October 10, 2019
The journey west continues! We upped anchor early on our third morning in Menorca and somewhat reluctantly left our little bay that had been such a nice respite for us after the crossing from Sardinia. However, we had places to be. We had a just a couple days to get Florence to Palma, the capital city of Mallorca, where she was scheduled to get a handful of jobs done, including the installation of new chart plotters, a full generator and water maker service, plus a couple smaller bits and pieces. We piloted back out into open water and pointed Florence west. It would only be about 40 nautical miles to the tip of Mallorca, which we could already see off our bow, though we wanted to make it a good deal across the north of the island before anchoring for the night.
The wind was fairly light that morning, not expected to fill in until later in the evening, so we regrettably had to turn the motor on and make way under engine. It was the most straightforward passage imaginable - conditions were flat calm with not a cloud in the sky. We hugged the north Menorcan coast as much a possible, trying to catch a tiny bit of land breeze to help push us along. Once we reached the Mallorcan coast, we steamed right past the entrance to the large bay of Port de Pollenca where we had met Stephen’s parents a few months earlier and continued along the island’s north coast. The last time we had sailed this coast had been in the dead of night on our crossing from Ibiza where the new moon had made the passage eerily dark. It was quite a different experience repeating the passage from the other direction and in daylight, where we could appreciate just how rugged and wild the north coast of Mallorca is. It’s essentially just a tall, jagged cliff face falling into the sea, with little development and very few places to anchor. Our old friend the Med Whisperer had recommended a small inlet he'd discovered earlier that month about 3/4 of the way along the northern coast. Aside from being one of the only tenable places to drop a hook on the entire coast, he also claimed it was one of the most special spots he'd seen yet - a small cove surrounded by tall cliffs covered in pine trees which felt more like the alps than the Balearics. This surely warranted a look. And though the motor-sailing was a bit dull, the scenery was spectacular, and an easy sail meant I could continue on my Patricia Highfield high - I spent most of the afternoon sitting at the back of the boat in the G&T seats ripping through The Talented Mister Ripley, which, while markedly different from the film, was gripping. Tom is a twisted little thing!
Our timing for the passage was just about right, as we approached the mouth of our intended anchorage just as sun was setting. It was just a small inlet cut into the steep cliffs, and we very nearly missed it. The Med Whisperer was right - the spot was absolutely breathtaking, though it didn’t appear the easiest place to anchor. The cove was deep, only shallowing off suddenly at the lip of the cliff face. There were 2 other boats anchored already, though they must have had shallower keels, because there was no way Florence could shuffle up that close to the cliffs. We nudged her nose up as close to the cliff face as our nerves would allow, dropped her hook and reversed backwards, hoping we dug in sand, though it was impossible to tell as the water was too deep to see the bottom. We seemed to settle nicely though, and as long as the wind didn’t shift, we should be OK for the night. We settled in for a quiet one, eating dinner in the cockpit with the sharp smell of pine trees filling our noses.
We awoke the following day with two options: we could sail on to Palma, getting there a full day before the work was scheduled to start, or we could do a short hop to the neighbouring bay of Port Soller. We’d heard the port was lovely, and one of the only proper towns along the sparsely populated northern coast. We figured as we were here and had the time, it would be a shame to miss it. So we upped anchor relatively early and did the very short hop to Port Soller, which only took about an hour. The port itself was well-tucked into the rocks, so we had to pilot into the cliffs for a while before the bay revealed itself. Once inside, we were greeted by what was a lovely port indeed - a decent-sized round bay with a small marina and a long quai lining the bay full of restaurants, bars and shops. On first glance, the port looked about a 5th the size of Port de Pollenca with 5 times the charm.
There were already several boats anchored and space was relatively tight. Another sailboat had entered the bay just after us and was vying for our chosen spot, so the pressure was on to nail the anchorage on the first go. The space was too tight to use wind to anchor, so we dropped the hook and reversed back on it sharply to secure us in place. Success! The other boat had to bugger off deeper into the bay where the holding didn't look as good. Anchoring can become quite the competitive sport in tight bays! Eager to explore the town, we dinghied to the end of a pontoon where it appeared most boats had left their tenders. It was more of a pile of tenders than an organised row, and we had to hobble over 2 or 3 to make our way to the pontoon. After a stroll along the length of the quai, we learned that Port Soller was only half the story and that the town of Soller sat about 2km inland from the port, reachable by tram. Apparently the town itself was built up in the hills away from the port to protect it from pirates. We found the old-fashioned tram and hopped on, enjoying the 15-minute ride through brush and several orange groves that the area is famous for. I guess that explains why every bar along the quai was hawking fresh orange juice. When we reached the town, we were let off in a lovely traditional old Spanish square - a world away from the touristy places we'd been in Mallorca thus far. It was getting bit late for lunch, and after being turned away from a couple places, we finally had a proprietor of a little tapas place a few streets back from the square take pity on us. We enjoyed a quiet hour sat under the trees eating far too much manchego. Afterwards, we continued our stroll around the town, which you can walk the entirety of in about 20 minutes. We stopped at a little stand to sample some of the fresh orange juice. I’m not a huge orange juice fan (it harkens back to a bad experience from my youth with screwdrivers from which I’ve never quite recovered...). This stuff however would have me reconsider my stance: Tropicana be damned, this was easily the best juice I’d ever had.
We rode back down through the orange groves in time to watch the sun set over Florence from the quai. I was really impressed with this little spot! Apparently there is an old-fashioned steam train that runs from Palma up through the hills of the island to Soller town that sounds well-worthwhile if you are in the area. We alas would be sailing there, as Florence had an important appointment with Berthon's Palma outfit in a couple days. Time to get back into business mode.
We were up early the following day to begin the 50-nautical mile sail around the western corner of the island and down the coast to Palma. Again, there wasn’t much wind, so we motor-sailed much of the way. Once around the tip of the island, the wind picked up a bit and was on our beam, so we had a nice sail down to the enormous bay in which Palma sits. Palma sits deep in the mouth of the bay, so once inside we still had another couple hours to go until reaching the capital city. We sailed passed a grim looking block of high-rises to our port that Stephen informed me was the magical town of Magaluf - a place that apparently only the most sophisticated of gentlemen grace with their epicurean presence (read: fratville for British lads on a bender and the spot where Stephen had once spent a particularly inebriated weekend with his mates after finishing his A-levels). Alas, we’d be giving this culturally significant land a pass this time around.
The marina area of Palma is massive and extremely intimidating on approach, with 6 separate marinas packed into the bay. Thankfully the marina where we had made a reservation had provided a map ahead of time, or we would have never found where we were going. We were lucky to have secured a berth at all, as there was an Oyster and a Swan regatta in town that week, and everyone and their brother appeared to have rocked up for it to show off their vessels. We sailed passed some massive cruise ships, navigating various bends as we tried to locate the right marina. It was my turn to park, and I used the long and somewhat involved pilotage into the marina to get in the zone. I find it’s always nerve wracking parking in unfamiliar territory where you don't know where you are going and space is inevitably tight. All you can do is take it slowly and give yourself time to bail out if something goes awry. We have third-party liability insurance for Flo of course, but the premium is so high we would basically have to total another boat in order to take advantage of it. So in hopes of avoiding that, slow is always pro when parking in a tight marina. We located our berth on the last pontoon in the marina. This was going to be a narrow one! I headed into our row bow first and motored a bit past our berth, which was disconcertingly tiny. This would be the tightest park I’d done yet, with no margin for error. I flicked the boat in reverse and began backing Florence’s rather beamy ass (no offence, Flo) into the spot, careful not to clip the boats moored in front of us with her bow. I was not ashamed of using the bow thruster to keep her nose straight as we inched backwards closer to the pontoon. Slowly, I slid her close enough for Stephen to toss the stern lines to a dockhand who was thankfully there to assist. He gave me a little clap and said he doesn’t normally see the girl parking the boat. Phew! That was tight. All tied up and relieved, we had about an hour before sunset, so we checked into the marina and decided to explore the town before getting an early night. Berthon were scheduled to come the next day at 8 AM to begin work on our chart plotters and generator service.
Palma is a really interesting town. The capital of the Balearics, it’s large, multi-faceted, and well-worth exploring. Its port area is absolutely massive and definitely the biggest collection of boats I've ever seen in one place. Our marina was right at the far end of it, so it was about a 50-minute walk along the quai before reaching Palma Old Town, which is my favourite part of the city. It’s about what you would expect of a Spanish old town - a series of narrow, winding streets with lovely architecture, particularly the large old wooden doors you see on many of the buildings. The Spanish's door game is strong. Palma has a great culinary scene with both traditional and modern options, as well as a burgeoning art and design scene, and we popped into several funky galleries tucked into ancient buildings. The old town is a fun place to explore, and small enough you are never really lost. We found a tiny tapas place that looked cozy and friendly where shared some absolutely amazing fusion tapas and some garnacha before heading back to the boat. Tomorrow would be all business.
For the next 3 days, we had Berthon on board fitting our new chart plotters, which, as is the case with most things boat-related, was not straightforward. We had purchased different systems than they anticipated, and they weren’t entirely sure how to make our new chart plotters speak to one another and synch with the other navigation systems. There was a lot of head-scratching and staring at different plugs and wires before anything seemed to start getting put into place. The nature of the beast I suppose. We also had a full generator and water maker service to ensure these systems were humming along nicely before the Atlantic crossing, where they would be mission critical. While far from the cheapest option, Palma is likely the best place to get work done on your boat in the Med, as they have everything part and service you could imagine there. After full days spent working on the boat, it left time in the evening to go for jogs along the marina and up to the famous cathedral and around its walls. Afterwards we would spend our evenings meandering the old town.
On our final afternoon with the work on the boat was pretty much wrapped up, I decided to take my Mac Book to the marina cafe and use their wifi to get some blog work done (I’m finding it surprisingly hard to find time to set aside to write about the trip - always too busy doing stuff!) As I was preparing to walk the gangplank from the boat to the pontoon, I thought I’d be smart and try to avoid dropping my lap top in the drink while I clambered across, so I placed my bag in the dinghy, retrieving it at the other end. When I picked it up, I was horrified to find the bag dripping with water. I had forgotten it had rained the night before, and it seemed the dinghy had a couple inches of water in it. Shit. I rushed back onboard, towelled off the bottom of my computer, and held my breath as I tried to turn it on. No joy. Surprise, surprise, Macs and water do not make good bedfellows. My computer was toast. I was crushed - I hadn't even had the computer a year. And being the idiot I am, I hadn’t backed up all my recent material, so I lost all the photos I'd had recently uploaded and at least 5 weeks-worth of blog posts I’d written but hadn't had a chance to upload yet. So that’s one of my excuses for the blog being a bit back-dated! I'd have to begin recreating the posts from memory, which while painful is my own damn fault. Sigh…. OK, rant over. I’ll just need to somehow get a new computer and start again!
On our 4th morning in Palma, with all the work completed, we paid our boatyard bill (which, of course, was about twice as much as we had anticipated) and with lighter pockets and one less computer, slipped the lines for what would be an overnight sail to the neighbouring island of Ibiza. We plan to spend a couple days there as our last stop in the Med before heading to Gibraltar and then down the coast of Africa to the Canary Islands, which will be our staging post for the Atlantic crossing. The wind forecast is strong, so it’s time to get going and test out our new and improved navigation systems! See you in Ibiza, kids.
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