Denia to Barcelona

Friday 5th November - Tuesday 10th Nov Still in Denia

Denia taken from the top of the castle our boat is in the marina on the right hand side

We ended up staying in Denia for another five days because the wind varied in strength between strong and extremely strong and always from the North. The forecasts for the whole area were pretty awful really and we were glad not to be in the Balearics as they were getting the worst of it. The wind had given us a bit of a shock as we hadn’t realised how bad the sea actually got. Each morning we would go for a walk out along the breakwater to see what it was like and say - not today!

Captain Jack?!

There was a lull in the weather forecast for the Saturday morning and we set off at 4am hoping to get to Valencia before the ‘real storm’ started. We were about ten minutes out of the harbour when the wind started gusting (not forecast) from the North West (not forecast) at about 25 knots (not forecast!!) so I decided we would turn back as if it was this bad already and we didn’t make it to Valencia before the high winds then we would be stuck out for hours again after enduring a whole day of bashing into the wind.

Typically by the time we got back to Denia the wind had died back down again and somebody was in a fairly bad mood, not helped by the fact that the vent in the fore cabin had been leaking soaking the bed after all the water splashing over the boat and the girls were up and alert too! I packed 'grumpy' off to bed and did school with the girls for a couple of hours.

Once Ali woke up we decided we should make the most of Denia since we would be stuck for a few days now. We went off to the Toy museum. Denia was obviously a big toy producing town in the early 20th century and there is a toy museum in an old workshop building. The girls loved it looking at all the old dolls and kitchen sets thankfully it was all behind glass display units or they would have been right in on top of it all.

Aargh Chucky!! Can you spot two little girls?

We went walked through the tunnel under the castle as Kaylee was dying to go through it.

The Tunnel

It takes you out to the North side of town where we went to the beach, by now the wind was picking up quite dramatically and was still coming from the North West so Ali said I was off the hook for making us turn back in the morning - phew. There is a big climbing frame on the beach so the girls had a good old play on that.

We spent a bit of time in the internet café on the pier which was German owned and came to realise that Denia is a German enclave, all of the other customers were Germans and most of the businesses on the pier were also German owned. It was in the café I realised that the German’s also do the European kissing on each cheek thing. I had been under the impression it was just the loved up French, Spanish and Italians that kissed everyone they met but in the café all the Gudentags were accompanied by a kiss from the lady owner (who incidentally looked like an extra from an eighties soft rock video!) They were all very nice and could put up with the girls running around which was the main thing.

Windy Day

The wind really did pick up on the Saturday afternoon and Sunday so much so that I stayed on the boat with the girls for most of this time getting them off would have been a bit dangerous as we had to jump about a meter to get to the pier. The boat was heeling over more than it does when we ar sailing ometimes and ALi used and extra rope from the berth next to us to try and keep us from banging against the boat on the other side. This all made Ali resolve to buy a gangplank. He went along to the chandlery and found the cheapest gangplank to be over 500 Euros so obviously buy turned to make! On Monday Ali walked to the edge of town to find a builders store and returned with two long planks of decking which he had sawn up for himself in the store then carried back about three miles, he was pretty knackered but at least now we could walk precariously across the boards to get to shore.

We discovered ‘Bay Radio’ the English radio station for the area which was ever so slightly amusing, on a par with Shetland's own SIBC at home. It has hourly news and celeb gossip plus loads of cheesy British music peppered with advert for ‘British Toy Shops’ and English speaking lawyers etc. they even have a Sunday morning love songs programme just like Radio 2. It was well worth listening to for comedy value alone.

Collecting pine cones to throw at wolves!

We spent the last few days watching the weather and going on sea walks and play park missions around Denia. It is a nice enough place but we were slightly afraid we would get stuck there, it wasn't somewhere we felt we could spend a few months! On Tuesday morning the wind had died down a bit and was forecast to go to the west so we fuelled up and set off.

Tuesday 10th November Denia - Oropresa

It was a little bouncy at first as the wind never really did go to the west and didn’t die down much either but it was nothing like the last few days so we headed North and thought we would just sail until we got tired at night and then stop at the nearest harbour as there are marinas every 20 to 30 miles at the most.

The wind calmed entirely at dusk and we stuck the engine on and motored on into the dark.

We decided to stop in a place called Oropresa because it was closest to the next headland to go around. It was dark but thankfully clear as we were approaching because there were loads of tankers anchored nearby and some moving so we had to keep a very good look out. I though some other lights we could see were the lights of houses on the headland but it turned out as we got closer to be loads of fishing boats. We were only about half a mile from the harbour entrance when we noticed a very fast boat with very little lights approaching us. That was very little lights until they turned their spotlight on us. It was the police! They started shouting at us and kept the spotlight shining right into our eyes which as you can imagine is a bit disconcerting - probably the intended effect. We shouted over ‘Ingles, Ingles’ and they asked where we came from only then did we realise the problem that they had approached from the side that our Shetland flag flies from and we shone a torch onto our British flag instead and they said OK and zoomed off as fast as they came!

We radioed into the harbour and had a garbled conversation without understanding a word each other said and decided just to go in and have a look. We skulked around the harbour until the marinero turned up to help us tie up. We filled in our forms and went to bed as it was after midnight.

Wed 11th Nov Oropresa to Hospitalet de l’Enfants

(Don’t worry we didn’t end up in the children’s’ hospital just a place with a strangely similar name!)

Again we had to wait for the Capitano to come on duty at 9am before we could set off. Ali got his boards out again for a gangplank as it was another big gap to jump. Whilst I was having a wash the girls started jumping around screaming that daddy’s wood had fallen into the water and I should come and rescue it straight away. As fast as I could I got up on deck to find one plank floating past the bow almost on it’s way out to sea and the other floating under the pier. The girls and I rescued both by hanging off the safety rails and pushing the planks along with their nets. They were very proud that they had rescued ‘daddy’s wood.’

It turned out to be a flat calm day even though the forecast had been for light westerly winds (any wind we did get was coming from the North East - yep the direction we were heading) Ali finally succumbed to the flu and spent the whole day in bed whilst we slowly plodded along the coastline.
The girls 'helping' me clean the cockpitThere wasn’t much to look out for at first just the usual fishing buoys.

The girls were a bit narky and spent the entire day fighting and crying so I was glad when they finally had a nap in the late afternoon. I thought yeah now I can sit and read my book in peace. This was not to be...... There were a lot of fishing boats further out than us which I thought nothing of at first as they were quite some distance away and all trawling towards the shore. Then the first one started to speed up and head for port - apparently the first boat back to the harbour gets the best price for their catch, this means that they all fish away for as long as they can either until they get a good catch or they see their competitors heading home and it is a balancing act of big catch versus first back! As usual we were entirely in the path of all twenty boats heading back to port. I was keeping a good eye on them then one would start to head straight for us so I would take the wheel go behind it and resume course, reassess the rest of the boats and get back to reading my book, I soon gave this up as it became obvious the sight of each boat heading for port was spurring the next into action. None of the boats made any attempt to go around us and it felt a little like they were playing chicken with us and seeing who would change course first. It was always me so they won! We were slewing around so much then going over big bow waves that Ali felt compelled to get up and see, "what the hell I was doing?"

The rest of the journey was uneventful except for the wind picking up finally but only an hour from port so we just motored on. The place we had decided on was called ‘Hospitalet d l’Enfants’ which is a very strange name for a town made even stranger by the fact there is a big Nuclear reactor close by. We realised we were down wind of the reactor but hoped one night wouldn’t be enough to fry us. It was just a repeat of the night before, getting tied up then bed except Ali found a cafe nearby so the girls ha burger and chips for supper.

Thurs 12th November Hospitalet d L’Enfant - BARCELONA!!

The nuclear power plant

We set off as soon as we got up in the morning and dodged out past all the fishing boats that had tied up around us for breakfast. We had a forecast for Westerly winds once again and once again it was wrong we got all the sails up as we left the harbour and the wind promptly died away ands we were going along at about 1 knot. It would have taken us 2 and a half days to get to Barcelona at that speed, we didn’t have enough food and just wanted to get to our winter berth so I eventually put the foot down and the engine went on. This picked the speed up to a much more respectable 6 knots and enabled Ali to go back to bed as he still wasn’t feeling very well.

It was a very uneventful motor along. We saw our first fish farm since leaving Scottish waters. And managed to put away the gennaker and tidy up a bit since we wouldn’t be out on the water for a while.This is the 'automatic swing' it goes back and forth as the boat rolls (much more effective in the big swells off Portugal!)

The marina we were heading to was Port Forum which is North East of the main harbour of Barcelona. We had to go past the airport which was very impressive as we travelled beneath the planes taking off every minute or so. We could see all the planes queuing up to land on the North side of the city sometimes we could see four or five at a time and it makes you realise what organisation must go into running a busy airport.

We hadn’t really thought of Barcelona as a busy harbour until we got close and started to see all the anchored ships with other big boats entering and leaving through them. It was a bit mesmerising and thankfully calm as it was dark. We had to wait until we saw a gap between big boats to cross the harbour entrance (we put the pedal to the floor so to speak!) We noticed a couple of boats hovering around between the big ships except for three green lights on top I remembered that they were the lights displayed by a mine sweeper which I never expected to see. They must have been using them just to signify a military boat as there is no way there were two minesweepers in the harbour at one time. We made it past all the big boats and only had to alter course for one more fast ferry on the way to the marina.Barcelona at night as we came in

We radioed in and the marinero said he would be waiting for us which was good as we were under the impression that there were two entrances to the marina and tried to go to the North since the south looked a bit dodgy in the dark until the marinero came out in his rib to take us in. Oops again - I wonder if we will ever get it right!? Not the best first impression to make at our new ‘home’ We got tied up, showered and went in search of food as we were starving and had nothing decent left onboard having used up Ali’s tin of corned beef at lunch time.

We discovered the only restaurant in the immediate vicinity was a little pricey but we were knackered and hungry so we had a posh meal and a bottle of wine to celebrate getting to our winter berth. We went through to the bar afterwards and talked to an English couple who came in on their motor boat at the same time as us. They are staying for the winter too and we had a good old chat as they have been living in Menorca for years.

We went off to bed slightly drunk and very happy to have got to Barcelona, Ali being especially happy as the Barcelona boat show was still on for another few days……..