has often talked of motoring to make progress southwards, so you may have formed the opinion that when the wind isn’t going our way, we can just turn on the motor and away we go.

Nothing, I repeat nothing, could be further from the truth.  Since leaving Cadiz last week, we have faced winds blowing from where we want to go to.  Now, some wise people amongst you will say ‘well that’s OK, you can tack into the wind and still get there, just takes a bit longer’.  Take my word for it, this is not always an option.

At the moment, we have winds of about gale force 8 blowing down the Gibraltar Straits, straight on to our nose as we try to go east.  You will know that we’ve been here in Barbate for about 3 days now, waiting for the wind to abate enough to make progress.  Today, (Tues 8^th) we thought the wind had dropped enough for us to give it a try and our 3 day old wind forecast files seemed to back up our opinion.

We set off at about midday, aiming to catch the rising tide into Gibraltar.  I think we all knew that it wasn’t going to work as we left the harbour, which faces east, with the engine at full throttle and only giving us 3 knots through the water (normally, we’d get about 6 – 6.5).  Anyhow, we hoisted the mainsail and moved on to a northerly tack to clear the harbour breakwater.  Once we’d gained a bit of ground, we tacked on to a southerly course and let the genoa out a bit.  Instantly, we were off a fair old lick – about 6.5 – 7 knots.

The boat however was very overpowered and wouldn’t hold her course, as the mainsail was pushing her back end round.  We tried letting the sheets out but it was still too much and she was starting to refuse to answer the wheel.  Result; we dropped the main and sailed on under just the headsail.  Much more controllable and still doing about 6 knots.  Our course, however, if we were to make Gibraltar needed to be about 160^o but we were only making about 180 – 190^o in other words we were being blown westwards as we tried to move east.

Having made enough ground south to be safe, we then tried the opposite tack, heading northwards.  This was better and we made a bit of ground to the east but nowhere near enough to be said to be making real progress.  It was at this point that a short soviet was held and we decided to head back into Barbate and wait until the winds had really either dropped to the extent we could motor into them or until they swing round to west – even the north or south would be good, just not easterly!

Rampage on her new berth in Barbate - headsail removed for repairs

We came back into Barbate and chose a different pontoon to moor to, one facing the wind and with a bit of shelter from the wind.  We were greeted by another liveaboard crew, who had been considering making the same move as us but had decided not to move.  We’ve decided to go out to supper tonight and compare notes.

Weds 9^th.  We had a pleasant meal with Rose Smith & Brian Varley of Alixora from Glossop who turned out to be doing very much what we are: heading for the Mediterranean with no very fixed plans in mind.  They bought their yacht in March & spent the next couple of months preparing her & clearing their home ready for letting to tenants.  We had a lot in common to compare notes about.

Today the forecast is even more gloomy – strong winds until at least Sunday so we shall be stuck here in Barbate for over a week.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a horrid place – there is a lovely nature reserve all along the coast, west of the marina – it’s just not really where we planned to be at this point so it’s frustrating.  The beaches here are beautiful too – great sweeping curves of white sand with very few people on them but there’s a reason for that.  The wind is such that a trip to the beach would be more of a personal sand blast than a relaxation and pleasure.   

We’ve had to take the headsail down and hand it over to the local sailmaker for repairs after our fun yesterday.  He appeared on time to collect the sail, so we’re hopeful of a quick turn round, although the weather seems set against us.  Still, life is not too bad really.  The sun is hot and the beer is cheap so we relax, take the odd walk and wait for the weather to sort itself out.

View back to the port from the Nature Reserve

And then back into Spain …

We left Vilamoura about 9am and had a good trip to Cadiz arriving early Friday morning.  J promptly fell asleep at the chart table & then, when woken, explained that she’d not slept much during the night & promptly disappeared to sleep the morning away! 

J catching upon her beauty sleep during berthing operations at Cadiz

After lunch we walked along the city walls & into the city.  We liked Cadiz.  The buildings were attractive and in a reasonable state of repair.  The tall buildings and narrow streets meant that for most part it was possible to stay in the shade to avoid the intense heat.  Sadly the glory of the cathedral was marred by hordings celebrating the 125^th anniversary of some bank or other & made it impossible to capture a photograph for your benefit.  However we hope those photos we have included help to give an idea of the place to those who have never visited the city.  J got bolshie when asked to purchase a ticket to see inside the cathedral so we did not bother to venture in.  The view from the tower would probably have been impressive but none of us could face climbing lots of stairs in the heat of the day in order to see it. 

A nice old building in Cadiz

Another attractive old building in Cadiz

 

We had a fairly awful paella (choosing a restaurant is so luck of the draw,) before retiring early to bed in readiness for an early start to Gibraltar in the morning…

Cabo Trafalgar - no sign of Nelson

The best laid plans etc.  Wind and current conspired against us as we proceeded south and shortly after rounding the Cape of Trafalgar, the decision was taken that we should retreat to a safe harbour. 

 

We had taken longer than predicted to reach this point and were getting nowhere fast against a Force 6 easterly wind and strong current.  There was no way to cover enough ground in time make the tide to take us through the Straits of Gibraltar and so we turned into the marina at Barbate, about 30 Nm west of Gibraltar, to wait for more favourable conditions…

And so to the Algarve….

Let me start by thanking a young man by the name of Rafael, who mends boats for a living.  He was the man contacted by the marina staff to help fix our recalcitrant water pump.  He appeared on board about 6pm, looked at the pump, agreed it was terminally ill and that he could probably get a replacement to us that evening.  He was as good as his word, departing into Lisbon to pick up a new pump and returning to us at about 10pm, apologising profusely for his lateness, which had been caused by bad traffic as Lisbon came back to life after a holiday weekend.  He had the new pump fitted in about 10 minutes and was gone, having presented what was a very reasonable bill considering how much trouble he’d been to for us.  A credit to Portugal!

We left the following morning (yesterday) having topped off the water tanks; the new pump has a higher capacity than the old one and can empty one of our 2 tanks in about 10 minutes if a tap is left on! 

Our aim was to sail for about 24 hours to reach a place called Portimao, just round Cape St Vincent on the Algarve.  In the event, the wind was working with us to such an extent that we changed our minds about middle day and decided to run on to Vilamoura, which is about 30 miles further on.  This then makes our next leg to Cadiz that much shorter and easier.

The only real excitement of the day was mid afternoon, when it became necessary to put the third reef into the mainsail.  The third reef is the only one which requires you to leave the cockpit; the first 2 reefs work off single lines from the cockpit.

David was on watch and brought the boat into the wind whilst I went up to the mast to fix the reefing point at the mast.  This meant that we were heading into the wind for the first time that day and the movement of the boat was quite exciting.  Anyhow, all was going well and I’d just attached the reefing point and was preparing to move back to the cockpit when a large wave broke over the bow of the boat.  Result; soaked Duncan and David, cockpit full of water and much giggling.  However, J then appeared from below and gave us the news that one of the hatches in the saloon and those in David’s cabin had not been shut.  Result: loads of water on David’s bed and quite a bit in the saloon.  Nothing too disastrous but it meant David had to sleep in the other cabin for the night whilst things dried out.

We continued to make good time and rounded Cape St Vincent in the small hours of the morning.  Julia brought the boat on to the new course for Vilamoura and then had to start the motor and put the sails away when the wind went on strike.  We got the wind back again after an hour and cracked on at about 6 – 7 knots for the remainder of the trip, arriving in Vilamoura about middle day.

Having said the Oieras was a posh place,  it’s as nothing compared to this marina.  It’s at the heart of a tourist development, with bars, cafes and little shops surrounding it.  The facilities are quite good and it’s nice to be in the centre of town.  Have to see how noisy it is tonight!

J has conducted a recce of the laundromat and has left to wash a load of things that got soaked in our excitements yesterday.  I’m writing this offline as David has left on a mission to find cheap/free internet access.  If the marina doesn’t provide, we’re usually forced to drink beer in a bar which offers a wifi zone – it’s terrible the things you’re forced to do just to keep your reader’s curiosity satisfied.

Our plan is to leave for Cadiz tomorrow, arriving the following day.  We’ll then spend a night there before leaving to move on to Gibraltar, where we’ll refuel and replen with things British before heading onwards to Barcelona.  It is great to be approaching the next of our goals; entering the Med.  In many ways it still doesn’t seem quite real.  It isn’t until you sit and read through the log book or look at the charts with the hourly positions marked on them that you realise just how far we’ve come.  Equally, there’s still quite a bit still left; it’s just over 700 miles to Barcelona.  If we really wanted to we could do that in under a week (we can do 120 miles a day if we’re lucky).  Realistically, we’re aiming to get there late September, taking our time and mainly day sailing once we drop David in Malaga.

Anyhow, that’s all from us for now.  We’ll try and post again when we get to Cadiz and of course from Gibraltar.

Playing Tourist In Lisbon

Now don’t misunderstand me, I know that we’re probably the ultimate tourists – what day is it, where are we?  For your information, it’s Monday 31 Aug 09 and we’re in Oeiras, just outside Lisboa (Lisbon for the uneducated).  I know this with certainty because the GPS tells me where I am and, if prompted, when I am as well.

This is our 3^rd day here, having arrived on Saturday.  On Saturday, after taking a deep breath and settling in, J and I went for a walk looking for a supermarket that the marina office said was 10 minutes walk away.  After walking round the hinterland for about 1½ hours and failing to find so much as a corner shop, we gave up and came back to the boat, tired and brassed off.  There’s nothing wrong with the town, it’s just that it doesn’t seem to have a centre where you can get your life support sorted.

One of the beautiful buildings in Cascais

Anyhow, we had a couple of beers and felt much better and then set off for Cascais, a seaside town next to Estoril for supper and a walkabout.  On the way to the train station, what did we find – you guessed it, the supermarket in a little shopping centre offering all sorts of stuff including a paper shop selling today’s English papers.  Immediate improvement in morale.

Cascais was lovely, all bars and restaurants offering a wide selection of styles of food.  We wandered round and having walked the length of the quayside to the marina we wound up having a really great meal in an Italian place near the centre.  The place is holding a fiesta this week, so there was live music and fireworks later in the evening.

The Irish Bar in Cascais

Cascais is also hosting the world Laser SB3 championships this week; great if you’re into that but of little interest to those of us who prefer to sail without getting our bottoms wet.

One of the more impressive buildings in Lisbon - note the paving mentioned in a previous blog.

On Sunday we caught the train into Lisboa to ‘do’ the place in the accepted tourist manner.  In many ways, our expedition bears out the old military principle of ‘time spent in reconnaissance is seldom wasted’ in that we hadn’t done any preparation and didn’t know what we wanted to see…..  Having arrived in the town centre, we quickly realised that thing to do was to take an open topped bus tour.  Once we’d found the right bus stop, we caught a tour which took us round the city.  Without wishing to upset anyone, we were underwhelmed by the place.  There didn’t seem to be much left of the older parts of the city and the newer bits were mostly pretty soulless and uninspiring ‘though there were one or two impressive pieces of architecture, both ancient and modern.  Added to our overall disappointment with the city, the sun was very hot and every time we came to a halt we felt as though we were being quietly cooked!  At the end of the tour, we had a drink in the centre of town and decided to beat a retreat back to Cascais which we knew was quite pleasant.  

The modern railway station in Lisbon, of which the city is hugely proud.

Today, (Monday) we have come to the conclusion that the water pump is terminally ill.  It doesn’t seem to make much difference what we do to it, it will pump for a bit and then refuse to play.  The marina reception have now managed to contact a chap to come and fix it for us; he’ll be here sometime this afternoon, so we will not leave until tomorrow now.  I’d have preferred a place to go and buy a new pump but that doesn’t seem to be the way things work in this place.

Ah well, now there’s time for another beer to ward off the down time blues…

Duncan & David enjoying coffee & brandy after our meal in Cascais.

Our companion David, is very long-suffering of the constant delays & seems fairly relaxed about when he eventually reaches his home near Malaga tho’ he has said he’d like to make it there before the end of September!  We need to press on anyway as we have to be in Barcelona by mid-October at the very latest, when the first lot of guests are due in the shape of the Stunning Ruins.  (For further information, continue to watch for updates on our blog.) 

 One of the most trying things for David to put up with is our capacity to sleep.  I have always been fairly fond of my bed but since adopting our new life as water gypsies, we are both capable of sleeping 10+ hours a day given half a chance & by the time we surface David has often been up & about for a couple of hours or more!  This sleepiness could be due to all the fresh air, distances walked and lack of any real stress but just possibly it could also be linked to the quantity of alcohol we seem to be consuming these days!  If other things irk David, he keeps it to himself and really seems to put up with us with remarkable fortitude.  For our part, his excellent company, help & assistance have been invaluable and we’re just very thankful that he hasn’t jumped ship yet!

Next Steps in Portugese

Nazare was an entertaining place to stay.  The port and marina are about a 25 minute walk away from the main town, which is a somewhat downmarket tourist destination.  To be fair, the marina is a match; that is somewhat downmarket too! 

The main entertainment in the marina is the English harbour master, Mike. I’d say that he’s just the wrong side of 70 and is full of advice and helpful comments.  We came alongside initially, made a competent job of it and were promptly asked how Rampage handled in reverse and then told to tuck ourselves into a berth at the top end of one of the pontoons.  That entailed reversing the boat about 75 metres with the wind doing its best to disrupt things.  Mike then proceed to offer helpful advice on how to tie Rampage up.  Ah well, at least we got a berth to ourselves only a short walk from the marina offices.

Nazare also demonstrated the Portuguese bureaucracy at its best.  Two examples; to book in the boat I had to visit the marina reception and the Guard National Republica and a chap from the immigration police came and visited the boat.  When J wanted to do a wash using the machine in the marina offices, she first had to visit the marina manager, who solemnly filled out a form, which she then took to another office which took her money off her and gave her a token (from a locked safe!)  She then completed the process by going back to the marina manager to produce the token and collect some washing powder.  Small wonder it cost €6.50 for a load, considering the employment generated by the process.

We had decided to make an overnight move to Lisbon as the trip would take about 14 hours.  We had planned to set off at about 5pm but things were knocked a little askew by the water pump.  The pump had been running by itself at odd times, probably as a result of some dirt in the mechanism.  To sort the problem out, I took the pump out and stripped it down.  Result; pump reassembled minus the dirt found in it but now it wouldn’t draw water up from the tanks.  Much head scratching, 3 strips and reassemblies and I eventually tested the pump to see if it was properly sealed; result, slight leakage of air, which indicated why the thing wasn’t able to lift water less than a metre from the tanks.  The bodge job conducted in the pump entailed araldite and the permanent joining of two bits meant to come apart.  It fixed the problem but I feel a new pump coming on.

All this was done against the clock, as we’d booked out of the marina and couldn’t face booking in again.  We eventually left about 1½ hours late with much advice from the harbour master on the best route to take.

(N.B. Those readers who are not of a nautical turn of mind will guess that the skipper wrote this blog as it now becomes mildly technical and very unJuliaish!)

The harbour itself was very well designed and absorbed all of the fairly significant Atlantic swell which we met on leaving the breakwater.  The swell was about 3 – 4 metres with a northerly force 4 blowing, so we got the sails up and headed south to our first turning point.  As darkness fell, the watch keeping system was started with David taking first turn, then me and finally J.

We kept shortening sail as the wind increased, eventually down to 2 reefs and on a broad reach just off the wind.  The first turn was made during my first watch.  The ideal course would have been due south but the sea and wind meant that we couldn’t come that far round, as keeping the boat under control with the wind dead astern would have been too difficult.  Instead, I headed south south west, as close to the wind as comfortable.  I had decided to gybe the boat on to a south south east course after about an hour and so on either side of our ideal course until we rounded the next headland into the Lisbon area.

The wind was such that we were doing 8 knots much of the time, a good speed for Rampage, so losing ground tacking didn’t worry me too much.  The more southerly course also meant that we were following the swell rather than crossing it, so the motion of the boat was much easier than before.  I handed over to J once we’d brought the boat onto the opposite tack; she woke me about an hour later to reverse the tack and the next thing I remember was David marking the chart with our progress 3 hours later!  He’d put a waypoint into the chart plotter and was tacking a mile either side of the resulting course.  Much neater than my hour or so but more work, as we seemed to need to gybe about once every 45 minutes.

The normal way to gybe a boat is to pull the mainsail into the centre of the boat, the helmsman then turns the back of the boat through the wind whilst the crew pulls the genoa (foresail) through to the opposite side of the boat.  The helm then steadies the boat on the new course, the crew trims the sails and re-rigs the preventer (a line to stop the boom making an unexpected trip across the boat – this can lead to holes in the skipper’s heads).  It is possible to do it yourself if you’re on a night watch.  Instead of the helmsman doing the work, the autopilot is told to move 60 degrees across the wind.  This happens in reasonably slow time, giving the person on watch time to bring the genoa across to the new tack.  Just means you have to it all yourself.  It certainly stops you getting bored at night.  J had never done this particular trick before, so I coached her through it for the first time.  Inevitably, by the time we came to do it, the wind died as we finished the turn….  Motor on and resume our course, putting the genoa away as we did so.

I then went to be bed and David took over from J later on.  I woke at about 10am to find David grinning from ear to ear.  He had hoped to get alongside in the marina without either of us waking up!  He’d got to within ½ mile before being joined by myself and J.

This port is not called Oeros but Oeiras and is quite the poshest marina we’ve visited so far.  All fairly new and up market but a good base for exploring Lisbon and surrounding are, which we intend to do over the next couple of days.  Watch this space for our opinions about the place, if we can ever find internet access that doesn’t cost an arm, a leg and half our bank balance…

PS – Sorry, no suitable pics for this entry.