Tag: trawlerlife

Balearic Islands Part 2

by cruisingwithgratitude
Port of Soller at dusk

Soller, Formentor and Pollenca Mallorca


Due to the length of the post I have opted to break the Balearic Island posts into 3 different pieces – Please look back or forward to other entries on different Islands.

Recommended by 3 different people in 3 different countries, the next stop was Port of Soller, 3 km inland to the town of Soller and nestled into the side of the Tramontana mountain range. Soller is connected to the port by a little mahogany tram. Nearby villages of Fornalutx and Biniaraix and Binibassi can be easily reached by bus or taxi, In fact, for 2 Euro and 30 minutes we spent the day enjoying the UNESCO Heritage village of Fornalutx. This town most certainly made the top 3 destinations of the year in terms of charm and is a not to be missed destination should you find yourself cruising this area. Some of the best hikes we have done happened here and without much direction or planning, we ambled into the back country of the mountain finding Goats, Donkeys and a throwback to the industry before tourism, fields of olive and citrus trees. Again, due to Covid our time here can only be described as enchanting. We changed our dock reservations 4 times before and 2 times after our arrival and we were accommodated easily with each change. Certainly, a sign of the times as this is the only harbor on the NW coast offering refuge from the “mistral” which arrived this week. The town itself is loaded with a full range of restaurants and cafes to suit any budget or taste, and many were opened early enough for us to dine at our usual 1800 – BONUS!

Mistrals – interesting wind events common in the Med result in the entire lee coast becoming potentially dangerous, so we were happy to be tied safely to the dock (though the surge made us feel like we were on a rolly-ride at Disney) and made boarding via the passarelle (first time we have ever used it) a challenge. A small side note, if you read the Gibraltar post on Med mooring, you may have asked yourself how does one manage to get on or off the boat without any adjacent dock on which to jump? The answer is, of course, to jump from the swim platform off the stern or a ladder from the bow – depending on which way we back into the sea wall. This was how we did it thus far but in Soller, the sea wall had an underwater ledge that made getting close impossible and really with all of the surge, we had no choice but to employ the use of the passarelle. We have thus far been reluctant to use it– honestly it just looked too complicated and unwieldy and we just preferred to jump to the dock. That strategy would absolutely not work here thus the passarelle got dusted off for the first time in 2 years. Attached to the aft bulkhead of Gratitude via some backing plates and screws, one side of the roughtly 7 foot long walkway Is secured in this manner while the other end hangs just over the ledge on the dock side held up by bungie cords connected to the davit. It is important that the dock end not be left to ride on the pavement as the boat is in constant motion and would certainly break at least the passarelle if not damage the boat. Braun and Tina gave us a little tutoring on it and Alec felt he had a pretty good handle on it – so up it went. With Gratitude bucking and rolling even tied to the dock, boarding and disembarking became an act of care and concentration 

What makes cruising uncomfortable, made for perfect hiking weather and with an occasional mist and cooler overcast temperatures we enjoyed exploring the olive groves, windmills and wild donkeys and goats which graze freely. Recommended by new friends, we found 2 hikes and several anchorages to explore – which we enjoyed exploring when the weather calmed, and we could take out the dinghy.

So wonderful to have a pool in the back yard again! This is the first marina in over a year with a pool and we took full advantage.

Reluctant but anxious to see what new delight await us further North, we departed Soller and next made a 4 hour passage to Calle de Formentor. on the Northern tip of Mallorca, planning to be here just a few nights before jumping over to Menorca, we can already see that plan has changed – again…

Have you ever returned from a vacation and felt like you needed a vacation? Sometimes as the on board “cruise director” I can sense that my crew is feeling that way, so I like to plan in some “lay days” at anchor where we aren’t spending a fortune to NOT take advantage of the town we are in. That was my plan for Calle de Formentor because the next island, Menorca, has evidence of the oldest civilizations in the Med and according to the Islas Baleares cruising guide, “Menorca has the greatest concentration of prehistoric remains IN THE ENTIRE MEDITERRANEAN”. So we may need to arrive refreshing and ready to learn to do the exploring that this island promises even though it is one of the smaller islands, it promises to keep us busy.

Our few days of rest in Formentor became a week here. We enjoyed the rest, of course, as well as lots of snorkeling, swimming, a small bit of hiking and a trip to Pollenca. Recommended by a friend from home and a short 15 minute dinghy ride to the Port of Pollenca, we were so happy to have been warned of this spot mere miles from where we were. The port is a typical large port city – nice and with a market (you know how I love the markets!) the real gem was a 15 minute and 1.50 Euro bus ride to the old town of Pollenca. Pollenca just as with Soller, the main towns were built 7 and 3 km respectively, inland from their ports as protection from pirates. Conquered by the Romans in 123 BC, Pollenca was founded between 70 and 60 BC. The 365 steps to Calvary were so much fun to climb and the town was a true gem with adorable shops and restaurants in this ancient city. Thanks Bob and Dori for the recommendations!

Pollenca, Spain

School is beginning across the US this week and we will be continuing our plan of limited school until we are tucked into our “winter” home. Jack has been writing in his journal weekly and reading both assigned books and non- assigned fun books. We had hoped to do 3 days a week of Kahn Academy – but due to limited internet some weeks have been better than others. Still, Jack has completed nearly 50% of math for 4th grade (the grade he is “going into”) so we feel as though we are mostly current. Jack continues to learn History wherever we are, and living in and on the water is a daily Natural Science class.

As I write this we are underway to Mahon, Menorca. We hope you too are able to take advantage of the changes that this crazy Covid times are offering.

Cartagena, Spain

by cruisingwithgratitude

July, 2020

Cartagena, Spain

I’d like to start this blog by just saying we as a family have no words to express our gratitude that we are underway again. We feel in our groove again, in stride and engaged once more in the life we are living. There are a number of you reading who love the numbers so this week I’m going to start with that.

Over the past 14 months we have fueled up intermittently taking fuel at various stops from the time we left Florida until we last fueled up in Jersey, Channel Islands last October. When we fueled up in Gibraltar last week, we chose to “fill her up” as we aren’t expecting to see these prices again throughout the Med. Fuel in Gib was .40 pence/Liter. For the Americans – it’s roughly 4 liters per gallon and we took on 5200 Liters. Based on our typical usage, we aren’t anticipating needing fuel for at least another year. A typical overnight trip which we just enjoyed from Gibraltar to Cartagena, SP took 30 hours to travel 244 miles. We averaged 8.1 knots and used 198 gallons of fuel for 6.6 gallons per hour or 1.23 Nautical Mile Per Gallon. For this cost, we are essentially moving around our home and doing so very comfortably. There is nothing in the world like spending the day sightseeing, hiking or just living to arrive home to one’s own pillow, bed, and all of the full bottles of toiletries one uses to be comfortable. Preparing all of Jacks favorite meals and treats in our own galley is another of our great joys. Jack and I are the very grateful beneficiaries of the vast knowledge and dedication Alec brings to this venture. Our Gratitude has been steadily and faithfully performing beautifully since we first adopted her and that is in no small part due to the care and constant vigilance that Alec brings to his avocation. A couple of hours from the dock in Gibraltar we had a failure of the Satellite Compass – we got a “work around” allowing us to navigate using our back up flux gate compass – this worked perfectly allowing us to get to the dock but due to the Covid situation – we couldn’t really get the electronics guy to fix the problem. Alec worked around it by running Cat 5 wire from the antenna at the top of the mast through the wheelhouse port and to the processor. It’s not the most elegant solution but it is working perfectly and allowing for the electronics guy to complete the work properly at a later date when travel isn’t so onerous. In any event, the electronics guy lives in Ireland so that’s a bit of a help.

Now back to the fun stuff… Cartagena, SP

What a cool city! Inhabitants of Cartagena date back 3700 years. For our purposes though, we looked at the history dating back to when it was inhabited by the Carthaginians who built a wall in approx. 3rd century BC. Remarkably, that wall is still standing despite the failure to prevent the Romans from capturing the city and turning it into a Roman Colony around the 2nd century BC. The Arabs left their mark arriving in the 8th century AD and the Christians came later in the 13th century.

The Punic Wall (3rd Century BC)

The Roman Theatre only recently discovered

Restoration work being done daily on the ancient discoveries

The recent and modern Theatre with the ancient roman theatre in the background (right)

The stunning statue paying tribute to all of the victims of terrorism.

While uncovering the Punic wall only recently discovered, the sarcophagus was also found which was once part of the church which stood here. Before the 18th century, brothers of orders would leave offerings to pay for a mass and a place in the tomb in the church. The practice was stopped in the early 19th century.

Some of the benefits of this kind of living and teaching were apparent right away – and some others have taken time to emerge. One benefit which I only recently discovered is the wonderful gift of time to get curious. Certainly, the greatest inspiration for learning is curiosity but in our past lives, we seemed never to have enough time for our curiosity to flourish. We have noticed lately that we have a thought – or a curiosity, and then we research the answer later. We have all been enjoying this latest benefit and not more so than this past week. We were doing one of the silly bus tours where you hop on and hop off, listening to the audio recording about some given monument or building as it whizzes past at 30 miles per hour. I hate admitting this, but we love these – not for the vast knowledge that we acquire in the moment but rather the overview which we can then home in on and decide which of the local special attractions we would like to spend our time on later. Such was the case as we zoomed past a monument paying tribute to the soldiers who lost their lives in the Spanish American war. Immediately, I got curious. Hmmmm, I seem to remember something about that but…. When was that?……what was it about? The next day we did some research. On the off chance that you are as curious as I was – here are a few details. It was fought in 1898 and it started over a squirmish in Havana Harbors after an American Ship had some fire aboard. Now, at the time, Cuba belonged to Spain. The resulting war or more accurately our win, brought about an end to Spain being a world power and the beginning of America with overseas territories in Guam, Philippines, Puerto Rico and Cuba gaining their independence. For this we paid a paltry 20 Million dollars. Jack was curious about the Spanish Civil war. So interesting in that it occurred between 1936-1939. Jack immediately recognized the significance of those dates – just before the start of WW2 and it was largely due to the rise of Fascism (sound familiar) and the disparity arising between the poor and the wealthy. Essentially the poor and disenfranchised rose up. Sound familiar? seems to me that has happened in several other countries just before the fall of an empire. It happened in Russia with the Czars. Now I swear I’m not making this up and I’m sure if you are a parent you have said these words to your own child when they came to you as Jack did this week to inquire, “why do we have to spend so much time on ancient history”? There can only be 1 answer to this question, right? Writer and philosopher George Santayana is credited with this well-known – quote “Those who don’t know History are condemned to repeat it” So that begs the question – do we all need a history lesson?

The hiking here is fantastic with 5 large hills of approximately 800 feet (I know because we climbed one of them) surrounding the city. It is a bit balmy – some would say Hot but we are Floridians, so it hasn’t hit the “hot” moniker for us yet. As long as we can sit with the ports open during the day – which we have done every day – it’s not hot. We do sleep with AC at night but during the day the breezes – though warm- are comfortable.

And finally – the food – glorious food!!! Yes, we love Spanish tapas – who doesn’t right? But we still have some work to do to get our body schedule on the local schedule – the closest we have come is eating dinner just before the restaurants close after lunch. We are really going to be in for it when we get to the Balearics. The islands – (particularly Ibiza) are well known for their party ‘til you drop night clubs of which we, in a perfect world – would not be partaking. But this is not a perfect world – or is it? The nightclubs are closed due to Covid and we have every reason to suspect that the attendant crowds, of which we have been warned, will be non-existent. We shall see. You can see in the Cartagena photos that there were very few other tourists in any of the sites we visited yet most of my research indicated ways to avoid the crowds – as though that was something one might want to do. Certainly, the cruise ships which normally occupy a large part of the port were non-existent during our visit as were the several thousand occupants which pour through the port doors when a ship is in town. According to the BBC, roughly 35% of the Balearic Island economic output is in tourism and there has been a grand effort to save some of this year’s revenue lost due to Covid but also according to the same BBC News article, there has long been an agenda by the locals and the Balearic islands’ tourism board to get away from the party –“ booze tourism” crowd inundating the islands every year in search of a more upmarket crowd. I can hardly wait to see what awaits us at the anchorage.

Our plan is to spend several days at anchor and minimize our time at the docks. The reasons for this are many – but primarily, in addition to enjoying our times at anchor – especially in warmer weather where we can just jump in the water and have a swim, the dockage in the Med is very expensive. Since we left Florida, we haven’t spent nearly the budget for dockage that we spend in the US. And this is true for most of Northern Europe – but not so for the Med where dockage expenses range from the pricey to the insane – think basic Bahamas or Nantucket. The cruising guides and all empirical knowledge from friends warn that dockage and anchorage space is incredibly limited in July and August, but we are hoping that this Covid thing is going to cause the exception. We will let ya know…

So we are currently off the Spanish Coast heading for the Balearic Islands due in tomorrow morning.

So very nice getting back into the swing of things…