Off at last!
Philippides III
Chris & Carol Jackson
Tue 8 Sep 2009 10:38
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We didn't get away yesterday as planned, looked at
the forecast and the Bora is still blowing hard, decided to leave the following
day(today) Also, we had had two nights broken sleep and as the trip is about 36
hours we like to start fresh. The idea was to get an early night and leave in
the morning. Another plan gone wrong. We duly went to bed around 2130 and fell
asleep despite the wind still gusting around the bay. We had 40 metres of heavy
chain out and our anchor waas well and truly embedded in the mud, so we were
confident it would hold us safely. What we didn't allow for was othe boats, at
0200 I awoke and went on deck to find a 50 odd foot Halberg Rassy nuzzled up
against us and grinding our pulpit, it broke the port navigation light, having
dragged its anchor and drifted into us, Carol came up and we crammed fenders
between the two boats to avert further damage, we shouted and called and
eventually a buy came on deck, the boat is from Belgium and the owner and his
pal spoke English, eventually, they got thye anchor up and got free of us, not
without lifting our anchor as well, we were now drifting around the harbour in
the wind, Carol on the helm and me on the anchor windlass, we got most of the
chain up when it all slipped off the windlass again owing to a massive piece of
revolting waste material wedging itself into the anchor gipsy, I cleared this
with a knife and we finally retrieved the anchor and all was ok. Except, where
could we go that was safe? there appeared to be no real space in the bay for us
to anchor in a reasonable depth, so we eventually decided to berth on the
harbour wall of the Q dock, ie customs dock where we would have to go tomorrow
anyway, we dropped anchor and reversed into a space there and spent the remains
of the night in peace, even managed a couple of hours sleep. Went to check out
this mkorning at 0800 and after being sent from Harbourmaster to police to
customs and back to all 3 again and again we were finally given clearance to
leave Croatia about 0840. Left after swapping telephone numbers with the guy
from last night who agreed to pay for a new navigation light and any other
damage we may find. Wind started at a hefty 30 knots and we were sailing at 8
knots plus under a scrap of main, now 4 hours later, we have about 7 knots of
wind and are motor sailing for Corfu, 170 miles to go, hey ho, never a dull
moment!
Chris
SAT Phone 00881631573629
http://blog.mailasail.com/p3 |