We left Formentera with a nice easterly from behind …yay we can sail!! Our plan was to head south east to Almeria which is a two night passage. According to the weather, we would be arriving in strong winds. As the Spanish coast is not very protected from the elements, we decided to head to Cartagen which is an overnight passage. We met a couple of Kiwi’s the day before, Joanie and Bob on sailing yacht Nemir, who were headed that way. I consulted our pilot book and it seemed like a very interesting place steeped in history. So off we sailed. We actually managed to sail about 70% of the passage, not the fastest passage as we are still trying to improve our downwind sailing performance (wind behind us).

We arrived just as a 600 ft cargo ship was being escorted into the harbour. As you don’t play around with those big boys, we patiently waited for the tug boats to bring her in. Meanwhile we contacted the marina and found our way to our berth. Within half an hour we had our first drama, we were busy ensuring that our lines where well secured when Si looked up and noticed that our neighbour’s boat was up hard against Aura. Their stern line had come loose and the boat had been pushed over by the wind. Due to the angle, we did not have sufficient fenders to stop it from hitting. Indiana Jones (aka Simon) managed to fend off the boat. Meanwhile I jumped on the radio to the marina and managed to mumble out something incomprehensible about requiring assistance. With help from other cruisers, we managed to secure the boat as best as we could. When our neighbours returned shortly after (a lovely young French couple), they could not be more apologetic and just a bit worried about the possible damage. Si got out the magic cloth (thanks John “Catch the Wind") and gave the marks a bit of a rub. Fortunately the marks were only superficial and came off; much to the relief of everyone.

Once we had settled in, Si was speaking with a couple a few boats down who had lost their dog, Tequila the day before we arrived.. She was so excited to be on land, she took off and they were not able to find her. Gilbert and Isabelle own a lovely catamaran (Vent d'ailleurs ) and we had seen them at many of the same bays as us in Ibiza...the gorgeous golden retriever standing on the stern was hard to miss. As you can imagine, they were both devastated and we decided that we would do anything we could to help find her.

The next day Gilbert provided us with some flyers with Tequila’s picture and headed into town. Cartagena was once a Roman stronghold with its natural harbour and strategic position. They have excavated a number of Roman ruins such as the Roman forum and Amphitheatre. We visited the 15th century palace and the underwater museum that displayed some of the antiquities they have pulled from the sea along providing some fascinating information on the origins of many of the items and the associated trade routes. This was definitely one of the more interesting museums that we have visited. We also discovered a great local’s restaurant for lunch. It was more a gourmet deli / wine bar than a restaurant and nobody could speak English and the menus where in Spanish. Thank goodness for Google translate so we could determine what to order. We settled for rabbit in a garlic broth and boar in a red wine sauce. Both dishes were really different but very tasty. A few glassed of the local vino helped wash it down. During the day, we handed out flyers for Tequila to people walking their dogs, asked local shops to display them in their windows and any place that had a lot of foot traffic and crossed out fingers.

Cartagena

Upon arrival back at the marina, we were greeted with the news that Tequila had been found by a fisherman at a small fishing marina around the corner. She was exhausted and dirty and just wanted to sleep. That evening, we had celebration drinks on Gilbert and Isabelle’s catamaran. Tequila was not able to walk but we all hoped it was due to exhaustion and she would be on the mend in the morning. We gave her lots of attention and you could tell that she was happy to be home.

The next morning was back to work. Doing the usual hunt for food and preparing for a two night passage to Gibraltar. We never seem to be able to get it all from one supermarket so it requires a fair bit of walking to find what you want. Sadly, we returned to Aura only to discover that Tequila had to be put to sleep that morning. It appeared that she had been hit by a car that had damaged her spine. It was a very sad time especially for Gilbert and Isabelle. That evening we had a get together on Joanie and Bob’s yacht. We drank tequila, danced on the foredeck to ABBA and enjoyed being with our new friends. Just seeing Isabelle smile was worth the slight headache I had as we set sail the following morning.

Quite Night....before passage

Unfortunately setting sail was only temporary and within a few hours we were motoring. As we got closer to Gibraltar the sea was became totally calm without a breath of air. We had to keep on reducing the revs of the engine as we were going too fast and did not want to arrive in Gibraltar in the middle of the night. Being becalmed provided an amazing opportunity to view the many pods of dolphins that reside in this area. Most people say that the Mediterranean dolphins are not very friendly but one morning we had a large pod playing at the bow. The water was so calm you could see them looking back at you as they turned on their side playing in the currents. Amazing and not one I have experience before in such calm water.

Passage to Gib

The remainder of the trip was fairly uneventful until the morning that we arrived. I finished my watch at 6am and have a couple of hours of sleep before I get up for the day. In this case we had three hours before we reached out waypoint just near the Rock. The sun rises very late in Gibraltar at 7.45am so we had timed our arrival with the rising of the sun. At 7.30am, I was awoken to what sounded like a fog horn…oh no, please don’t let there be fog!! One of the reasons we were headed to Gibraltar was to get our AIS looked at (component of the navigation system). It appeared that we could see ships but they could not see us. Thankfully they could still see on radar.

Anyhow, up I got of bed and sure enough it was a "pea souper". You could not see 15 meters ahead. Everything was wet…including a very unhappy looking Simon who grumbled something about me getting the good watch. There was a cruise liner that had just passed about a nautical mile away and a 900 foot LNG tanker that was coming up next to us within 2 nautical miles. You could hear his fog horn in the distance…it felt very close. To top it off, our fog horn was not working. We continued forward at snail’s pace. Behind us I could just make out the sun rising and pointed it out to Simon. Within 15 minutes, the fog began to clear and the rock was revealed. It was a huge relief. We could not get over all the small fishing boats that were buzzing about…are they crazy?? We finally made contact with the marina and showed us to our berth located right in the heart of Ocean Village.

The LNG Tanker appears from the fog

We arrived on a public holiday so had an opportunity to relax, have a nice lunch and catch up on some sleep. The next few days were back to work. We had a number of jobs that needed to get done that we had scheduled with the local marine workshop (Shephard’s) including the reprogramming of AIS navigation system, new LED navigation light, new whisker/spinnaker pole, tune rigging, boom preventer etc. We also picked up our new offshore life raft.

The rigging and electronics guys were great and we were able to tick off all the outstanding jobs. We also had the Yanmar guy spend a day checking our engine to ensure that she was still in good working order after all the miles we had motored. We had hoped to visit Granada for a night to explore the Moorish castle and old town. As is the case with boats, the scheduling of the work did not work out as planned so we decided to explore the Rock instead.

We did the mandatory cable car to the top of the Rock followed by a solid walk down past the only troop of European monkeys. We also visited St. Michael’s caves, a network of limestone caves in the upper rock. The walk down included the “Great Siege” tunnels that were used to defend Gibraltar from the Spanish in the 17th century. We also toured the Moorish castle which was a bit of an anti-climax compared to what we would have seen in Granada. Oh well, there is always next time. For those history buffs, the Moors occupation lasted from 711 to 1309 and then again from 1350 to 1462, a total of 710 years. An Anglo-Dutch force captured Gibraltar from Spain in 1704 on behalf of the Habsburg pretender to the Spanish throne. The territory was subsequently ceded to Britain "in perpetuity" under the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713.

The Rock

St. Michael’s Caves

"Great Siege” Tunnels

Moorish Castle

As per usual, we had been keeping a close eye on the weather. To cross the Gibraltar straights a light easterly wind is ideal or preferably, no wind at all. You also need to ensure that you leave Gibraltar a few hours after high tide so that by the time you cross the straights you have a favourable current. There was some strong winds coming and wanted to avoid the worst of it. So we made the call to leave Saturday midnight. After walking down the rock, we had to walk back to the supermarket to provision for our 5 day passage. Yes readers, there is a very good reason why my legs are in such great shape.

On the day of our departure was Gibraltar’s national day…otherwise known as Gib’s party day! I fetched our latest crew member from the airport, Crispy from Perth. He had changed his flight so he could enjoy the celebrations with us. By the time we finished our chores and had a welcoming lunch for Crispy, the party was in full swing. The streets were filled with people wearing red and white. The air force did flyovers, a rescue helicopter dropped confetti and red/white rose petals. After a walk through the main street and squares, we stopped in at the cruise ship casino hotel and the Ocean Village area, where everyone was singing and dancing. We joined in for a few hours knowing that we would be setting sail within hours. Si and I reluctantly went back to Aura for a few hours’ sleep. I was woken up by fireworks…which Si slept through. By the time we were ready to go, the night club on our dock was in full swing…so off we headed with the sound of dof…dof and some drunken idiot throwing glasses in air. The timing was right for our escape, we were very pleased to be on our way!!