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Date: 20 Sep 2010 10:44:37
Title: 37 43.797N 015 12.58E Riposto, Sicily - Porto dell' Etna
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Hi all, we made it through the straights and are tied up safely in Sicily once again. The marina is located directly under Mt. Etna... one BIG volcano. It is covered in clouds most of the time and the winds comming off of the thing come up all of a sudden at about 25 kts, blow for an hour or two and then just stop.

We left Agropoli early to avoid another night of docking fees although I never again saw the dock guy after I gave him cash upon tying up their... no receipt, no papers, no hassles. We probably should have hung out there another day. We made for Strompoli, a continuously erupting volcano in the Aeolian islands about 30 miles north of the Straights of Messina. Motored about half the way and then was able to turn the engine off for half the way and sail. We got there around 1PM. We didn't want to attempt the straight in the night so hove too ( that is sailor speak for stopping the boat and bobbing around aimlessly out of the shipping lanes) and made dinner and took naps until about 1 AM. We then motored the 25 miles to the straight just in time for sun rise and a steady parade of large ships going in and out of the straights.

We left the sails up which have some effect steadying the boat in the tidal currents there. They were in our favor and we shot through the 5 mile straights doing about 6.5 kts over the ground. That is likely about 2 or 3 kts of current. The ferries connecting mainland Italy to Sicily are set up so that as one leaves one side another one is just leaving the other side. It looked like there were maybe 3 ferry companies and an odd hydrofoil operating all at the same time. LOTS of fast moving traffic. I wonder if they have any bridge engineers in Italy... or maybe the correct question is who owns the ferry companies?

There were maybe three or four distinct patches of heavily choppy water where I think the current, wind, and bottom interacted to produce a 4 or 5 boat length of heavy hop.

It was about another 35 miles south along the Sicilian coast to the marina which we sailed wing on wing. (sailor speak for the wind was right behind us. A point of sail for us almost as bad as having the wind dead ahead) The pilot book described the town of Riposto as untouched by tourism but with an expanding marina that would eventually change things. I think what they said about the town was right on. The marina has expanded and the prices were higher than Rome! As we got closer to the marina a 3 foot swell developed likely from the Mt. Etna wind described below. All at once all the power boats seemed to want to enter the harbor with us. As we dropped our main sail a 50 foot power came by at half speed and the wake and swell combined to give us a gunnel to gunnel roll that flipped every movable object down below. They put is in with the larger boats and the fishing fleet. The fishermen here arrive about 3 AM and leave at 4 - as timed through my open hatch. Katie took the bow line as I backed in and proceeded to get three fingers caught between the one inch line and the bow cleat - burses but no broken bones. Could have been bad. The ships doctor gave her an Ibuprofen to stop the swelling and applied a cold compress to the effected fingers in the form of a cold beer bottle, the contents of which helped relieve some of the pain. We also had a safety briefing afterwards on how to avoid similar episodes.

It is Katie's 25th birthday today so we went out to celebrate last night. We found a delightful family run wine bar/restaurant, the Astemio, down a side street after asking two or three 'men on the street' where to go. Katie had a veal dish with lemon sauce, potatoes and onions. I had a Calzone with lots of water buffalo mozzarella (specialty here. Ever try to milk a water buffalo?) We drank two caraf of local red wine. Some kind of cheese ice cream for desert. All for 38 Euros. Our waitress, a daughter of the family, spoke pretty good English. She explained how her grandfather lived in America, her brother was the chef, and they had opened the restaurant to take advantage of the growing tourist presence, but there was still nothing really to do here.

We left the restaurant and came upon the main square in front of the cathedral where an Italian rock band had set up. Katie said it was a 'ska' band? I would call it Italian rock umpa music. Lots of people, dogs and kids milling around at 11 PM.in front of the church on a Sunday night. A great Italian dinner and a live rock concert was the best I could do for Katie on her birthday - not bad...

I am almost sad to retire the Italian Waters Pilot to the shelf with the Spanish ones, the binding is broken and some of the pages are wrinkled and faded from salt water exposure but after this it will be on to Greece and a different set of books. We will also be loosing our Italian communications infrastructure, internet and phone, and will have to look for new ones when we get to Greece. We will pick up the Martins in Corfu. I spent about an hour studying every weather forecast I could get my hands on before our three day open water crossing and they agree a gale will be blowing across from mainland Italy to just north of Corfu between the 25th and 26th so I think we need to try to be there before then. Katie is out restocking provisions and I have a couple of fix it jobs before we try to get going early tomorrow morning the 21 st. More later...




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