July 19, 2019
Team Florence woke up the next morning much later than expected. It's tricky to sleep in on a boat, as the ambient sunlight always manages to creep below deck, and as soon as you begin to regain consciousness, you immediately spring out of bed to check the anchor and your surroundings to ensure the boat is still OK. With Florence safely tucked into a marina and her crew sleeping soundly on dry land in a very dark room with AC, we were shocked when we finally rolled over and realised it was 11 AM. When was the last time we had slept past 7?? We roused ourselves and decided to tackle the day, a day away from boat jobs. We sometimes find it's helpful to designate work days and off days. This strategy we find helps us compartmentalise effectively so we are motivated to roll up our sleeves and get shit done on the boat on work days, and we don't feel guilty for enjoying ourselves on off days. After all, the reason for going on this adventure wasn't only to clean the boat, fix broken things, and make long passages. We also want to experience all the places this boat takes us.
First order of business was to stretch our legs, something we always crave after a crossing. We decided to run up to Park Guell, Gaudi's take on a public park, located on the north side of the city. I think we perhaps underestimated what an undertaking that was. The park was a good distance from where we were staying, and much of it uphill. By the time we reached the park, we were both limping. But the fun only started there. We ran all over the park, which is stunning and in my opinion one of Gaudi's most interesting works. The park is multi-faceted and multi-layered, each landing offering an absolutely amazing vista of the city below. And of course, the landscape is punctuated with Gaudi’s bizarre and slightly psychedelic artwork.
About the last thing we wanted to do when we got to the top of the park was to continue with our 30-day squat challenge, which was quickly becoming a literal pain in the ass. But some things just have to be done! I used the promise of a tapas bar crawl after our workout to power me through: pain now = ham later. Once back from the run, we were both tempted to take cold showers and just pass out, but there was so much more of this city to explore (and by explore, I mean eat). Our hosts, Katie and Theo, armed us with a list of about 20 different tapas places snaking through the Gracia neighbourhood of town, which we were more than ready to tackle. Katie and Theo know a thing or two about Barcelona and particularly its restaurant scene. A few years ago, newly married and living in London, they had what I imagine might have been a similar conversation in principal to the one Stephen and I had when we decided to buy this boat. They likewise decided to throw convention to the wind and left their lives in London to move to Barcelona and start a restaurant. Note that neither had lived in Spain before, and neither had worked in the restaurant industry... This lack of familiarity sounds to me strangely familiar... ;) Sure enough, they went and did the damn thing and started up a successful restaurant in Barcelona bringing the soul food of the southern US to Catalonia. Fucking cool. They moved back to London to have their first child, but shortly afterwards realised that reentering the London rat race was not what felt right for them. Struggling to slide back into conformity, they remembered how alive they’d felt in Barcelona and decided that was the energy they wanted to bring back to their lives and into their new son’s life. So that's what they did. They've officially been back living and working in Barcelona for two weeks and loving every minute of it.
So yes, suffice it to say, we couldn't have asked for better people to give us the lay of the land, especially from a gustatory standpoint. We left their flat loaded with a list of tapas places that would take us a week to get through. Gracia, we learned, is a simultaneously old-school and hip neighbourhood of narrow, tree-lined streets. It is decidedly pro-Catalan, and you can't go a block without seeing at least 7 Catalonian independence flags. It's also become home to many artists and artisans over the years and seems a perfect example of the traditional blending harmoniously with the trendy.
Stephen and I happily spent the afternoon wandering around this quirky area, eating and drinking just about everything we could find. Out of the 20 places on the list, we managed to hit about 7 over the course of 6 hours, which I thought was pretty solid work. We were really digging deep by the last one, plowing through the meats, cheeses, and vermouth through sheer force of will. Only at our last stop did we finally violate our "one drink per stop" rule, as we found ourselves in what seemed to be a very authentic after-work scene, with locals spilling out into the streets, leaning over barrels, drinking vermouth and eating small bowls of sausages. Vermouth is a very important spirit in Barcelona, widely considered to be its signature drink. While I'd only previously experienced vermouth as one of about a dozen strange ingredients incorporated painstakingly into a $30 cocktail by some mixologist in Brooklyn with a handlebar moustache, drinking vermouth on its own in this little bar in Gracia was decidedly pleasurable. It's traditionally served in a small glass with an ice cube, an olive and an orange wedge. It's slightly sweet, slightly bitter, and a real treat to sip. I endorse.
We were practically crawling back to our friends' flat by 8 PM, slightly broken but very happy people. We reentered Katie and Theo's to a party in full swing. It was their son Hazlo's first birthday, and you best believe the team was celebrating. We had to summon up some energy reserves for what amounted to an amazing dinner party. As you might expect, a dinner party hosted by a couple who used to own a restaurant is not likely to disappoint. We were joined by 2 other couple friends of theirs, all international, all having formed friendships with each other in this amazing city. The evening was a wonderful and refreshing example of how your life can be what you make it, and you never know who you are going to meet where or when, and what effect they might have on your life. The party involved free flowing cava (though not for the birthday boy), shrimp tacos with all the fixings, and great conversation that lasted until about 4 am. It's true that everything just happens later in Spain. I still can't decide if I love it or if I'm just too old for this shit...
The later than anticipated finish meant that our 6:30 AM wake up call to head to the marina to meet our refrigerator repair man was high on the Richter pain scale. Bless my husband, he insisted it didn’t make sense for us both to go, so he was off to the marina in the wee hours while I stayed in bed a little longer. Once he got to the marina, he was surprised to find that someone had messed with our lines. Florence was drifting away from the dock when he found her, too far away to be accessed from the pontoon. He had to wrestle with the lines for about 45 minutes to get her secured more tightly to the dock and so that he could get aboard. So that was a bit disconcerting! You definitely do not want random people messing with the security of your boat when you are away. He spoke to the marina, and they were not aware of anybody playing around with our lines but promised to have a look at the CCTV. Whatever.
4 hours and EUR500 later (another classic 10-minute boat job), Stephen and the technician were able to bridge the language barrier and get the refrigerator up and running again. Surely Stephen's efforts warranted his wife to treat him to a cheeky tapas lunch at a place of his choosing. We spent what was left of the day visiting the Sagrada Famiglia, wandering around the waterfront and then the Born neighbourhood before calling it early, as the following day was definitely a work day.
We awoke the next day early, like kids on Christmas morning, eager to embrace.... boat cleaning day! OK, so not exactly like Christmas morning. We decided we'd run to the marina rather than take a cab, which was a questionable decision as it was brutally hot and the route from our neck of the woods to the marina was along a wide and industrial highway with nothing to recommend it. Oh well, at least we saved cab fare. We spent the next 4 hours giving Florence the royal treatment, scrubbing her decks and stainless, deep-cleaning her interior, doing all the laundry, until she was looking and smelling beautiful again. It was warm work, but worth it to get Florence primed for her next crossing, which we intend to embark on tomorrow early afternoon. This will be a roughly 180 nautical mile crossing we estimate will take around 30 hours across the notoriously tricky Gulf of Lyon to Provence, making landfall in the small town of Cassis. The wind that rushes down from the Pyrenees gets funnelled through the Gulf of Lyon and can quickly reach gale force levels, so careful weather routing across this stretch of water is imperative. We had found what seemed to be a good weather window that would get us safely across before the next big blow from up north swept through, so we were going for it. We will enjoy one last night in this awesome city and one last night on dry land before we are back aboard and out to sea. While I'm a little nervous about the crossing given the horror stories you hear about the Gulf of Lyon, I'm ready to be back aboard and ready to get to France. Baguettes et fromage, here we come.
Comments