Heron is home!

The bay we found on Saturday afternoon was really pretty, but unfortunately very rolly. We were really tired, were starting to get grumpy and snappy, and we really wanted a good and peaceful night. We were considering moving to another bay, but we didn't know the situation there either. When we saw that the neighboring boat had Slovenian flag, we invited the crew for a beer and it was decided - we were staying. We had a nice evening with fellows cruisers, but not so great night, we were waking up a lot.

We departed early in the morning, passing some nice cliffs and rocks.

We talked about sailing North along the Italian coast, weather forecast was not very good, and we heard from our neighbors last night that they had a terrible night passing Adriatic on Friday with wind gusts up to 50 knots.

We sailed towards Ancona first and saw a lot of boat garages. I think some are being used as small beach houses now. But I like how colorful they are.

I was just wrestling with Italian mobile Internet and publishing the previous post when captain informed me there was a change of plans - we are crossing Adriatic towards Istria, Croatia. I was not very happy, I really didn't like the weather forecast, but I had to agree the route was much shorter. 

So we steered away from the shore. Wind was on the nose again, of course, but not very strong and the waves were bearable. We managed to motor-sail most of the time. In the evening there was the red sunset again. But I knew by now we have to wait until morning to see how the next day was going to be. 

 Night was not too bad, despite bad forecast and warnings on Croatian radio, that there is a possibility of strong wind gusts up to 40 knots. There were gusts of wind, it went from 3 to 25 knots, and it changed direction by the second, so after hand-steering for some time - autopilot couldn't cope with sudden wind shifts and changing speed - I rolled the genoa in and switched on the engine.

Captain took over from me little before 4.00 in the morning. There was a red dawn again. This is taken when the sun was already up over Piran, Slovenija.

The weather was true to that old saying again. NE wind was up again, over 30 knots of it, and it was a wet and wild ride to Monfalcone, Italy.

In one of the canals we found home for Heron, at least for a while, in Nautec Marina.

We are heading home in the afternoon. Next days we will be coming back to Heron often, we want to bring back home all the clothes, tools, books, etc., to be able to clean Heron thoroughly. And to do a lot of boat projects. And then to only bring on board stuff that is absolutely needed.

There will be some celebration in the next days, but today we're too tired to think about that. Even too tired to feel the satisfaction and pride about what we achieved. But I'm sure that will come soon.

There is still a lot of untold stories from our journey I would like to post here. And probably we will want to proudly present the results of our boat improvements. And the stories will emerge from our weekend sailing or other trips. So this isn't over yet, there's more to come.