22.05.2023 Cala d'Or, SW Majorca, Spain
Graptolite's Sailing Log
Martyn Pickup & Heike Richter
Mon 22 May 2023 20:03
After contacting several local Volvo-Penta dealers we discovered that they were too busy to be bothered with our little problems. A Yanmar dealership in Portocolom said they could help but we had to get there.
We sailed off our remote anchorage and headed down the coast. The entrance to the Portocolom is narrow with 20m high cliffs on each side. We came in on a tack that could take us to an anchorage inside but between the cliffs the wind shifted dramatically, first sending us close to the southern wall then then to the north then pushing us back out. We gave up at this point and turned downwind to go south along the coast. The southwest coast of Majorca has many pretty branching rocky inlets but without an engine and in stiff wind they are very scary. One such inlet is the port of Cala d'Or. We had no wish to sail overnight again so we chose a branch of the inlet near to the entrance and managed to drop the anchor in 10m of bouncy water. The inlet was about 100m wide with the usual cliffs topped by very expensive white-painted houses. Our tiny kedge anchor was dropped over the stern in case the wind shifted and we battened down the hatches for the night.