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Wednesday, October 1st, Maó, Menorca, Spain
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Completely overshadowing the recent dicey weather and
unreliable connectivity, numerous encounters with
friends during our two weeks on the Côte d'Azur helped
to reinforce our love of the area. It started as
we pulled in to anchor in Villefranche. Totally
unexpectedly, we see our friends on "Twixter" anchored
in the middle of the bay. We met Cathy and Rob
originally in Badalona in November 2006. They also
wintered in Marmaris, Turkey last winter and
participated in the
EMYR tour through the Eastern Med
this spring. We hadn't kept in touch since we left
Israel and were surprised to discover we were in the
same waters. Although they were leaving the next
day, we caught up over cocktails on Zia that night.
An American couple from San Francisco, these guys had
originally planned on leaving the Med after just a year.
They took delivery of their boat in La Rochelle, on the
Atlantic coast of France, in the summer of 2006 and have
just decided to spend the winter in Valencia so they can
cruise the Med for yet one more season next
spring/summer. I'm jealous!
Our next surprise was seeing Pat and Lani, who work on
the Privilege 58 charter catamaran, "Sagaponack".
I was in the little grocery store in town and saw Pat
walk in as I was at the register checking out. We
had met them in Marmaris this spring before the EMYR.
Pat didn't see me, and I wasn't completely sure it was
him. We took a look in the anchorage to see if we
could spot their boat and sure enough, they had pulled
in that morning. They spend most of their time
with either the owner or charter guests on the boat,
working hard to keep them happy and well fed and the
boat clean and running smoothly. They were
enjoying some time off with just the two of them on
board so we had the chance to visit with them and
exchange stories from our different summer experiences.
Also in Villefranche, we had a chance to see Anna, a
friend from Barcelona, who was in the area for a few
days. She works for a fancy new marina in Taragona,
selling boat slips to super yacht owners. The big
Monaco boat show was in town and she offered to get us
tickets. Joe couldn't pass up the opportunity, and
had nearly as much fun checking out the attendees as he
did the boats on display. Arab sheiks and their
entourage of minions strolled the docks alongside
wealthy elderly men sporting scantily clad and stunning
young women on their arms. It sounded like quite
the scene, but I'm sure I would have felt terribly out
of place so I wasn't sorry to have missed it.
As
I met an old high school friend, John, at the train
station that day, I was feeling decidedly elated with
all the friends we had around after nearly a month on
our own. For all of the new people we meet
cruising, it isn't often that we find ourselves
surrounded by so many people we know. But, as is
typical with cruising, the encounters were brief.
On the other hand, John was staying with us through the
weekend, so we decided to move on towards the
Porquerolles where our friends from "Saka" and "Kia Ora"
(who we met in Corsica in August)
were planning to spend the weekend on their boats.
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After checking the weather and buying a few groceries,
it was too late in the day to make the 70 mile journey
in one shot, so we found a bay to anchor in for the
night called Rade d'Agay. We ventured on shore for
dinner and found a nearly deserted strip of shops and
restaurants. The inclement weather had driven all
the business away nearly a month earlier than usual.
We enjoyed a good pub-style meal seated at the outdoor
tables nonetheless, and took off first thing the next
morning.
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Enjoying a beautiful spinnaker sail over, cruising along
at 9 knots, we arrived earlier than expected, in time to
enjoy an afternoon swim.
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We
met up with Jacques, Veronique and their kids, and Eric
the next day. These guys have been coming to
Porquerolles Island for years and know it inside out.
We signed up for an afternoon bike ride through the
beautiful countryside, to a lighthouse, a windmill and a
castle.
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The kids had a great time riding bikes, an activity they
miss desperately from home. With the youngest bike
rider being just five years old, the group kept a nice
mellow pace. Although it was windy and cloudy, the
rain held off until we were sitting down for a beer at
the end of the day. Jacques had previously stopped
by his favorite restaurant on the island to arrange for
the evening meal. We had hoped for a bouillabaisse
but there wasn't enough fish to make a proper one for
such a large group. Instead, he picked out a
couple of tarpon
or red snapper, prepared in the traditional island
fashion with onion, tomatoes, fennel, thyme and mustard.
It was phenomenal.
We
topped off our Porquerolles visit with a trip to the
Perzinsky winery where we sampled the rose, white and
red vintages while watching the grapes grow.
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We
couldn't resist buying some of the red and white to add
to Zia's "cellar." We knew we would be leaving
France soon, and wanted to be sure we had enough fine
French wine onboard.
We
sailed northwest for the Bay of Toulon on Sunday
afternoon where we dropped John at the boat bus stop.
He elected to make the twenty minute ride from Saint
Mandrier to the city of Toulon and find a hotel near the
train station that evening rather than risk the panic
and rush of finding his way there in time for the 8:45
train back to Milan the next morning. We had a
great time chilling, chatting, swimming, and sailing
with John, but his wife and five year old daughter were
home waiting for him so it was time to go.
With a mistral looming in the forecast, we made plans to
sail 200 miles south to Menorca on Tuesday morning.
We took the boat bus into Toulon for a quick walk around
the city and our last French meal, which turned out to
be a big disappointment. Oh well. Toulon was
very different from the other cities we had visited
along the Cote d'Azur. It is a navy town.
The feel of the streets and the people walking around
was much more blue collar and down to earth than the
highfalutin' ambiance of Nice or Villefranche or St.
Tropez. Walking around near the port, we also saw
a few seedy stores that obviously cater to the
stereotypical sailor's appetites.
The twenty-eight hour sail to Menorca was a little more
lively than we expected, but nice and fast! The
wind blew up to 30 knots but it was behind the beam so
not as uncomfortable as it would have been if we were
going upwind. As predicted, the winds calmed down
as the day wore on and by 3am we were motoring for the
last six hours of the journey.
Last time we were
here we only managed a one hour stop, so we were
looking forward to seeing the city and exploring a bit
of the island. Our arrival was accompanied by
sunshine and warm temperatures so it got off to a
wonderful start.
Next Entry
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Many thanks to our friend Craig Homenko for his assistance in setting up the website.
We also would like
to thank our buddy Scott Brunner who has been kind
enough to host the website on his server.
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