40:39.5N 17:57.8E

The marina at Santa Maria di Leuca is not the most protected marina we have been to.  Any waves from the west tend to find their way into the marina and roll the boats which are moored beam-to the waves.  This is also a “bus stop” place where most of the visiting boats are headed to Greece or the reverse.  So around 5-7 PM there are usually 5-10 boats heading in from there trip.  With this type of business the marina is pretty relaxed on answering the VHF or assisting in berthing.  They eventually get there but you may be floating around awhile until they decide to tell you where to berth.  Reality is just pick on with boat close to your length and let the rest fall into place.

The town is a upcoming Villa resort.  New Villa’s are being built to go along with the large in town Villa’s which have existed for years.  The beach, well there is no real beach except lava rocks and a few poolings or coral sand.  To compensate the hotels and beach pavilions have made wooden platforms with umbrellas, etc to make the user happy.  Personally I do not see much point in laying on a wooden platform above rocks by the water but it does get customers.

The coast along here is steep cliff sided with many Grottos.  I would have pictures but I think I deleted them before I saved them properly onto the computer.

On 11 June we left for Brindisi Italy.  This is around the heel and slightly up the east coast.  Not a long trip, 70 nautical miles and around 9 hours of motoring again.  We attempted sailing and got a whole 30 minutes of slow wandering.  Back on with the iron sail and up the coast.  There are two areas to stay offshore from, one is the Italian firing range out into the sea and the other is the anchorage for Brindisi.

Entering Brindisi you soon discover it is one of the industrial ports of southern Italy.  Petrochemical, bulk storage and electrical generation provide a scenic view and smell, the smell of money.  There are two marked marinas in the port.  One called Brindisi Marina and the other Legal Navel.  Neither one was where we were supposed to go.  I went to Brindisi Marina thinking this is where we set up a reservation.  This marina is well protected and looked very good at first.  After a few minutes of calling on the VHF they came and directed us to a spot.  The mooring line they gave me was about 8 mm thick.  When I asked for another they at first said no.  Then they showed me a seconf line that was completely covered with mussels and they would not lift it up.  So I asked for another berth and they said no.  This marina is only half full so what’s up with that?  Finally they gave me another proper 25 mm line. 

We settled in and our agent who made the reservation called and asked where are we.  I said at the marina.  He said which marina and it was obvious I was in the wrong place.  We picked up our lines and left and headed into town and berthed right at the eastern start of the Appian Way.  A perfect spot right at the entrance of town, with only water, no electric.  But we did not care we can run our generator to handle that.  So he we are right next to a racing sailboat and the Romanian tall ship on a visit. 

In the next note I will provide a history lesson again along with pictures.