Cala de la Calobra (Torrente de Pareis) - Around Mallorca beach by beach

August 22 -2012

The forecast for Wednesday was no wind but when we motored out of the inlet and cleared the high cliffs of the headland we found ourselves in a very handy 15+knots of breeze. The sail bag was unzipped and the mainsail raised in a flash. Unfurling the genoa followed very smartly and we were soon zooming along at 6 to 7 knots the way a good yacht should. This time the wind held for a few hours before slowly fading away. We were determined to sail as long as we could but when our boat  speed fell to 1.99kts Rob hit the starter button and we motored to our next stop at Cala de la Calobra.

Described in the pilot guide as ‘a large and spectacular cala …with several mini bays and a slit through the high rocky cliffs behind, through which the Torrente de Pareis (more often a gentle stream) enters the sea. The Torrente de Pareis is considered one of the sights of Mallorca and is a popular destination by road and sea.’

Approaching Cala de la Calobra we didn't realise what was in store for us.

With a wrap like that we really didn’t want to sail past without stopping so thought we’d just pop in for a quick lunch and have a look at the place before heading on to Port Soller.  However, once we made our way into the bay and took a look around it was so amazing we quickly decided to stay the night.

Cala de la Calobra - Torrente de Pareis
whatever you call the place it's spectacular.

The gap in the cliffs may be where the river runs into the sea during the wet season but now in summer it was a stony beach packed with sun lovers. Behind this beach we could see a fresh water lagoon where the river temporarily terminates after flowing through the very high but narrow canyon stretching away into the mountains. It’s a truly spectacular sight from the water but to be honest, it didn’t matter which way you turned, you were always met with an incredible vista.

We really enjoyed our stop at Cala de la Calobra  (Torrente de Pareis)

We were able to anchor not far from the beach in the shadows of the enormous, vertical cliffs. The beach is tiny and along the water line was packed wall to wall with people so we took the dingy a short trip around a point to where the tourist boats dock. There’s a number of restaurants here and we chose one with a great view over the water for a relaxed lunch. Then it was time to go exploring.  A path leads from this mini-bay to a pedestrian tunnel cut through the rock to the river canyon. Exiting the tunnel and looking across the lagoon to the canyon is a real experience.

Alcheringa (left) viewed from inside the tunnel at Cala de la Calobra (Torrente de Pareis)

Marc leading the way through the tunnel at Cala de la Calobra (Torrente de Pareis)

Brochure shot

We wandered around the beach and lagoon for a while then made our way back to the boat and had a nice refreshing swim off the stern. What was left of the afternoon and that evening was spent just relaxing and trying to soak up the natural wonders surrounding us.

Rob enjoying an early evening swim

We were still on a perfect score. Every anchorage on this trip had outdone the previous.

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Cala Barcas & Cala Figuera - Around Mallorca beach by beach

August 20 - 21

On Monday morning Rob played the role of the alarm clock grouch and was up early putting the kettle on and rousing Karen and Marc out of bed. By now he’s well aware that there’s no chance of getting any productive input out of either of his crew mates until they’ve had at least one strong, morning coffee and preferably two so the fastest way to get the boat underway is to have the cups poured as they exit their cabins.

We’d identified a few potential anchorages along the east coast of Mallorca but until we saw exactly how protected from the easterly winds predicted for that evening we weren’t exactly sure how many miles up the coast we were going to have to go in the day. As a result we had the anchor up and were underway in the half light of the predawn despite the protestations of two tired meerkats who rather have still been curled up in their burrows.

Click on any photo to see larger versions

We motor around the light house on the south east tip of Mallorca just after sun up and then pointed the bow north up the east coast. There are many lighthouses marking the headlands along the way along this coast, most of which is lined with sheer cliffs rising out of the sea that have been battered by waves for centuries. There are however a number of small calas or bays and a couple of larger harbours.

Much of the east coast of Mallorca is cliff lined

Unfortunately a number of the better harbours don’t have any options for anchoring and you must use the expensive marinas which doesn’t suit our cruising style or budget. As a result we’d chosen from our pilot guide one of the small bays amost half way up the coast, Cala Magraner as our first option for the night. We arrived after lunch and carefully made our way into the bay between the high cliffs. It was a narrow but very beautiful place well sheltered from the expected winds that night but there were five boats already anchored. We performed a couple of very slow, tight circuits and decided we’d move on. There was room for us to anchor but not with the amount of swing room we prefer to have for safety overnight and although it was very likely some if not most of the boats would head home by sunset we just didn’t want to be caught in an unsafe position if they didn’t.

Our option B was the larger harbour of Porto Petro a few miles north which did offer one anchorage area apart from the marina. As we exited Cala Magraner we decided at the last minute to poke our nose in the next bay along,  Cala Barcas, and just have a look. What a great idea. This was a wider bay than Magraner but because of the high cliffs at the entrance we were confident it should be well protected through the night. Although there were plenty of smaller boats out on the water it was clear they wouldn’t be staying and we were able to anchor with good room around us anyway.

Marc and Karen on the paddles taking photographer, Rob, to the sea cave
to get a very different pic of Alcheringa.

The bay was totally undeveloped with just a walking track in from the road well behind. There were no cafes, bars or the near obligatory sunbed hire operation but only one enterprising couple selling cold drinks and baguettes from under a canvas awning tied to a rock. Despite this it was still very busy on the beach with a lot of people simply having a good time. A massive sea cliff complete with a very large cave stretched along the northern side of the cala which we had a great time snorkelling along and into. Great care had to be taken with your timing entering and exiting the cave though as it was extremely popular with rock climbers and cliff jumpers.

The climbers and jumpers provided us with plenty of entertainment
at Cala Barcas

The object of the game appeared to be reaching the other side

Fail

It really was a fantastic spot to spend the afternoon and night and another case when a second option can turn out definitely being for the best. As the sunset most but not all of the people departed. We discovered an interesting little community of alternative lifestylers (what we in Australia call ferrels) had set up camp on the beaches and soon had their fires burning high and serenaded us with bloody bongo drums half the night.

Sunrise at Cala Barcas - Mallorca

Well after sunrise next morning the beach was littered with sleeping bodies wrapped in blankets and just a single soul showing signs of life meditating on the waters edge. After having his sleep seriously impaired with the bongo drums Rob was keen to test out our fog horn as payback but Karen felt that would be a little too anti-social.

The evening’s predicted wind had failed to materialise and the day had dawned with glassy flat seas so unfortunately we were once again reliant on burning fossil fuels for forward motion rather than the sails. We had a fairly uneventful trip up the rest of the coast until performing our first rescue at sea, sort of. We were nearly a mile offshore passing by a very wide bay lined with large, high-rise resorts when Karen spotted something strange in the water ahead. Quickly the binoculars came out to assist with the identification of said floating object. No question about it. The poor thing had been blown out from one of the resort beaches and was at serious risk of being lost at sea. We sprang into our man overboard procedures to render immediate assistance. With much skill and heroism we had that air mattress safely aboard within minutes.

As we motored around the high cape of the north eastern corner of the island the stillness was suddenly broken by a just mild breeze at our backs but after two days of motoring weren’t going to waste it. Out came the asymmetric spinnaker and up she went. The silence was glorious as the engine went off and the breeze pushed us along at a modest three to four knots. Sheer heaven – for twenty minutes then it all disappeared as quickly as it came and we were left to pack it all away again and restart the cast iron topsail (engine).

We soon anchored in Cala Figuera, a long, narrow inlet surrounded by towering cliffs with a nice little beach at the head.

Alcheringa with the towering cliffs of Cala Figuera

Once more we were all settled in with plenty of time for some great snorkelling in perfect clear water exploring along the sea cliffs, caves and underwater stone archways we were able to swim through. We were finding it hard to believe but each anchorage we arrived at on our circumnavigation of Mallorca seemed to be even better than the last.

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Playa del Trench - Around Mallorca beach by beach

Playa del Trench - Around Mallorca beach by beach

August 18-19 2012

We said goodbye to Palma, again, and headed east, sort of. We were in for a  big day’s upwind sailing in 18 to 20 knots so started with a long tack out off the coast. The sun was shining and the day quite warm so it was fairly pleasant with the boat powered up under sail, healing nicely and slicing through the moderate seas.

Rob making sure we're highly visable on the
water via his favourite boardies.

We were all fairly relaxed, cruising along on the autopilot until the boat suddenly turned through the wind all by itself performing an unplanned tack and back sided the sails. Rob quickly jumped to the wheel and gybed us through a 360 to get things back under control with no damage done. Fortunately the first thing we did when we bought Alcheringa was rig a ‘preventer’ which stops uncontrolled and very dangerous swinging of the boom across the boat in this sort of situation. It really paid off in this instance but we were at a loss to explain what had gone wrong. Our best guess was that someone may have bumped the button on the binnacle turning the autopilot off.

With everything settled we again began to relax only for the boat to perform the same unwanted manoeuvre again about thirty minutes later. Now we were concerned. Once we had the boat back on track we had someone at the helm at all times while we started working through the possibilities. We then noticed that that heading shown on the autopilot didn’t agree with the compass. Not a good sign. Maybe something was wrong with the GPS antennae or system itself. Could we continue or would we have to head back to Palma and try and find an electronics technician that wasn’t gone on August holidays with the rest of Europe. We were already speculating that Alcheringa was fitted with a homing device that made her continually return to Palma the way a riding school horse always heads for its stable at the first opportunity and this appeared further proof to the theory.

We checked the aerial connections, they looked fine. We checked the plotter, our position seemed right but the bearing was odd. Think tanking what could be wrong Rob speculated that something could be interfering with the system as it had worked perfectly until now. What had changed? The actual control boxes for the GPS are fitted in the back of Karen’s locker and clearly marked with a warning not to place anything magnetic near them. Had anything magnetic been put in her locker? Karen was adamant that no there were no magnets in there.

We decided to push on to our planned anchorage at Playa del Trench near the south-eastern corner of the island and see what developed. If need be we could return to Palma the next day. The autopilot continued to give false readings and twice more suddenly steered well off course and Rob finally asked Karen, ‘Are you sure there’s nothing different in your locker?’. To which she replied indignantly, ‘I told you. There are no magnets in there. All I’ve stowed in that locker that wasn’t there before are the electric fan and mini vacuum cleaner we bought in Palma last stop.’ Uh Huh!!!!

After explaining to Karen that electric motors such as found in vacuum cleaners and fans contain very strong magnets in their electrical windings, both offending items were moved to the other side of the cabin and guess what, problem solved.

So with lots of tacking back and forward through the day we sailed 39 nautical miles at an average of 5.1knots to cover the 24 nautical mile journey. Our track data recorded a highest speed of 8.1knots which is good for our type of boat into the wind. More importantly though, in between our autopilot dramas Karen caught our first fish in the Mediterranean. There was much jubilation as she pulled in onboard. Rob then poured a bit of Gin into its gills to pacify it before Karen did her beheading and eviscerating trick . Marc was horrified at what he referred to as a waste of perfectly good alcohol but it is much less messy than having the fish flapping all over the teak decks spitting blood everywhere while you try to bash it into submission.  Marc seemed satisfied when Karen suggested we were simply advance marinating the fish.

Our first fish caught in the Med. Tasty little bugger too..

The beach at Playa del Trench stretches forever.
It is a great anchorage during easterly winds too

Anchored off the very, very long sand beach of Playa del Trench well populated by yet more naked Spanish Senors and Senoritas, we enjoyed G&T sundowners before tucking into our Gin infused fish as an appetiser followed by a fine paella that Karen served up as we watched the obligatory colourful sunset in the west.

9.35PM and a very different sunset this time.

We spent Sunday morning lazing on the boat then went in to the beach for a walk along the sand and a swim. Well that’s what we did. Marc actually embarked on a Mallorcan version of the great march and walked about three kilometres to the southern end of the beach before retracing his steps and heading the two kilometres or so along the sand to the north calling into every beach bar along the way in a desperate quest to buy a cigarette lighter. An item he’d neglected to purchase when he stocked up on his cancer sticks in Palma. Fortunately for his sanity and ours he found a small convenience store just past inland from the north end of the beach. At least he got his exercise for the day.

Alcheringa happily at anchor off Playa del Trench

The local traditional style boats here are so cool.

Back on the boat we were having one of our semi-regular AFDs (Alcohol Free Days) and broke out the agua con gas (sparkling water) with dinner but following the stressful afternoon our fellow Meerkat  afloat had experienced he was not having a bar of such stupidity and was quick to have the cork out of a bottle of vino tinto (red wine).

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Back to Palma Mallorca - AGAIN

 August 16-17 2012

On Thursday morning we finally dragged ourselves away from Cala Portals and headed the short trip back across the bay to Palma. Marc was arriving back from the UK that evening and if everything went to plan we’d be getting our radio back and hopefully having a new battery charger fitted. Then we could fill the boat to the brim with provisions and head for Menorca and on to Sardinia to really get this cruising business started.

We were really looking forward to this next stage of our Mediterranean adventures but a text message we received as we entered harbour put a hold on things. The radio was still not back. It may have been with them for over two weeks but that didn’t matter. Europe closes for August. Quite simply everybody including huge companies simply shut up shop for the whole month and go on holiday. Our radio was apparently sitting on a bench in a deserted workshop at Raymarine somewhere and Walter our marine electrician held little hope of seeing it before September. Definitely not the news we wanted. We were going to have to spend another two weeks in Mallorca at least and we could see summer slipping away.

We decided to provision the boat anyway so hit the supermarket with a big 700 Euro shop. Thank goodness for home delivery. The lot was delivered right to the boat that evening. We welcomed Marc back just in time for him to help load it all onboard. It was just what he needed after a flight from London of course.

We settled in for a few catch up drinks in the cockpit after dinner when a three parts drunk Scott from a charter boat down the dock decided to invite himself to the party. Everybody on his boat had gone to bed so he arrived at ours with a bottle of Gin and many tales about his life. He was harmless so we humoured him until we really wanted to go to bed and indicated so. It wasn’t until next morning that we realised he’d not only left with his Gin but also our tonic and a glass to drink it in.  Thanks Joe from Glasgow.

We really didn’t want to be in the marina on Friday because that’s when all the charter boats come back in and the place turns into an absolute zoo but we were hopeful of at least coming up with a battery charger to make some progress. A morning of chasing proved fruitless with the same response everywhere, ‘August, gone holiday. Come back next month.’

Some of the 'Jeanneau' letters were missing so we decided to remove the rest
but at one stage this is what we had. Jean from Doubletime will be impressed.

We did however have another great lunch at our local in next marina with their menu of the day. It’s hard to beat 9.50 euro for a starter of a huge plate of Paela, a second course of chicken or fish followed by desert and all accompanied by a bottle of wine and water.

Enjoying sundowners that evening we were relieved not to have another visit from Joe but some French charterers from one of the boats did come over and ‘borrow’ some orange juice as they needed it desperately for their vodka. Next morning as they were packing everything off their boat and getting ready to leave they come over to tell us they have some food leftover from their week on the boat, would we want it. So Karen wandered over to have a look only to learn they wantedr to sell it to us. Thanks but no thanks and hope you choked on the orange juice.

It was definitely time for us to get the hell out of there. We had time to kill before we had to come back to Palma yet again so we were going to circumnavigate Mallorca. Throw off the lines, all ahead slow.

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Some Naked Sailing - Just the two of us for a while turning white bits brown

August 7-15 2012

After a very busy day in port we left Palma on Tuesday morning. As our crewmate, Marc, had flown off to London for a few days, we were having our very first ever sail totally on our own. Rob handled the lines and Karen helmed the boat off the dock, through the harbour and out into the bay. With a 12 to 15 knot easterly blowing we’d decided to head back to the shelter of Santa Ponsa for our first stop.

The wind was blowing from right behind us so we tacked out off the coast then went wing on wing with the mainsail out the starboard side, the genoa out the port and ran dead down wind. Unfortunately we don’t have a spinnaker pole on Alcheringa yet but even without poling out the headsail it held beautifully in the moderate breeze all the way across the bay to Punta de Cala Figuera, the cape on the south west corner of Mallorca. 

It was another clear, sunny day and a good opportunity to work on tanning our white bits although Karen insisted a keen lookout was maintained so she could cover up whenever a boat closed within half a mile.

We rounded the lighthouse on the cape and then had a nice broad reach flying the asymmetric spinnaker along the west coast back up to Santa Ponsa. We had no dramas this time and were able to anchor in almost the exact spot we’d been only a few days before. It was as nice a day’s sailing as we could ever ask for and a real confidence builder handling  the boat two up.

Getting some sun on an empty sea.

An elegant lady we passed entering Santa Ponsa - Mallorca

Just outside Santa Ponsa

We went ashore for the afternoon and had a wander around a few more of the streets and enjoyed a nice cheap early dinner ashore. Karen was also a pretty happy girl having found a beauticians and was able to get an appointment for the important job of getting her legs waxed first up the following morning. This would still give us plenty of time to get further up the coast to our next stop.

We had a very peaceful night until the nightclubs emptied out about 6.00 and the streets became alive with drunk Irish and Brit tourists. Fortunately no wars broke out but if we hear one more loud, drunken rendition of ‘We are the Champions’ we may not be responsible for our actions.

It's a bit freaky looking across Santa Ponsa and seeing the bay full of VW Beetles

After breakfast Karen duly got de-furred and then we headed out to sail up the west coast to San Telmo. Unlike the day before, this time the wind was very unco-operative. It was right on the nose as we left the anchorage then as we turned so did it. We motored across the large bay with the thought that we’d be able to sail once we rounded the point. The bloody wind turned as we turned again. Realising it was out to get us we gave up on the idea of sailing and motored our way the short distance up to San Telmo.

Rob with the San Telmo anchorage in the background

Like Formentera, San Telmo has restricted anchoring in areas of sea grass and a number of moorings which have to be pre-booked. Not wanting a repeat of our run in with the anchor nazi, this time we’d actually gone on line and had booked one of the moorings. When we arrived we wondered how we’d find mooring 8B amongst the bay full of floating plastic balls and started idling around trying to spot the numbers. Then we spied a sight to instil fear and dread into our very beings. Speeding from the shore towards us was exactly the same type of RIB (Rigid Inflatable boat) as driven by our jackbooted nemesis on Formentera. Not again.

But this time the government official had obviously been trained in a different place. He really could not have been more helpful. He guided us over to our mooring and waited to see if we needed help to get organised.  Picking up moorings is not exactly new to Karen as it’s a skill she learned on her parents’ game fishing charter boat long before high school and as Rob slowly nudged the bow onto the upwind side of the floating buoy she very quickly pulled it on board with the boat hook. Our attendant made us feel very good about ourselves as he even complimented us on the boat handling and mooring pickup.

Later when Rob went for a snorkel to make sure we were happy with the strength of the mooring we found out why. The attendant obviously witnesses many failed attempts. The sea bed was littered with boat hooks people had obviously dropped trying to pick up the mooring buoy. Pity they were fourteen metres down and way too deep for Rob without scuba otherwise we’d be boasting a very nice collection now. We then watched as the man we soon dubbed the Anchor Angel in contrast to the Anchor Nazi, went up to arriving boats that didn’t have moorings booked, explained the regulations to them and then guided them to where they could anchor legally and safely away from the sea grass area. Now that was more like it.

San Telmo, or Sant Elmo, depending on which book or sign you read, is a very beautiful spot with more of the crystal clear water we’ve got used to. We went  for a great snorkel one and a half kilometres all the way around a small island in the middle of the bay and then had a nice dinner and sun downer drinks for two on board.

The island we snorkelled around at San Telmo

It was the first time we’d had Alcheringa on a mooring and considering small swell running and slight breeze it actually provided us with a very comfortable night. Each morning since Marc had returned to the UK we had emailed him the Navionics track of where we’d sailed the previous day so he could see where we were and got all the track info such as distance travelled, average speed, highest speed etc.. After our first day on the mooring Karen emailed him the track.  It showed a series of lines that all merged together to form a large dot centred on the mooring. Incredibly we’d actually got up to 2.5knots across the ground at one stage as we swung with the wind and current. Marc got a giggle out of it anyway.

We had a quiet second morning on the mooring and Rob and finally got some blogging done. Mid afternoon we headed ashore for a look around the town but ran out of fuel in the outboard about two thirds of the way in. Bugger! Rob had been sure there was plenty left in the tank. Yeah right!

Someone got creative at San Telmo beach

So after paddling the rest of the way in we found the town extremely nice. There was only one small resort on the southern end of the beach and the main street was all paved and lined with nice cafes, shops, a great bakery and some even better gelato stores. It was also a vehicle restricted area, very few cars making it very pedestrian friendly.

San Telmo is a lovely little town

We came across a beautiful mosaic commemorating King Jaimie 1^st of Aragon arriving with his fleet here in the 1200’s  on his way to drive the Moors out of Mallorca. Hang on isn’t this a groundhog day moment. Hadn’t we seen a monument commemorating the same thing at Santa Ponsa? A proud local café owner explained that the King may have landed his troops at Santa Ponsa but San Telmo was definitely his first landfall on Mallorca. He anchored here for a few days and then moved down the coast to get serious. Makes sense. This was a great spot for some R&R before waging war after all.

We wandered around trying to buy some petrol but unfortunately the fuel station was in the main town a few kilometres inland so we had to paddle back out to the boat moored about 300 metres offshore against the wind. Bugger! Bugger! With much effort we made about two thirds of the distance before our Anchor Angel arrived with his rib and towed us the rest of way. He’d left us to it until then because he thought we had everything under control but as the wind got stronger he saw we were actually being blown backwards towards the beach again.

You can only stay on the moorings for two nights and we had planned to sail on further than San Telmo but next morning there was no wind so we decided to just move the boat in close to the beach and anchor in a patch of sand near the swim line. There’s very little anchorage space and it’s usually filled quickly with the influx of smaller pleasure boats each morning so we moved early before day trippers arrived and had the pick of the place.

It was so nice here in fact that we ended up staying another couple of very enjoyable days in San Telmo doing not a lot other than swimming, snorkelling and soaking up the Mediterranean sun with a book..

That's what you call a house with a view - Mallorca West Coast

On Sunday morning we set off to sail back to Cala Portals, the nice little bay we stayed in when we first left Palma. As the wind was predicted to swing to the north, it would be a well protected spot  to sit out a few more days waiting for Marc to return. There was no wind to begin with but then it picked up and we had a great day light airs sailing around the coast. It’s great when there’s no rush and we can just make the most of what breeze there is. 


We arrived after many of the day boats had departed and dropped anchor right in close to one of the beaches. Yes OK. It was the nude beach packed with naked Spaniards of all ages, shapes and sizes but we chose it because it was the most protected from the wind and swell. Really!

Enjoying a skinny dip at Cala Portals. Karen had given up on the half nautical
mile clearance while naked by this stage. When in Spain do as the Spanish do.

We never troubled the anchor winch again for four glorious days of skinny dipping, blogging, reading, working on our all over tans and watching the daily parade of visitors arrive by boat and down the cliff paths to the beaches. Each evening after the bay emptied of vessels and people we enjoyed the solitude and just being us on Alcheringa with nice food and local wines.  Life afloat is good.

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Each night when the sun went down we had Cala Portals to ourselves.
Oh the serenity!!!!!

Back to Palma Mallorca

August 5-6 2012

What a surprise! There was no wind again next morning so it was once more a motor powered trip around the south-west corner of Mallorca back to Palma, back to the La Lonja Marina and back on the exact berth Alcheringa had come from. We were moored by Sunday lunchtime and made good use of the fresh water available to do a major clean of the boat. It may have taken a few hours but it was fantastic to see her looking very spic and span again.

La Lonja Marina caters predominantly for charter yachts but fortunately for us they were happy to have us stay as the boat had originally come from there. As a result our mooring fees were less than a third of what we would have had to pay at the nearby Club Nautica Marina. Never the less we were trying our hardest to minimise our time in port and maximise what we got done in that time.

We were back exactly where it had all started

Next morning Marc was heading back to London, we needed to get the windlass fixed, get the MMSI number on the VHF radio changed to our newly assigned one, find out if our now lifeless battery charger could be coaxed back to life and do nearly a month’s washing. We wanted to get all that done in the day so we knew we were going to be busy.

On Sunday afternoon we noticed a boat on one of the other fingers in the marina flying an Australian flag on the stern and Boxing Kangaroo from a shroud line. It was the first Aussie flagged boat we’d spotted here so we just had to go over and say ‘Geday!’  Aussies being such a hospitable mob, this of course quickly turned into sundowner drinks with Alan and Gloria from Adelaide on their Moody Deck Salon “Just in Time Too”. We had a great evening chatting away about where they’d been and planned to go with their boat and the same from us. It was extremely enjoyable with time passing so quickly it was quite late by the time we returned to Alcheringa to get some much needed sleep before the big day awaiting us.

Monday did not start as well as planned when we got up in the morning  to find the boat buried in layers of red dust blown in from Sahara Desert on a strong southerly Sirocco wind overnight. Bugger!! So much for  the big clean we’d done the previous afternoon.

It was washing day for Karen so first thing, the three of us lugged five huge bags of washing to the laundromat where she then spent all morning and into the afternoon fighting the boatie hordes. You can’t leave your washing unattended at all or you’ll find your clothes out of the machines and piled in a corner somewhere. She did meet an American cruiser, Scott, though and the two formed their own AUS/USA alliance so they could at least take turns to leave and get a cold drink or take a comfort stop. Scott used to crew on boats much like we’d done but had now bought a Bennateau and was out cruising with his wife and young kids. While their respective linen, t-shirts and underwear went around and around they were able to have a long chat comparing past cruising experiences and found we’d visited many of the same ports in South East Asia

Meanwhile Rob was back at the boat handling the electrician, a German named Walter who fixed the windlass by fitting a new relay, pronounced that the battery charger was probably deceased but he’d take it back to his workshop to see what he could do and removed the radio for its number change. He explained he couldn’t reprogram the VHF radio on the spot because it had to have the old number reset by Raymarine, the manufacturer. This prevents people being able to reprogram stolen units and has cut theft considerably since the system came in. He’d send it away then put in the new number when it came back. When Rob asked the obvious question, ‘How long?’ Walter said it normally took a week. This didn’t seem to present too much of a problem because we’d be back in about ten days or so to pick Marc up.

 Rob then went and bought a hand held VHF radio to use in the meantime and which we’d always planned to get as a back up anyway. In between humping bags full of clean washing back from the Laundromat every couple of hours he filled the rest of his time in on the never ending job of polishing the stainless on the boat.

Meanwhile Marc, who had a thing about being early to airports just in case, took taxi at 9.30am for his 12.30pm flight. It’s only a fifteen minute ride to airport so he was in no danger of missing his flight, particularly when he arrived to find out it had been delayed for 3 hours. Make that 3 ½ , no 4, OK 4 ½ hours. By the time he got to London then caught a train out to Buckinghamshire there were no taxis about and he had to walk two miles home - over the hills – in the rain.

Polishing stainless and doing the washing was probably not so bad after all. After all, we were done, dusted and settled in with a refreshing glass of white long before our high flying meerkat mate dragged his cold and waterlogged body through his back door at home.

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Ibiza to Santa Ponza, Mallorca

 

August 3-4 2012

With the days just starting to get shorter, we rose at dawn preparing to up anchor and say goodbye to Ibiza and by about 7.30am we were on our way back to Mallorca. We had to return to Palma to get a growing list of little jobs done and Marc had booked to fly back to London for a week or so to tidy up a number of loose ends at home. Rather than going straight to Palma though we had picked the large and well protected bay at Santa Ponsa on the west coast of the island as our landfall. This shortened our passage by a few hours and Marc wasn’t flying out to the 6^th so there was no rush.



We motored away from Cala Boix in dead calm but the predicted winds came good and before too long we picked up enough breeze. With full sails set we were getting along nicely so all settled in for our passage and watched the mountains of Ibiza grow smaller over our stern. The wind provided a good sail for about 5 hours before it both swung and dropped in strength so alas we had to resort to motor once more for the last couple of hours.

While we always prefer to sail all the way, motoring a little at each end of a trip is no real problem because we have to run the engine for a bit morning and afternoon to charge our batteries. It’s probably better to be actually going somewhere when the motor’s going than sitting at anchor with it chugging away disturbing the serenity.

We arrived Santa Ponsa in good light a bit before 7pm having logged 55.6 nautical miles for the day.. This bay is where King Jaimes 1^st of Aragon brought his fleet in 1200s to land and drive the Moors out of Mallorca. A monument to commemorate the occasion is very prominent out on the point.

Santa Ponsa itself is located around a big rectangular inlet at the head of the much larger bay. Our charts showed  some shoals in centre of the inlet but good depth past them so we headed into the left side of the inlet skirting the shallows and looking for a good spot to park for a couple of nights. As we slowly rounded what was shown as the end of the shoals the depth gauge went from five meters under the keel to point five almost instantly.  Realising very quickly that no good can come from this we immediately went into reverse but not quite in time. We felt the very lightest of touches as they keel made contact with the sea grass bottom.

Gunning the engine in reverse produced no result. We were stuck. Bugger! Running aground is never part of any sailors’ plans and was definitely not on our agenda. As we discussed various strategies to get back into deeper waters, we spotted a ski boat heading our way. Perfect. As it went past and its wake reached us it lifted the boat just enough for us to ease back off the weed covered sand bar and back into safe waters.

We sheepishly looked around and wondered how many people had spotted our faux pas and retraced our route out to the bay entrance. We then re-examined both the charts and the pilot guide and all came to the same conclusion that both showed we should have had a couple of meters where we had rubbed the bottom.

We weren’t going to take any chances the second time though and entered on the opposite side of the inlet. We made our way very slowly through the anchored boats and found a nice patch of sand to drop in about four meters of water. Rob snorkelled as usual to make sure we were securely hooked in but this time also made a close inspection of the keel looking for any sign of damage. Fortunately our soft contact with the thick kelp on the bottom hadn’t even rubbed any of the anti-foul paint off so we were very thankful we’d been going slowly and not run right up on the shoal. Interestingly, where we were currently sitting in a bit over four metres of water, the charts indicated a depth of two meters. It’s safe to say we now treat all charts as a guide rather than gospel.

Santa Ponsa is actually a very well protected anchorage with good secure sand bottom. It has a very long sand beach at the head of the inlet and a number of high rise resorts lining the northern shore. After our trip from Ibiza we had a quiet evening watching the sunset and enjoying the calm of the bay.

Santa Ponsa provides a very well protected anchorage

Late next morning we went ashore for a look around and in search of a cheap lunch. The road behind the beach was lined with café/bars and small shops offering the standard tourist tat. We had no trouble finding a good meal. Two courses with wine for 5.5 Euro ($6.50) will do us. We then explored further afield and found the main street full of more Irish bars than many towns in Ireland. The proliferation of Irish accents walking past provided a clue as to why. Santa Ponsa is apparently a very popular package holiday destination with the Irish and supplemented with a good number of Brits they easily outnumbered all other nationalities in town.

We chose a bar based on its good wfi signal strength and the fact it wasn’t showing Gaelic football so was not full of very loud, Irishman shouting undecipherable obscenities at the screen regarding the opposition team and the referee’s forebears. While Karen and Marc had a lazy afternoon checking up on what was happening in the outside world, Rob took the opportunity to get a couple of blog updates posted on the web which were long overdue.

When we returned to the boat Rob went off on a long snorkel exploring the shoreline while Marc and Karen both disappeared into the latest books they were reading. Thank goodness for electronics. Between us on board we have two I-Pads, a Kindle and a Sony E-Reader that collectively contain literally thousands of books. If they were all paperbacks Alcheringa would of gone to the bottom under the immense weight long ago

 We had another nice meal aboard that night and enjoyed a few sundowners to cap off a very enjoyable day. Our ritual, after dinner, feeding the leftovers to the fish was also good sport as always. We never just tip them in. That would be all over way too fast so instead we cut or break everything up into small pieces and a good feeding session may take up to a quarter of an hour. The hungry buggers certainly compete hard with each other to grab a morsel. Watching a fish snatch a hard piece of bread crust and dash off through the clear water trying to protect it from the fifty of his cousins wanting to steal it always gives us a chuckle.  Entertainment comes cheap on Alcheringa.

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