What a week – can’t believe it’s only 7 days since we last blogged – a bit of an electrical problem halted the escape from Almerimar for 2 days – eventually after waiting and waiting for electricians and several leaving parties later we got away Wednesday afternoon with the ‘Ankara Bar’ clan waving us off which was so lovely - the plan was of sailing through the night to get round the Cabo de Gata and find a good anchorage before continuing on up the coast to Mar Menor, Alicante and onto Calpe before heading over to Ibiza.
Sailing was good and anchorages poor so we continued through the night and on into the next day – a bit of wind and then none and then it was on the nose, the cruising chute (big sail at the front of the boat!) was flown up and then taken back down – the engine was on and then it was off, several times - we had forgotten what Med sailing was like!! The sun was shining; the views wonderful and then came the dolphins (see the video attached), flying fish and the basking sun fish just so amazing.
We decided to anchor outside Cartagena on the 2nd night but the sea was crashing on the rocks and the wind had turned in our favour so we decided to carry on – this was a new experience as neither of us has ever sailed for this long before – our longest voyage was across the channel when we started this adventure, but no worries, lots of short naps we were doing well that was until a shout from Philip while Chris was dozing – there’s lights in the distance and not sure what they are coming from – we can hear engines and we’re in the shipping lanes – Philip can see white and red lights but Chris can see green too – oh dear oh dear it’s heading straight for us – a quick turn towards land with a torch shining on the sail we get a flash from the largest tanker we’ve ever seen and the wash hits us - whoa that was a really close call!! Deep breath we carry on close to the shore – the tankers can’t get us here!!
The sun rises on our 3rd day – the fishing line is over the side trying to catch tonight’s dinner but not a bite while 1000’s of fishes are swimming by taunting us – by 6pm we arrive and drop the anchor in Benidorm, we are feeling so exhilarated albeit a little weary – it was straight in for a wonderful swim, a hot shower off the back of the boat and then we relaxed after our non-stop 186 miles, 2 nights, a 50 hours sail. We were in for an interesting night of swelly seas but hey so tired nothing’s going to stop us sleeping tonight.
The following afternoon we arrived in Calpe to be met by Pete and Anne, our friends off Clean Sweep from last year – they’d just completed on their villa in the town and so we were invited to stay for a couple of nights – A wonderful time had by all even though no furniture had arrived so we were sleeping on a blow up mattress that went down over night!!
Then last night of course Spain won the Euro Cup – oh what a night – we’re not really footy fans but you couldn’t help getting caught up in the party atmosphere (more video!) The noise was incredible with firecrackers, car horns, whistles and singing – just amazing to be part of.
Today we’re off again on another 70mile journey across to Ibiza – we’ll be back in touch soon xx