Santander 18 July - 43 27.3N 03 46.6W

ALKIRA
Charles & Maggie Bevis
Thu 18 Jul 2013 16:54
We went to see Ann off from the Bilbao central bus station yesterday, escorting her onto the airport bus just to make doubly sure she actually left.

When we returned to the boat, the half hour tidying up session we had planned, turned into a bit of a marathon and before we knew it, it was 9.30pm. I hurriedly threw a light meal together and we then took our places in the cockpit so that we could wave farewell to Ann as her flight passed over us shortly after 10 o'clock.

Up relatively early this morning to get ready for our departure. We left Bilbao at 10.30 in glorious weather, with a pleasant breeze to keep us cool. Charlie had taken the spray hood down and the bimini so we had a clear view of the lovely coastline as we sailed and/or motored along. Stunning scenery and lots of beautiful beaches along the way.

Sadly no dolphins spotted, or anything else for that matter. After the last few weeks of dodging fishing boats and lobster pots and quite a few other boats, we had the ocean virtually to ourselves with only the very occasional yacht or ship sighted.

We arrived in Santander at approximately 5.30 pm and have dropped anchor close to a beach but around the headland away from the city itself, although we have an excellent view of everything that is going on and across the bay toward the city. It was still busy everywhere as we arrived with lots of small pleasure craft darting all over the place. A constant ferry service is running and transporting everyone to and from the various beaches back to town. In another hour or so, the crowds will have gone and with luck we will hopefully have the anchorage to ourselves, well almost. We've no plans to go and visit yet another city, although I'm sure we could find plenty to see. As we are running slightly behind schedule, we hope to leave early tomorrow morning at around 6am as we have quite a long passage to get to Ribadeselle.

The weather looks set to hold for the next few days, so we're taking the opportunity of pressing on and hope to turn the corner early next week ... if possible.

We both agreed today that although Spain has been very enjoyable so far, we are both missing France. The people, culture and lifestyle of France is more to our liking, but as we continue our passage along the Spanish coast, it's a great surprise to us to see how varied this coastline is and how different each place has been. We look forward to yet more variety and hopefully a little more breeze so that we get in more sailing.