Two days on a river

Our gennaker poles were successfully delivered to Mazagon and in a spare day - while we waited for delivery - we managed to install AIS antenna, so it was a time well spent. On friday early in the morning, still in the dark, we sailed towards Villa Real de San Antonio, where we planned to spend the next night. It is a town on a Portuguese side of Guadiana river, opposite of Spanish town of Ayamonte. Approach to Guadiana river delta is very shallow, so we planned to be there at the time of high tide, at arround 1 pm. We got there in time, the water was high, but we were still quite nervous sailing through water less then 4m deep with only few buoys very far apart marking the channel. But it all went well and once there we changed the plan and continued sailing up the river to the anchorage between the towns of Sanlucar on Spanish side and Alcoutim on Portuguese side. The river is very beautiful and peaceful, a big change from windy and bumpy sailing on the sea.

In the evening there was a perfect sunset to end the perfect day. The river banks are very green and home to many birds, there was a colony of little white egrets (mala bela caplja in Slovene) right in the high water grass on the right side of the picture below. Unfortunately the light was to weak to get them on a photo.

Next day we made a little sight-seeing tour. This is Sanlucar, photographed from Portuguese side.

The river was full of boats, many being left there for winter. 

In Sanlucar we found exactly the same scooter as captain once owned - it put a wide smile on captains face.

And this is Alcoutim photographed from Spanish side.

We quickly made some friends - after eating up all of our old bread and cooked potato peels, the ducks came back every couple of hours to check if there is more ...

On saturday afternoon we sailed down the river to river delta again. The way down was even more beautiful then up, we saw countless birds, among them many herons. Unfortunately they were very shy so we couldn't get the decent photo although we tried.

Shortly before reaching the river delta we passed under the bridge - again, and again it looked as hairy as on a day before... The bridge height is 20m, out mast is 18m high....

We stayed on anchor in Guadiana delta for two nights and went to visit both towns on either bank on sunday.

This is Ayamonte....

... and this Villa Real de San Antonio.

We enjoyed both of them.

Rota to Mazagon

We arrived in Rota in marina at about 7 in the evening. From sea town looks like most of the Spanish coast - hotels and tourist development of medium uglyness. After the dinner we still went on shore to stretch our legs. And we were very surprised. Behind the first row of modern concrete buildings there was beautiful old town center. It was getting to dark to make photos of all the beautiful old buildings and pretty streets, so we decide to get up early next morning and make another stroll through the old town.

This is a covered market place - the inner yard.

This is one of the entrances.

Few shots of the streets.

A pretty entrance to a house.

Even some modern buildings were made with more taste than most we've seen.

This is probably called "Geranium alley".

On main square there is a church and a beautiful palace.

This is how palace looks from inside.

And this is one of the entrances to the church.

Rota was a real revelation and we were thrilled to discover such a beauty. From Alicante we were making 30 - 40 miles per day (with an exception or two) and we did not have much time to explore the land and this was a nice change.

Next day we planned to get to Mazagon. The wind was very weak, so we motor-sailed most of the day. Again we did stop for swimming, water was calm and warm - 27 degrees C. Atlantic ocean presented its gentle side again. 

Right in the middle of our lunch we saw a dark grey speed boat coming toward us. It was Guarda Civil, the Spanish police. They told us, that we were in the army firing practice area and that army wants us to move towards south. They were very polite, telling us exact course and range to were we need to sail to get out of the dangerous area. We altered our course, but the feeling that Spanish army has something against us got stronger and stronger. I mean, it is one thing that they circle around us with battle ships and fly the helicopters 5 m from our mast, as it happened at Garrucha, but do they really need to shoot at us? We reached the border of the shooting practice area in about an hour and the minute we reached the coordinates the shooting begun. They were obviously waiting for us to clear the area.

We reached Mazagon at around 7 in the evening. We stayed on boat, since there are only tourist developments around. Again marina is behind two giant breakers, lower being 7 - 8 m high. It made us think how it really looks here when Atlantic is not so benign. 

We are staying here for two nights since we are expecting a delivery of gennaker poles we ordered in Almerimar. And then we are sailing towards Spanish - Portuguese border.

Gibraltar to Rota

 After a well deserved long sleep we were thinking of staying on anchor in Spanish part behind Gibraltar and going on shore with dinghy. We even decided to row ashore (i promised to boys i'll do the rowing), so we tried to tie the dinghy in marina, but they didn't let us, then at sailing club, and again we were told to go away, and after an hour of rowing (now i know how the slaves rowing on galleons felt) we landed on a sandy beach. But before we draged the dinghy ashore a man came up and told us there are many thefts in the area and that he would not advise us to leave our dinghy there. We were absolutely frustrated, so we called up one of the British marinas again with little hope that they have a berth for us. But after so much bad luck we got a break - Queensway marina did have space for us, so we rowed back to out boat and in one hour we were tied to a quay right in the middle of the Gibraltar. We immediately decide to make a trip to the Rock and suddenly the day didn't seem so hopeless any more.

We took a cable car to the Rock, it is almost 500m high and we didn't feel like walking that much. The moment we stepped out there were monkeys. We were warned not to feed or provoke them as they are wild animals, but most of them seemed quite friendly. They for sure like to be photographed. 

Unfortunately the weather was not to good, there was huge cloud hanging on top of the Rock and over Gibraltar. As i said - British territory, British weather.

This is a view to the north, behind the airstrip there is already Spain.

This is view to the NW, to the British part.

This is the view to the SE, where we came from.

And this is Queensway marina - behind two sets of breakers.  Some of the swell still got in.

And this is a view to the east.

We decided to walk downwards, and again there were monkeys everywhere ...

Tomaz tried to make the cable car stop at the middle station to get the ride to the town - and he succeeded...

Matjaz and me walked all the way down. The town was a disappointment, even the old part was not very pretty.

One of the nicest part of town was the cemetery for soldiers, that were wounded in the battle for Trafalgar and died in Gibraltar...

.... and of course the botanical garden. Needless to say - i went there alone, while guys were having a beer in Italian restaurant.

There are one or two pretty historical buildings around ....

... like the town hall.

The whole tour was very nice and after two days sailing we needed the exercise. In the evening we were all tired but happy. 

Next day we left Gibraltar at noon after having a true English breakfast at the nearest restaurant - with black pudding and all. It was great, it reminded me of two months i spent in London many many years ago. We were lucky to catch the right tide and the right wind, so sailing was fast and nice. Except for some heavy traffic in bay of Gibraltar itself we didn't even have to much work throughout the whole Gibraltar straights. 

We came by the Cabo Trafalgar, not much can be seen from the sea except for this pretty lighthouse (and some hotels).

We spent the night in Barbate in Puerto Deportivo, which is some kind of town quay or town marina, with all that is available in marinas - only for half the price. Price for our boat for one night is 19 EUR (low season), which makes it easy to forget there aren't many good anchorages around. The town of Barbate didn't look like much, so we stayed on the boat and in the morning set sails towards Rota. Unfortunately the wind was weak, so we had to motor for quite a long time. But the sea was calm and warm, the sun was shining again, so it didn't bother us much. In the afternoon we had a break, we stopped the engine and went swimming. We were all surprised how calm and warm the Atlantic ocean was. We all thought that if Mediterranean is so rough and cold, the Atlantic will be even worse, being such a huge ocean. I just hope it stays this way .....

Gibraltar

We left Almerimar one day later than planned, captain found a great nautical shop and an Inox workshop there and it took time, till everything was purchased and completed.

We sailed off yesterday at about 4 in the afternoon, with weather forecast promising good strong wind from NE and also some bigger waves from E. And so it was - we were sailing with speed up to 10 knots on small flock only and waves were not to bad at the beginning. After 2 in the night the wind slowed down and at 5 in the morning it was so weak we had to start the engine. Unfortunately it stayed that way almost until we reached Gibraltar, only waves got bigger and made our trip quite uncomfortable.

There was very little traffic, a couple of cargo ships passing by in the distance and a sailboat sailing in the same direction as us. As we approached Gibraltrar, picture has changed - there were big ships everywhere, so we had to pay attention not to crash with any of them. AIS is a great help at keeping control over traffic, as well as radar.

Big waves never show very well on photos - on this photo it looks like we were on sunday walk in the park .... in fact waves were about 3m high and it was very choppy. 

It looks like British territory must have british weather - it was cloudy and hazy and the rock was barely visible.

Unfortunately both British marinas were full and didn't have berth for us, so tonight we are staying in Spanish part on anchor. Tomorrow we will take a day off to do some sightseeing and on monday - if weather and currents are in our favor - we will sail through Gibraltar straight.

From Alicante to Almerimar

We left Alicante on sunday late morning with the idea to sail to Mar Minor. It is a inner sea protected by sandy dunes and sailboats must wait for the bridge to open to get in. From looking at the area on the map we had this romantic idea that it is wild and pretty. Before noon the wind was weak, so we motored for an hour, then it was time for gennaker and as the wind was getting stronger and stronger, we soon pulled the gennaker down and sailed with small gib and the main. And it was good sailing, speed up to 9 knots, so we reached Mar Minor in good time. We were lucky to get there just in time for opening of the bridge at 5. 

Bridge looks very modern, especially with the "space shuttle" style command tower. Unfortunately our idea about the area wasn't right, there were masses of tall buildings and tourist development again, straight on the dunes separating inner and outer sea. What a pity.

Night was peaceful, we slept very well and were up early to sail under the bridge at 9. We had very good wind most of the day so we reached Cape Tinoso before 3 in the afternoon. Which was great since the bay behind the cliffs is quite pretty, no skyscrapers around, and the water was green and clean and with temperature of 26 degrees. We had a nice afternoon bathing and lazying around.

Next day we started at around 10 and headed towards Garrucha, where we were hoping we could anchor behind the breaker. With the constant wind from NE there were quite big waves from E so we tried to find sheltered bay or port for each night. Sailing was again very good, with very good speed after lazy start. The wind was better off the coast so we were sailing some 8 miles from the coast when we saw couple of army ships in front of us.  We immediately checked if we were in some zone where we shouldn't be, turned the VHF radio on if there are some announcements, but couldn't find anything. Three army ships sailed by quite close, without any sound or sign from their side, so we thought nothing of it. There was some conversation going on on VHF but all in Spanish. After a while we saw helicopter flying our way, and made three circles around our mast, one so close we thought the rotor will shred our mast. There was again some talking on VHF in Spanish and then they took off. So we thought they were just curious or included us in their drill. After some time the helicopter came back and this time they spoke English on VHF. They told us we are in the area that they are using for exercise and we should not be there and they want us to go back north. We did a tack and sailed NW closer to the coast until we decided we are far enough from them so we proceeded towards Garrucha. I would so much like to have a photo of that helicopter on our mast, but it happened so fast and i have a feeling they would not be very happy to see me taking pictures of them. After we moved away we heard on VHF how they tried to convince an Spanish fisherman to move from the area and although it was in Spanish, it was clear by the tone of the voices that the fisherman was not happy at all and he told them so with very many loud words. From what we could understand he was telling that he has some fishing to do to make his living and that army should go and play their games somewhere else.

Without further disturbances we reached Porto Garrucha at 7 in the evening. The anchorage behind the breaker at the beginning of the port was less protected than we hoped so we tied our boat to the fuel station for the night. The price was very reasonable, water and electricity included. Only one boat came in the port after us, a 42 foot Sun Odissey with a Spanish guy alone on it. We went to bed early, we wanted to make early start next morning.

We left Garrucha at 8.45 next morning and the Spanish guy on Sun Odissey left some 30 minutes behind us. He was sailing in the same direction, so after a while he caught up with us and we were sailing less that half a mile away from each other the whole day. Our original destination for the day was Almeria, but sailing was so fast that we decided to sail further to Almerimar. We thought Spanish guy is also going there and that we will have a beer together in the evening. After talking to him on VHF we learned that he is going to Malaga and then to Africa. What can i say - a brave guy and i wish him all the luck and good weather. 

We reached Almerimar at 7.30 after making almost 60 miles that day. After the dinner (i'm sorry to say that we had one of the worst pizza ever) we made some changes to our plan again. We decided to make a use of good wind while it's still lasting and sail directly to Gibraltar. We want to start this afternoon and will probably be there some time tomorrow afternoon. We checked the weather forecast today, it has changed a bit - the wind will be less strong in the night, which is ok with me, but might slow us down a bit, but there are some brutal winds forecast for tomorrow around Gibraltar - hopefully it will not be to bad. So, cross our fingers that all goes well.

Alicante

The second night on the anchor on mainland was rolly, but not extremely. We decided to wait to see the bays around Alicante before we decide wether to go on anchor or in the marina.

While leaving our anchorage i had to made some pictures to document this incredible view - i mean incredibly ugly of course. To prove my point ....

Not that there aren't any quite beautiful parts of coast - there are great cliffs .....

... even waterfalls .....

... and just around the corner - there it is again - the brilliant spanish architecture. If you enlarge the photo, you could see how tall those buildings really are.

Sailing to Alicante was not very comfortable, there were big roller waves coming from east, so i was pushing to go directly to marina. Tomaz wanted to see the only bay suitable for anchoring 3 miles before Alicante first, so we made a quick stop there. I used some gentle persuasion (like threatening with divorce) to made my point that bay was to open to the waves and so we headed on to the marina - Real Club de Regatas in Alicante. 

We stayed there for three nights and it was very nice. The club is real club with big room where gentlemen smoke cigars and drink gin&tonic, with all the trophies from club members on the wall. There is a big storage room for rowing boats, smaller sailboats and stuff in the club building on the ground floor. It has nice atmosphere and not least important - it is much cheaper than Marina Alicante, that is located in same bay only to the opposite side.

The most prominent sightseeing point in Alicante is Castillo de Santa Barbara, sitting on top of a hill in the middle of the town. We went up of course, but we cheated - we took the elevator. But we then walk quite long through the town - to get used to firm ground under our feet again.

There is a nice view from the castle. The Real Club is the smaller marina on the right side, and i'm sure by now you can tell which boat is ours.

After arrival of the third crew member and then stocking up the boat supplies, this morning we started next leg of our journey to Gibraltar. Today we had a great sailing day with not much waves and right amount of wind in right direction, sailing around 7 knots of speed in the afternoon. We are crossing our fingers that it stays like this over next few days. We are planing to reach Gibraltar in 6 days. It means quite a lot if sailing every day and even one night, but it is not to aggressive, so there will be time for eating and sleeping also - every day :-)