.... SAIL AWAY

Well, here it is - the first Paso Doble sailing update with crew on board. As I am writing we are crossing the western Mediterranean rounding the northern cape of the Isla de Asinara in Sardinia, with becalmed waters and virtually no wind, and I am taking my chances to trace back our last 3 weeks.

On Wednesday, July 6 at 2100 hrs with threw off the lines from mooring 4542, our temporary home in Port Ginesta for the past 6 months. The very last day we could have left to arrive at Palma de Mallorca in time to pick up our first sailing guests on July 8. As you can imagine we had some very busy days getting the boat ready, trying to finish as many of the started and not finished jobs as possible, tying up all the loose ends with suppliers and saying good-bye to our ‘cat friends’ we made in and around the marina. On board with us was August, who tirelessly worked with us during this last week to make sure all important electronic bits were functioning. The weather predictions for the night sail to Mallorca were what one could call close to perfect for a cat. North-westerly winds aft of beam of 20 to 25 kts plus and …… we flew away. We all [and the boat, I guess] enjoyed the wind blowing around our faces and we celebrated the beginning of this journey. Arriving on Mallorca after about 20 hrs we called into the first cove we found called Cala Basset, nestled behind the south western tip of Isla Dragonera - and ‘chilled out’.

Connections via Astrid from Multihull Charter supplied us with a spot on the charter dock ‘La Lonja’ in the harbour of Palma. We were watching the chaos of charter parties leaving and new ones arriving with all their luggage piled up while cleaning teams frantically emptied out the boat and scrubbed it before they could take over. Then our team arrived and we participated ourselves in the incredible hustle and bustle of ‘provisioning’ the boat for the coming weeks.

Let me introduce the first crew on board for the trip around the island of Mallorca.

 

Last Crew member being Croq - pick up by Susanne floating in the middle of Alcudia bay

We set off on Sunday, July 9 to sail up the east coast. We left the bay of Palma with good winds and our first stop was Cala del Pi, a narrow cove of crystal clear turquoise coloured water surrounded by rock faces. Our resident photographer Annemarie took the opportunity for a photo shoot. As a result we finally have been able to replace the stock shots from our original post of ‘Belize Specifications’ with our own – worthwhile checking out by clicking on the November post.

Cala del Pi was followed by Cala Mondrago and Es Trenc, two more wonderful anchorages. On the beautiful turquoise waters of Es Trenc we mustered up the available crew power and replaced our existing quite uncomfortably knotted trampoline net with a tailor made version made by Christoph Wendland from Yacht-Netze. What a wonderful product and no comparison to before – thank you Christoph. It extended our outdoor living area by about 20 sunny square meters and was most welcomed by all crew members. Besides being by far the best place for just ‘hanging’ it has proven itself as a most magnificent dolphin watching platform. It is a perfect match to our other most visible alteration to the boat, our new fiber-glass bimini. Without going into the details of how this piece of work came into existence I want to thank Ramon and team from our stainless steel workshop in Port Ginesta for welding the frame and Jaume from EscoPrem fiber glass moulding for the last minute huge effort. I will dedicate at some later stage a smaller post to explain more about this combined effort.

Next stop was Porto Cristo with its very cute and narrow harbour, where we parked on the public mooring. We had a very mediocre meal out and decided we are better off with our own quality catering on the boat. After replenishing supplies we headed north around Mallorca’s most eastern point, Cabo de Pera into the bay of Alcudia. That night we anchored off a secluded beach with more crystal clear water near Betlem and enjoyed another wonderful sunset. This was followed by crossing the bay to Cala Engossalba, a narrow cove with steep cliff faces and more crystal clear, but this time blue-ish coloured water.

The week ended in Alcudia where we said good-bye to the first crew. Many thanks to them for putting in such a great team effort to stretch our new out door relaxation area into place. Your work will be eternally appreciated by all guests that follow ….. guaranteed.

The second week was our first ‘private’ week. Susanne, Maria and Christian and I rounded Cabo Formentor, the most northerly tip on a rather choppy and confused sea with fresh winds of force 4-5 to make our way south along the spectacular rocky west coast of Mallorca. The icy blue, almost arctic coloured water in Cala Calobra was our first anchorage. After 7 pm quite often these spots overcrowded with day tourism miraculously empty out and on that night we were the only once left. The serenity of the night was followed in morning by bleating of the wild goats which inhabit the rocky capes and a secluded swim through the cove. No need to say more ……. but divine. By 9 am it was all ‘on again and within half an hour we weaved our way out through all the other boats meanwhile anchored around us. The final stop was in Porto Soller, the major port of the west coast and followed by a great sail along the impressive rock faces of that rugged coast line south towards the Isla Dragonera and Palma back to our busy charter mooring, getting ready for our next crew and new adventures.

Finally some sailing stats for those who are interested;  total distance covered was 324 nm, thereof were 175 nm under sail and 149 nm with motor or motor assisted.

From above and from below ......

Another milestone in the preparation phase has been finished – and we had our first outing under sail. Although short and only half a mile offshore, we motor-sailed from our current home Port Ginesta past the centre of Barcelona to Port Forum, one of the marinas to the north of Barcelona.  

Unfortunately the travel lift in our shipyard at Port Ginesta couldn’t cope with the 7m width of our Belize and we had to find an alternative. After weeks of collecting and comparing quotes for the work we wanted done and a last minute set-back, because the shipyard we had chosen refused to let in our team of workers we ended up lifting Paso Doble onto the dry at Port Forum. Here are some pictures - out on a grey day and back in looking shiny on a sunny day.

Well, we ended up with a complete English team – Barry and Guy from Watertight Marine doing anti fouling and engine work, Gary doing the fibre glass repairs and Paul and John doing the polishing. A welcome change to practicing Spanish all the time ….. if you know what I mean.

The list of major works was not very extensive and mainly preventative maintenance, but we decided to get it done now while we are in the swing of it. The existing anti fouling looked still pretty good, but because the boat was inactive for some time now there were quite some fury attachments on the under body. Here’s the before and after comparison.

The other major repair was changing the rubber seals on both sail drives. Again, there was no leakage or apparent damage, but the engine and sail drive manufacturer Yanmar advised us to change them anyway after 7 years of relative easy and little work. They still looked almost impeccable as they came out, but there might have been some internal erosion due to inactivity combined with water conditions. The anodes and a few more gaskets were changed and also an exhaust elbow connected to one of the heat exchangers. Best done now rather than in an emergency situation in some remote and exotic place without access to a certified mechanic or spare parts.

The rest was putting in an inlet valve for our water maker and tailoring in a hatch to close the hole at the transom, where the life raft was originally sitting. We needed this spot to put in the additional diesel tank. Accessibility to the life raft was dubious anyway as we virtually needed an hour of back braking pulling and tugging to extract the life raft from its original spot. After several weeks of moving it around on the boat we finally decided where to put it. You’ll see ….. much better.  In fact, we don’t ever intend to use it so we could have left it where it was – hadn’t we needed the space. Not to forget the polishing – we had mixed weather and it rained 3 out of the 8 days on the dry, hence the job provided quite some challenges with the unstable weather conditions. And of course the many little jobs like putting up a wifi aerial at the mast head and grounding plates for the HF radio and finding a spot for all the new electronic gadgets and more.

But in the end it all worked out and we had ‘only’ one day of delay. As she went back into the water she looked spectacular and we could notice the difference in the water on the way back. The clean and smooth hull with the self-polishing anti fouling paint added another knot of speed at the same revolutions. The sail drives didn’t leak and neither did the bulkhead valve. So all in all we are happy and together with the 'hired crew' on the way back to Port Ginesta we enjoyed a sunset sail, finished off with a full moon eclipse while having a few ‘coldies’ back on the mooring.

More preparation ......

We arrived in Port Ginesta about 3 weeks ago to start the next phase of the project. Since then we have been working through what appears to be an endless list [or better lists] of jobs to do, quotes to get and equipment to install.

The work we commissioned during the 2 months of February and March while we were back in Australia and Switzerland was, in true Spanish style 'almost' finished. The port double guest double cabin has been modified and is now a flexible triple cabin. It can be still be used as before for a double accommodation or now as either a bunk bed for two singles or a triple for couple with child. The starboard bow berth has been turned into our workshop and storage area.
We have a new stainless steel targa joining the two hulls at the stern. So far it is loaded with 5 solar panels and a wind generator. It will also house the various antennas and may be the hammock .... later on. We also installed new hand rails around the top of the saloon and around the back of the cockpit. We have mounted the brackets for a new inner fore stay to be able to use a second genoa and if necessary a storm sail. We have also installed a second stainless diesel tank which brings our capacity to about 550 litres of diesel.

Underneath the deck in the engine rooms and between them we have an impressive array of regulators, sensors, an extra new battery bank and charger and an inverter. The many meters of new wires converge onto 'schmick' new switch panels. Responsible for the design of this expansion in electronic equipment is August Madlener.

 

Looking at the wiring diagrams still makes me positively dizzy. But I guess it takes time to get used to, much like seasickness. May be I should take some tablets before looking at the plans. August, you have done a tremendous job - thank you !!! This installation should ultimately most effectively manage the supply and storage of most of the power we require for our day-to-day living, without having to run the engines; and if we still have to do that, we are installing two new alternators with double as much output as before to cut engine time.

What remains will be a complete overhaul of the navigation and communication system and then taking the boat out of the water to do some preventative engine and sail drive maintenance. We have to put in a water intake valve for the [also still to be installed] watermaker and we will apply new anti fouling on the under body and give her a good polish to make her all shiny and new. For this we have to move the boat to one of the marinas in Barcelona called Port Forum, where the travel lift is wide enough for a catamaran.

The list goes on, but in between we try to enjoy the sites of Barcelona like ...

....which are a colourful distraction.