How we can have so much fun & frustration in one week defies logic!!
As you all know from the last blog we left Cabo Roig just over a week ago with the engine all fixed and heading for Gibraltar …. The plan was to travel about 40 to 60 miles a day – that’s 10 to 12 hours sailing for us on Amy so early 5am starts within the week we should be there….. not!!
We first travelled to Cartegena…. A lovely 35 mile trip and so exciting too - Chris caught the first fish that was big enough to eat …. Was it a giant mackerel?? We arrived at 10pm after an amazing sunset. Next morning up for 4am oh dear, oh dear, the engine’s not starting … eventually our African engineer Alex from Cabo Roig arrives to fix the problem … ooh not the same problem he says!!! By lunchtime we’re off again – another great sail and another fish … this time a beautiful green one … not sure if he’s edible so he goes back. We stopped overnight on anchor at Aguilas, swim and fish dinner – ooh how delicious, texture of chicken and certainly didn’t taste of mackerel … oh so lovely to be back en-route again. Next morning 4am start we head for San Jose – 45 miles up the coast – 1000’s of wonderful stars reflecting in the water, 2 shooting stars and phosperous fish lighting up the water too. By 7.30 we have the most amazing sunrise, so beautiful and within the hour 3 dolphins too … Chris was so excited. We arrived into San Jose by 3.30pm to fill with fuel and told we could not stay …. No space, nada. The wind is now blowing a hooley and it’s another 25 miles to the next port …. Philip’s persuasive skills come in handy – they’ve agreed we can stay alongside the fuel pontoon as long as we’re left first thing …. Whoops 5am next morning the engine doesn’t start again … we can’t believe this and we’re not popular! We’re now too far for our engineers to come out …. Nothing to do with them they say!! It’s now Saturday and nobody speaks a word of English – oh dear oh dear oh dear … we’re here for the duration at a very expensive marina of 38euros a night but hey an Engineer will be available on Monday!! Nothing for it, sun’s shining, it’s a quaint, picturesque town let’s just enjoy – which we did – great fun fishing with two Antonios (father & son) from the fuel office – loads of fish too and found out the fish we’d caught and eaten was actually a Bonito, a small tuna. We enjoyed the afternoon out on the dingy and by Sunday night our saviour came in the form of Jesus – an engineer by day and diving instructor at weekends – young, fit and with a long ponytail!!! He got Amy working – another 60 euros but it's still a puzzle why we're having these problems, however all should be ok now so it’s off again – hoping against hope all’s now good. We had another amazing sail, no need for the engine today – 7 ½ knots surfing the waves, 100’s of flying fish and even 40 dolphins swam with us for 10 minutes (see video) so so exhilarating and then we arrived at Almerimar and our problems really started….. huge waves, high winds and oh dear - no engine again …. Panic …. Not!!! We try to tack into the marina but no good, wind is on our nose and we kept being blown close to the rocks so as a last resort Philip had to get on the radio …. Help! It came and we’re towed in … huge relief we’re safe but a bill of 158 euros for the 15min rescue and another engineer requested – mañana!!
That was Monday and we’re now Thursday – Frank our German engineer spent the whole day yesterday diagnosing and fixing the problem – the engine had been wired up wrong in Cabo Roig!!! We’re now feeling confident all is good but as we’re so far behind time, our friends Pete & Anne on Clean Sweep, who we were due to meet up with in Gibraltar are on their way back here, so here we stay until they arrive later today or tomorrow and then we’ll be off on our way to Morocco ….. we hope 5th time lucky!!!