Via Inmarsat:

Position update just left med sea going to rail until wind changes and see
where we get! Maybe rota or olhio. N36 01.709 W5 49.0

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Ceuta and Gibraltar

Islay Mist in the marina at Ceuta

So we went to explore Ceuta - and if we had found a laundry and a chandler we would have probably stayed another day but we were getting desperate on both these points and we knew the wind was only staying easterly for another couple of days for getting out of the Med into the Atlantic. 

Being technically in Africa we had expected to be blasted with the heat but the fog had made everything a little colder and we even had longish breeks on!

Ceuta seems just like any other Apanish town from the main street all full of designer shops but here there are a lot of gadget shops too as it is a tax free zone although we didn’t notice the prices being that much lower! 

Hercules

Ceuta is the Spanish enclave on the Northern coast of morocco which mirrors the Brit one in Gibraltar.  Greek mythology has it that the tow mountains – the rock of Gibraltar and the hill in Ceuta are the two pillars which Hercules pushed apart and let the ocean flood the area inside which is now the Med!  Thus the Hercules statue...

Ali thought it was the Klu Klux Clan but I reminded him of the religious festival we saw in France.  This is the girls best scared look.

There are a few different religions here and we heard our first call to prayer from the mosque since leaving Turkey.

The sea walkway - very pretty. 

After a look around and a fruitless supplies search we decided we had better have a meal out as it was turning out to be our only night in Africa on the boat.  This turned out to be another marathon search as all the restaurants seemed to be closed but maybe as it was Monday.  Alisha kept reminding us that there was a McDonalds near the boat but we were determined that would not be our meal out!  We finally found a fish restaurant next to the marina which was quite pricey but very good food.   

Yum!

The place was full of little lizards - thankfully too fast for the gilrs to catch or we may have had pets on board!

We would have liked to stay another day or so but hey ho when the wind blows!

Alistair manning the radar.

The crossing to Gibraltar was even foggier than the day before it seemed clear in the marina but as we left the harbour we could just see the bank of fog and ships appearing out of it to go into the harbour and so the next few hours were spent intently watching the radar and changing course loads of times, listening for fog horns and on the VHF.  The freakiest thing was that even though there were loads more ships to deal with in much closer proximity than the day before we didn’t see a single one as the visibility was down to about 50 metres - yikes!  Apparently whenever there are prolonged easterly winds in summer it is foggy here as the warm air hits the cold Atlantic waters.

At least the dolphins came out to see us again!

Europa point Gibratar comes into sight at last!

We berthed at Marina Bay instead this time right next to the runway this is a plane landing just as we were coming in.  what a noise they make especially the military planes the girls were afraid theey would go all night but they stopped at about tea time thankfully!

A picture to make all Shetlanders sick maybe we should apply to be a British duty free out post and cut our fuel bills by more than a third!

 We are ready almost to leave Gibraltar today we have refuelled visited the chandlery got our laundry done and looked at the weather it doesn't look too good for getting out into the Atlantic for a while but if we get out of the Med that is the first step!  So hopefully tonight we will be in Barbate if we have timed the wind and tides right to get ou the Gibraltar Straits oh and it's foggy again!

First Over night sail to Ceuta

We only stayed in Almerimar for one night as the next day was Sunday and everything would have been shut anyway and the Easterly winds looked like they weren't going to last as long as the forecast had said a few days previous.  That was infact true as we had NO WIND the whole 133 miles from Almerimar to Ceuta in Northern Morocco all night long!  At least our fears of diesel bug seem to be allayed as we used nearly all the fuel we had left and went on to drums after that. 

We left at 11.30 am and got into Ceuta the next day at about lunch timeish. 

The trip was memorable if not for the sailing but the amount of wildlife we saw and then the fog……

Wildlife spotters Kaylee even did a wildlife tv programme for us that day!

As always in a motoring situation Alistair retreated to his bunk out of boredom so the girls and I were on the day watch.  We saw what we are sure were pilot whales from the fins and then an hour or so later  saw some more. 

Pilot whales (minky whales in Shetland) we think.

Then dolphins a few times!

Then jelly fish, we motored through a couple of swarms of jelly fish.  So of course as they were small ones there was going to be no peace until I had caught a couple and got them into a bucket.  The girls got their sea life book out and we identified them we think as Pelagia jellyfish. 

Inspecting the jelly fish.

I discovered a good way of staying awake at night as I had the first watch until 2am (and hadn’t had a sleep like some others all day) – dancing, coffee is no good as when you go to bed then you can’t sleep but dancing to some good old jubilee type tunes on my ipod in the companion way seemed to do the trick!  Only Shetlanders about my age will know what I mean about the jubilee type tunes…  I suppose dancing may not work so well when we are actually sailing instead of motoring on a flat calm or I might actually do myself an injury! 

The night and the next morning was devoted to radar watching as the visibility was so poor and unbeknown to us getting much worse as we headed towards the busiest shipping lane in the world…

At least it gave me and Ali a very good catch up on our radar reading skills!  It really was quite scary especially when you had a few big blobs on the screen all seeming to be coming your way.  I only had to do a 360 turn once and alter course a few other times slightly and I was probably being over cautious but big boats scare me!  Ali did the next watch then I did a couple of hours but I got him up again as we were approaching the Gibraltar straights as the traffic was getting heavier.  However even though it was a bit scary we made it to Ceuta and were relieved to come out of the fog bank about a mile from the harbour entrance and so managed to avoid the fast ferries running in and out.  We got tied up and had a rest before going out to explore a little. 

The one I had to 360 for he only appeared when he was less than half a mile off the stern and doing about 15 knots...

The radar getting busier but nothing compared to crossing the straits a day later....

First Sail from Agua Dulce to Almerimar and the festival of San Juan

Last day on the brach at Agua Dulce!

Sailing once again.

On Sat the 23^rd we set sail from from Agua Dulce to Almerimar a short trip of about 18 miles just to check if everything is working and to stop at the big chandlery there.  The sail went fine we had our new main sail up and it seems to be very good we were bombing along at 8 knots for a while until we had to change course to go down wind and the wind died. 

Little monkeys

The coast of the Almeria region is entirely full of these polythene covered growing areas, Kaylee thought it was snow from a distance!

We arrived in Almerimar in the afternoon and soon got tied up and very quickly realized we were glad never to have wintered there!  It is a huge harbour for over 1000 boats but it is a very artificial town just full of waterside cafes and bars.  For example for the next few hours we couldn’t escape the sound of the pub singer singing very cheesy songs fairly badly to a really enthusiastic crowd of Brits who were up dancing, need I say more! 

That night is was the festival of San Juan which is a celebration of the longest day of the year.  Basically the whole Spanish coast is lined with huge bonfires and nearly all the locals were out in huge family groups having barbeques and swimming then coming to the fires to dry off.  To add to that Spain were playing football against France and won so there were lots of bangers and fireworks going off all over the place.  Someone did tell us that there would be people jumping over the fires but it hadn’t started by when we left at 1am.  It was another example of how the Spanish like to party, large family groups, lots of lovely food and not half as much alcohol as we would have had at home!

As always my photographic skills don't do the atmosphere justice at all!

Via Inmarsat:

I wonder if this works? Trying an email from our satellite phone. We are
currently motoring along the costa del sol heading for ceuta current
position is 36 27.756N 03 34.679 W

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Getting ready to set off 2012 - Agua Dulce Spain

Alisha and Kaylee playing with  their big cousin Alannah in Perth on our way to Spain.

So here we are again back on Islay Mist.   It has been a bit of a shock to the system this time especially after battling through a wet and windy Shetland winter, then to be abruptly blasted with 27 degrees of heat when you get off the plane. 

The boat was in very good condition when we got back to her, the only damage being the tarpaulins we had tied over her when we left, had been shredded by the wind and the sun. The Marineros told us they had had two solid months of strong wind in winter – bet they didn’t have 100 mile an hour gales on Christmas day though!  The main things we had to contend with the first day was the dusty dirt and the heat.  The girls soon started squawking about going to the beach next to the marina so Ali took them whilst I cleaned all the clothes cupboards out, unpacked and made the beds etc making sure the fridge went on and had a bottle of water in it!  They all came back refreshed and Ali and Kaylee cleaned the red desert sand of the decks whilst Alisha looked through the toy box to see what they had left behind.  Then we decided we must get the boat back into the water as fast as possible as it was too hot and you can’t use the sinks or toilet when you are up in the air -  so Ali started painting the anti fouling on the underside whilst the girls and I trekked up to the supermarket for the first time.  We didn’t cook on board the first night as it was just too hot and we were knackered so we went to the nice restaurant in the marina and had a metre of pizza and some Tinto Verano my new drink of choice out here – red wine gaseosa and a slice of lemon, very refreshing and you don’t get drunk either!

The girls with teh luggage under the boat when we arrived, Ali is up onboard checking for cockroaches!

The girls really are superstars, they adjusted to life back on board better than us- even the need to climb down the ladder last thing at night and first thing in the morning to go to the toilet.  Although the not putting toilet roll down the Spanish toilets has had them flummoxed just as not putting toilet roll in the toilet was a bit of a problem when we first got home last summer!  The heat has been the only thing that has bothered them and they usually get pretty grumpy waiting for us to finish our chores before we can go to the beach in the afternoon. 

Climbing up the ladder on the way to bed on the first night.

Metre of Pizza on the first night!

Ali got the bottom of the boat all finished in one day but we had to wait until first thing next  day  to get lifted in as the boat yard is so busy.  I was cleaning the insides of the boat emptying all the cupboards and cleaning in nooks and crannies.  We had been very pleased not to find an infestation of cockroaches onboard, though there was a tense moment when I thought I found a dead one in the cockroach ‘hotel’ under the sink but it turned out to be a big seed. 

The boat got lifted back in on Tuesday the 19^th at 8am sharp.  It was strange being onboard and trying to remember how to tie half hitches and bowlines again but it all came back pretty quickly thankfully as we had to tie up 2 minutes later.

For the next few days we have been slowly getting the ropes and sails back on in the morning before it gets too hot and continuing to clean, clean, clean!  We discovered that the thin strings we had left in place of our ropes had mostly disintegrated but thankfully not all or we may have had to hire a crane to get them back in.  Getting the ropes all sorted involved me winching Alistair up the mast twice, not an easy job in 27 degrees and rising!  We have our new smaller main sail on which we are going to test out as our usual main is very large and we spend an awful lot of time reefing up and down so hopefully this will be an end to that but if not we will just put the old main on again. 

Ali up the mast

Of course two little girls needed to have a shot too!

Fun at the beach

The girls have been occupied with letter writing and school work as the school term hasn’t ended at home yet.  There are at least three families of cats living in the rocks of the breakwater here and the girls have loved feeding them- one day they even caught six small fish to feed them! 

We had a very interesting evening with an older English couple who are on a boat next to us.  They are aged 75 and 72 and crossed back across the Atlantic a couple of years ago when they were 73 and 70 after spending ten years cruising the Caribbean, Mexico and Venezuela! To top it all off they hadn’t  realized the male had had a heart attack before they crossed back across- he just thought he was feeling a bit off and had less energy!  Now Alistair doesn’t feel so bad about taking the boat home as he realizes that he may still do the big journey  as he’s in no way too old! The funniest bit of the evening was that the lady has taken over a bottle or ready- made supermarket tinto verano ‘sin alcohol’ without alcohol which the girls had a couple of glasses of and then we realized it was actually 0.9% so they immediately started falling over saying they were drunk and laughing – I fear we have failed as parents already…..

Anyway that is our first week away we are just about ready to set sail tomorrow (Saturday).

We are just doing a short ‘shake down’ sail to Almerimar 18 miles along the coast where there is a chandlery and big supermarket and hopefully on Sunday we will set off on an overnighter to Ceuta, the Spanish enclave in Morocco (don’t tell the parents…)  After that who knows, we would love to go back to Cadiz but maybe we will go over to Gibraltar then straight to Portugal we will just have to see how the girls (and I)  are coping and which way the wind is blowing! 

Kaylee's bearded look

Rowing across the marina - she's as good as me which isn't too hard....