8^th April 2013

Another long sail of 130 miles across the Tyrrhenian Sea to Porto Turistico di Roma.

We had left at 0955 with SW wind at 15 knots veering W. This meant that we could sail out of the port and take a straight line to Rome. There were calm seas and clear sunny skies but it was still cool out on the water.
By 1400 we had gone through quite a few wind shifts and there was now a considerable swell. The wind was all over the place and very light.
To make matters worse, we were motoring!
John hates motoring.

By 2000 a reasonable wind had finally returned and we are happy to be sailing again.
Even though we were sailing, (power gives to power – unless you’re a super tanker and BIG!), at 2131 we changed our course to avoid a 300ft tanker on collision course with us. Once he was past we were back on course.
That was the big event of the night.

It was a starry night with a little sheet lightening on the horizon – and the swell kept with us. By midnight we were well reefed because out of the blue would come gusts of wind at over 30 knots.
Geesh! By 0600 the wind had become more consistent. It had dropped to around 6 knots and we had the genoa out.  It is a sunny and clear morning and miraculously we are only a few degrees off course.
By 0800 we had taken the sails down and were motoring the last three miles into port.
If you have to do a night passage then it seems to me that the best ones are ‘across a big empty body of water’ with no scenery to be missing!

We have noticed that the Italians take lunch from midday to 3 pm so we needed to be in before midday! 

The entrance to the port was a little tricky as it is not only narrow and directly off the open sea but there often seems to be a swell around the entrance. There was quite a swell in the entrance for us this time so John left part of the main sail out to steady the boat (stop it rolling). Les had radioed ahead to the control tower.  We were advised ..
“Best entry is to center and towards the green”.
John’s steady hand got us through and the water was a lot calmer.

Again we were met by a man in a dinghy (without the English). He took us to the northern end of the port and we had to moor ‘stern on’ between two boats 1mm plus a boat width apart. Whilst we had 2 men on the pontoon and one in a dingy circling us, they were not as helpful as at Porto Cervo - they didn’t hand us the anchor ropes and so we ended up with filthy hands! Have we ever mentioned we hate Mediterranean mooring?

Note to self.
In future, if you take down the small piece of sail you used to steady the boat coming into port before you try to dock – it’s a lot easier!

We moored up at 0850 and John set about making the boat shipshape for a 7 day stay whilst we explore Rome!

Mediterranean mooring ‘stern to’ is a real pain!
We have the dinghy to deal with off our stern and of course all the boats are so tightly packed together you are then just in a car park as well.
For the time of the year this marina is quite full.
The only other marinas close to Rome are reached by going through an estuary but the depth is sometimes a problem due to silting. 

Man cannot live by bread alone – he needs internet too!

Like many marinas here, the marina does not have internet itself - but there is an independent provider on-site that does. After spending a day trying to set us up, 3 visits to the office and this overwhelming feeling that ‘we’ were doing something wrong, it appears their aerial is malfunctioning too! Just like Porto Cervo.
It doesn’t help that we were the ones that discovered it, nor that they gave us money back, nor that they thanked us for our help. The network would be down at least a week.
So now it’s back to internet cafes!

We are very safe here and are now awaiting the arrival of our new gas spring for the boom-vang.  Great service from Selmer and Discovery.

Bob and Cathy have arrived in Rome and are joining us on Monday to sail with us for the next 5 weeks.