Position: 38:43.54N 001:27.81E - Es
Pujals, Formentera
What a difference
a day makes, or even a couple of hours. The bay was flat calm when Tiny
Dancer ferried us ashore for our evening meal. Delicious it was too.
But on returning to our faithful little tender, the seas had turned a bit choppy
and mum was definitely a bit nervous on the way back to DecaDance.
The winds weren't
coming round to the East as quickly as promised which meant a night of
anchor watch for me and Chris. During the night most boats departed, we
were happy our anchor was secure, but kept watch nonetheless as the
wind was strengthening. There was also a boat very close to us which
appeared to be abandoned.
At about four in
the morning Chris realised that Tiny Dancer was no longer bobbing off our stern
(she was definitely there at half past three) and as the first light of
sunrise arrived we finally tracked her with the binoculars crashing against
the rocks in the distance. She wasn't alone - there was a smaller
tender dancing next to her. Sadly, that wasn't the worst of it - just
a few hundred yards further along the rocks lay the upturned hull of a
yacht. I can't tell you what a sickening sight that is.
Tiny Dancer
finally disappeared and we had no idea of her fate. We kept watch of shore
as the sun climbed higher; tired, dejected, and wondering how the hell we were
going to get off the boat. Then I spied something moving in the
distance - Tiny Dancer, complete with engine, being carried away from
behind the rocks by four men! Were they Good Samaritans or
tea-leaves? We waved and hollered from the boat and they looked over but
we lost sight of them behind a fisherman's hut. We stopped bobbing enough
to work out the name of Cafeteria Espardell close to where they were and -
thanks to mobile broadband, the power of Google and the fact they had their own
website - I phoned the restaurant and explained the situation. And then
again to a poor customer who was roped in because his English was better.
He said there was no-one with our tender and promised to keep an eye on it until
the sea calmed and Chris could swim ashore.
In the mean-time,
a coast-guard on a jet-ski delivered one of the occupants of the neighbouring
boat back on-board. The whole crew had been unable to return to the
boat overnight and he was bringing two of them to rescue their yacht and the
others were catching the ferry to Ibiza. He took Chris back with him and
towed Tiny Dancer back to her mother-ship, short of only an engine cowling, a
seat and her dignity. Our jet-ski hero had rescued the four
people aboard the stranded yacht at five in the morning. They're all
ok. And that's all that really matters.
To
follow our progress in real time, track our AIS signal on
marinetraffic.com
To see photos of our journey make
friends with Deca Dance on Facebook
Find out how you can join our adventures
on www.DecaDanceYachtCharter.com.
