The final Moondance blog

Having dropped off the family and picked up Gordon we headed north to go round the top of Mallorca over the next few days and thence to Barcelona .

Heading inland on our bikes from Porto Pollenca on the north west tip of the island we stumbled across this rather splendid arch in the middle of nowhere - left behind by the Romans. It had the top corners repaired in 1850 but otherwise was original, not bad after 2000 years!

We had a good forecast of 10 knots of wind on the beam for our trip to Segur de Calafell, 30 miles south of Barcelona where our new boat to be is kept.


Half way across we picked up a couple of passengers who traveled in the rigging!












A clear starry night made for a beautiful sail arriving in the early hours of the morning and tied up at the jetty, right next to a rather smart looking catamaran, soon to ours!


We spent the following day emptying all our gear out of Moondance and into a locker room they had available in the marina; you would not believe the amount of clobber that gets tucked away on a 45' boat!

On Saturday we took the train up to Barcelona to show Gordon the sights, not least of which was Christopher Columbus telling anyone who cared to look to go west.
After Barcelona the plan was to head back to Mallorca where I would leave the boat with a broker to sell her.

I use auto gas on the boat because it is easy to fill everywhere and, wanting to keep the bottles for the cat, I put them into the lock up and turned to our little blue camping gas bottle which we carry as back up. Unfortunately - it didn't work! We changed the regulator, it didn't work. We tested the old regulator on a new bottle, it didn't work. We tried a new regulator on a new bottle, it still didn't work! Oh well, cold beans for tea tonight!


Once at sea I had a play and got a little gas out. Thinking this just be enough of a trickle to get a cup of tea I connected up to the cooker and blow me down if it didn't work perfectly! I then twigged; the reason I had got no gas flow was because when the regulator was on the bottle but disconnected from the gas system too much gas tried to flow and the regulator shut down sensing a leak - I'm wiser than I was!






Another lovely overnight sail slicing through the water at 6 knots under a star lit sky took us to Soller on the mountainous west coast of Mallorca.



What a lovely place this is. All the crowds have gone, its still 25 degrees in the sun, the harbour surrounded by very steep mountains towering over us at 3000'. We set off for a walk that after 7 hours left us both pretty sore the next day! We cheated somewhat by taking a taxi to the top and headed down - then up - then down  - then - you get the gist! Dropping off the tops we were met by an extraordinary sight - everywhere you looked the incredibly steep slopes were covered in terraces, used back in the day for growing olives.


The labour that must have gone into these, no doubt over several centuries, is mind boggling. And through it all ran an immaculately maintained cobbled path winding its way down 2000'of mountain.




 

















The following day, somewhat sore from the previous marathon we headed into the smaller hills on the coast and passed through many more ancient olive groves; these trees are said to be as old as 400 years! - if only they could talk!










Tomorrow is my last sail on Moondance as we head for the port where she will go on show to be sold but before we set sail there is another sad last. I love prawns; I remember many happy days sitting on harbour walls as a kid with my Mum sharing a pint of fresh Cornish prawns. Sadly I have recently developed an allergy that causes a horrid tingling in my mouth and throat that has stopped me eating prawns but oddly the allergy hasn't yet stretched to the king of crustacae, lobsters. It was last year in France that Melanie and I last bought a couple to boil up on Moondance; it was time for another treat before this years end.
It was just as I popped the last bit of succulent tail into my mouth and was about to break open the claws when the tingling started; I dropped the claws like a hot potatoe. No more lobster for me, a sad day indeed.






So, after 6 years of adventure and nearly 10,000 miles through 12 different countries my time with Moondance is coming to an end. I will be very sad to part with her but we are moving to a boat which, although she does not have the sailing grace of Moondance, is every bit as beautifully built and I hope Melanie will enjoy the sailing part of our adventure much more with a stable platform under her feet. I too look forward to the lack of rolling!













Something else I will miss is our dependable little pink rubber dinghy which has been Moondances  signature on her travels and has done almost every one of the miles that Moondance has done with me following dutifully in her wake!










Thank you all for reading the blog over the years and all the nice comments I have had about it.

This blog will now close but will rise again under another name!

Moondance out.

The Wrinch boys are in town!

A couple of days after the trip to see the boat Olly came out to join us on the Moondance,  closely followed by Tim and Lucy - all 3 together - a rare treat indeed!
So what happens when the Wrinch boys get together on a boat in the sun?
1. They find a BIG cliff and , well, throw themselves of it.










2. Stand on the side of the boat, put a rubber ring in the water and see if they can back flip into it

                                                                                              ... nearly got it!

Take three rubber rings, grab a rope off the back of the boat. It started mellow enough -they even got Lucy out.





 but then Olly threw the gauntlet down and shouted go ....







At 7 knots breathing became a problem!

Happily there were some mellower pastime. A sunset sail,

a balooning trip for Tim and Lucys birthdays

Sailing, and swimming- Three men and their dog!

Cool Dog or Dad?

Olly took some nice photos of Moondance in action.

On Wednesday everyone left to go their separate ways. Tim and Lucy to finish their weeks holiday in the mountains of Mallorca, Olly set off on the next leg of lifes journey to Malaga where he hopes to set up a bike park, Melanie and Woody went with Olly for a few days on the mainland.









I was joined by my old friend Gordon who arrived a little jet lagged from Canada.
No matter - fresh air, a barbie on the beach and a little beer in a beautiful calm anchorage soon had him back to sorts!

 We are now taking the next step on our two hull journey. We have shaken hands on the Privelege catamaran. She is located on the mainland just south of Barcelona (incredible luck - 100 miles away - she could have been anywhere in Europe!), we are going to sail over to drop all our gear from Moondance before putting her on the market.

One hull or two?

We had a wonderful weekend in Madrid; it was lovely to see Louisa and Richard again. Like London buses, having not seen Louisa for 20 years we have seen them twice in 2 years!











After a days rubber necking we hit the town for a fabulous tapas dinner- then on to the clubs! Well sort off, we went to a Flamenco club to watch them strut their stuff and it was impressive indeed! Real Flamenco isn't the red flouncy dresses that you see in the tourist resorts that are a poor take off of the Folie Bergere. Flamenco is mostly danced by a single male or female seriously strutting their stuff and was well likened by Richard to a David Attenborough nature show on birds puffing their chests out to impress the girls! It was very intense, fabulously noisy from the tap shoes and very engaging. We thoroughly recommend it for a nights entertainment in Madrid!












And of course, when in Madrid, you have to do the tourist bit!

Do we follow the demonstrations of the world round the world or do they follow us? From Gays and Fascists in Sweden to Gay and Lesbian parades in Paris and now independence demonstrations in Madrid!






Within 3 days of getting back from Madrid we were on the great silver bird back to the main land again, this time to Barcelona. The story to this one spreads over about a month.
Melanie doesn't like to tip on a boat, nor does she like to roll (with that I have to sympathise). Having rolled for 400 miles down the Atlantic coast of Spain and Portugal I convinced myself that it wouldn't happen in the Med; in the Atlantic we had 30 knots of wind most of the way and, well, it was the Atlantic, the Meds just a big pond right? Well yes, and the swell is smaller, but its short and its steep and within the first 200 miles into the med when my glass flew across the cockpit during a particularly big roll I just thought - this has got to stop- I don't like this never mind Melanie! The way to stop the rolling - 2 hulls - and so the decision was made, we would cash in my beloved Moondance with whom I have shared so many adventures and get a catamaran.


Coincidentally we are in the mega center of the sailing world for cats. Everywhere we anchor there is at least one cat so a little cheekily we rowed over to every cat and said hello and asked if we could take a look! There are many fewer makes of catamarans than mono hulls so very quickly we were able to home in on what we wanted. The more we homed in the luckier we got with viewings; exactly what we wanted to see would pull into the anchorage and over we would go with some beer for a look around!
The next piece of luck was that, having homed in on what we wanted, there was one available close to us just south of Barcelona so we went over to see it yesterday. So many cats are frankly floating sheds and after having had such a beautiful sea worthy boat I couldn't face one of those; we did manage to find a well built boat that did actually at least resemble a sailing boat. The angle of the photo and the 'tent' round her cockpit do not do her justice!
We liked her very much; we have put in an offer; watch this space!

On to the Balearics

The Costa del Sol is not really a cruising coast. I has no sheltered anchorages, lots of fancy marinas housing super yachts with prices to match and high rise hotels. The plan was to pass by this lot and head to Ibiza in 2 or 3 overnight hops but, having had such excellent winds behind me for a week they were about to turn against us. Gentlemen they say don't sail into the wind, the leaning plays havoc with the gin and tonic, so we decided to take advantage of 2 days of calm and motor the 400 miles to Ibiza, it would take about 2 days and nights .

Calm, easy going, no excitement - right?? It was not to be. At 6 am on the second morning whilst I was enjoying a cup of tea and watching the stars, the engine coughed, hicuped, coughed again - and died. Another blockage I thought, no big deal. I got the tools out, stripped the usual offending place for a blockage - it was clean as a whistle. Hmm. Well, I was sure it was lack of fuel so it had to be a blockage somewhere. At this point I was getting a little stressed, 50 miles from land, not a breath of wind, no engine and unsure if I could get it going again. Head down, I was sure it was fuel starvation, find the problem. I broke the fuel feed system into about 5 different section and set to giving each section the suck test - with the mark 1 mouth. How I love the taste of diesel in the morning! If I sucked diesel through then that section was clear. After 3 section3 and several mouth fulls of diesel fuel I got not a blockage, nor diesel but air - hmm, not what I expected at all. Further investigation turned up a split fuel pipe where the pipe attached to the filter - the engine was sucking not fuel but air - bingo! I cut off the end of the offending pipe, reattached it and after what ended up being a two hour stoppage as we drifted around the Mediterranean, away we went.

We arrived that evening in a pleasant cove on the island of Formentera, just east of Ibiza.
Not to be out done, Woody also had to have his own little experience with a piece of pipe. Melanie had seen him chewing a piece of pipe he had found, about 6" long and 1/2" diameter and thought nothing of it, he wasn't doing any harm chewing that. It wasn't until the next morning that Melanie thought about the pipe again when she found it left in Woodys morning pile on the fore deck - how I do not know but he had managed to swallow a 6" length of pipe, it had gone straight through him and out the other end - that is one hell of a gut that can handle that, he should have ended up in hospital! We shall be more careful in future.

We had a pleasant lazy couple of days here then headed over to Ibiza. Ibiza town, much to our surprise, turned out to be very pleasant indeed; pretty, uncrowded and a nice first taste of the Med.


We wanted particularly to spend some time in Menorca, reputedly the nicest of the Balearics, before coming back to Mallorca to meet the kids in a couple of weeks so we beatled up to Menorca in 3 pleasant days sailing in succession. The wind was on shore which sadly ruled out anchoring because there was no shelter which meant we had to go into marinas.
Our last night on Mallorca we moored up in a typical marina in typical Med fashion - sardines -  with what seemed like every other boat in the Med! How I hate marinas -get me to a pleasant Menorcan anchorage!


What a pretty place Menorca is. The coast of Mallorca was scarred all the way up by high rise hotels and beach resorts; not so Menorca where they are said to have stopped the building after the first few went up in the '80's having seen what happened to Mallorca. As a result Menorca has retained much of its island charm.

We found some lovely coves to anchor in.













We have a line from the stern to the rocks here to stop us swinging round the anchor with the wind and hitting the rocks as there is so little space.





One of the coves was surrounded by dozens of caves inhabited thousands of years ago and still used by lovers - a couple of which had left their mark in the rock!









Walking round the caves we came across this little chap scuttling into the under growth.





We had a couple of bike rides to the north side of the island and one day met up with Nigel and Ali Christopher for lunch who were out here for a holiday.


After 3 very pleasant days the weather turned and we had 5 days of damp air, no sunshine and crime of crimes - rain! Everything got pretty damp on board so when the sun came out again  yesterday and it was time to head back to Mallorca, we did our Chinese laundry bit; Woody couldn't make up his mind for all the cushions he had to choose from to sit on!

We are now on Porto Cristo on the east coast of Mallorca where we are leaving the boat for a couple of days to go to Madrid to meet up with some Australian friends who are over here for a months holiday.

To Gibraltar and beyond!

Blog 18.9.17

Back on the ocean waves! We left the boat in early July as it was starting to get uncomfortably hot. I found a boatyard on the border between Portugal and Spain who would take her out of the water and look after her for a couple of months whilst we soaked up the joys of an English summer. Just before we left, Tim and girl fiend Lucy came out to see us for the weekend. Tim brought his kiting gear, the wind blew and Tim performed! We found a sand bar where we launched Tims kite, a perfect spot for the spectators!

In the 1960’s the Californians took their girls out on surfboards; the in 21^st century……..

We planned to come out together to start the journey east but Melanie needed a little more time at home so I set off on my own to get some miles under the keel and arranged to pick up Melanie in Malaga. I put the boat back in the water on tuesday 12 September and picked up a cracking westerly wind the following day, a long but exciting 70 mile sail to Cadiz. The pilot book said that swell from passing ferries made the marina at Cadiz very uncomfortable so with a little research I discovered a very nice looking anchorage up the river but the chart showed a road bridge between the sea and the anchorage. One of the terrible shortcomings of the electronic charts I am using is that the clearance under bridges (and therefore my ability to pass under it with a 20 meter high mast) is often not shown; such was the case here; I would have to suck it and see. As I approached the bay it became apparent that I needn’t have been concerned, the Queen Mary would not have had to duck to get under this rather elegant new bridge!

Cadiz is a very old city and is yet another of the cities visited by our friend Francis Drake who had quite a penchant for beating up the Spanish…. The city is on a peninsular and was fortified from the very early days with these rather super walls; standing on the sea front I could picture the Spanish soldiers looking out to see at Drake anchored just off shore whilst he considered the possibilities of rape and pillage in the city. 

I don’t know when this tree was planted but I must have seen some things – if only they could talk!

The following day with my westerly still blowing at 20 knots I headed for the Straights of Gibralter and entrance to the Med.

25 miles from Cadiiz is the last of the great capes of Spain and the sight of the most famous naval engagement ever fought; Cape Trafalgar. I threw up a salute to our main man who copped it that day. I think today’s military would have something to say about standing on the deck of your ship wearing your admirals hat and dripping with gold braid that shouted ‘I’m the boss, shoot me’ - which of course the obligingly did!

As I rounded the cape the great Atlas mountains on the north tip of Africa came into sight; just 8 miles separate the two great continents of Europe and Africa at this point with the Straight of Gibraltar running in between. With Trafalgar on my left, Africa on my right and a spanking wind behind me we turned east towards the Med and onto the next chapter of our adventure. It was 1500 miles as the crow flies and 5000 miles sailed from my last big turning point when I turned south from the fjords of Norway 4 years ago; it was a moving moment.

At the southern tip of Spain is a small town called Tarifa where I planned to anchor for the night. I dropped my hook at about 5 o’clock and dived in for a well earned swim. As I circumnavigated the boat I noticed an ominously official looking boat making a beeline for me. Indeed it was the harbour pilot who told me I could not anchor there as it was a national park. I am sure that was tosh as these are generally shown on the chart but I had heard about belligerent spanish officials in this area who often move anchored yachts on and into their over priced marinas. I decided I wasn’t going to stay in their grotty harbour and set sail once again for Gibraltar, 15 miles away.

The rate of evaporation in the Med is considerably higher than the amount of water flowing in from its rivers. The result is a considerable height difference between the Med and the Atlantic; the water at the western (Atlantic) end of the 30 mile long straights is a staggering 2-3 meters higher than at the eastern end so as you can imagine there is a permanent easterly current as the waters of the Atlantic try to restore equilibrium. Hopping on this conveyor added another 3 knots to my boat speed and in less than an hour the great Rock of Gibralter came into sight. The Rock of Gibraltar, one of the great bastions of the British Empire and the romance of the gateway to the orient – what a let down! I have seen some hideous places in my time but this truly takes the biscuit. The bay of Gibraltar is one big tanker park with the shore line being consumed by oil refineries. The rock itself has a concrete jungle at its foot akin to Hong Kong with the slopes being carved up by roads and centuries of military detritus. If you are ever down here, give it a miss!

To just rub in the urban aggression of the place this great bully continued on a collision course with me with clearly no intention of giving way despite the right of way being clearly mine; who says size doesn’t matter?!

Furthermore, I felt something of a minnow parked in front of this super yacht!

Once there I did the tourist bit and had an interesting morning seeing the famous Gibraltar Macau monkeys and learning about the fascinating military history of the place.

I hit the road again on Monday and headed up the Costa del Sol to pick up Melanie and Woody at Malaga.