Balearic Islands, Formentera and Ibiza

Formentera and Isla Espalmador, 31 May 2007
At last we have arrived at our first cruising destination!!! It has nearly taken a year, but we have seen such a lot along the way. It took 5 attempts to get our anchor to hold in the weedy bottom of the anchorage. Finally it bit and we could get some sleep after our night crossing, and relax for the day.
Early next morning the wind came round and put us on a lee shore (normally you always try to anchor so that you are being blown off the land – not onto it, so that if the anchor does not hold you do not end up on the beach/rocks/mud!) so we upped anchor and headed to Isla Espalmador – a beautiful anchorage in a bay of a privately owned island. The anchor held on the 3rd attempt – things are looking up! We found ‘Will You’ at anchor here too. The water is clear with turquoise patches over the sandy bits. Excellent for swimming.

We had heard and read about some mud pools on the island, so were not surprised to see small groups of people ,often naked , heading from the beach into the sand dunes, then similar sized groups of very black humans returning to the beach. This ritual is a must do, although I still can’t see why anybody wants to smell like a sulphurous rotting mud swamp for 2 days. People pay a fortune for this mud in exclusive spas!

Our first wedding anniversary was upon us so we decided to head off to another cala that had been recommended to us on Formentera – Cala Sahona. The water here was very clear and absolutely turquoise, and the weather behaved itself so the cala was tranquil. It was really weird to swim around the boat and to clearly see the underwater aspect that you can only vaguely remember from haul outs.

In the evening we headed up to the Mohito bar to watch the sunset. The mohitos (Cuban rum and fresh mint cocktail) had been recommended to us, so despite the absence of a menu or pricelist ordered one each. They slipped down very nicely, so we ordered a second one each. We speculated how much they might cost as we watched the sunset over the bay – oh well what the hell, we’ll have a third one! I went up to pay our bill and being slightly sossled I did not express too much surprise when presented with a bill for 13 euros – what a bargain, I thought. I then glanced up and saw that they had given me the bill for the wrong table, which had had only 2 mohitos! We quickly disappeared into the darkness outside before they realized their error and asked for 26 euros more. We wandered over to the beachside restaurant and decided the menu was too pricey and not apparently great quality and so we agreed that we could cook up something better ourselves on the boat. So we wobbled back to the dinghy on the beach. To our dismay there were a couple of people on the beach coming towards us waving flashlights – we really thought that the bar had rumbled their mistake and come after us for the money. “Ola Ola! Were you in the bar just now?” We could no longer escape so we resigned ourselves that they’d caught up with us. “I lost my bag in the bar and it’s closed now – did you see it anywhere?”  Just some other punters – not an angry proprietor. “No, sorry mate” we said and breathed a huge sigh of relief. So we did get away with  3 for the price of 1 after all.

Ibiza : 4th June 2007
As we didn’t feel we could go back to the same bar a second night we moved on the next morning, and just to be sure that we were off the hook we went a different island. A short hop and we were in Ibiza, and we found ourselves in Cala Yondal with just one other yacht at anchor. There were 2 beach chill-out clubs full of beautiful people. They were playing really good up-to-the-minute chill-out tunes at both bars – unfortunately we were anchored exactly halfway between the two! They were very well behaved and the music finished reasonably early by Ibiza standards.
Next day we moved onto Cala Port Roig – not as pretty or chilled out as Yondal, but a long safe well protected anchorage. Here we met up with Kate and Davy on Roamer and saw them at anchor for the first time – had to have a photo of that, just in case it never happened again. (They must have liked it – they’ve become true cheapskates like us !!) No shore-side entertainment here and not the prettiest cala, so we were on the move again the next day.

Kate and Davey wet their anchor

 The ‘spiritual’ island of Vedra

In tandem with Roamer we gently sailed up the stunningly beautiful coast to Cala Badella, passing between the ‘spiritual’ island of Vedra and the mainland – it didn’t think that it felt particularly ‘spiritual’ but then we hadn’t been up clubbing all night and taking drugs! Ibiza is very cliffy and steep-to so it seems to just rise straight out of the sea. Vedra must make an amazing sight at sunset from the mainland. Cala Badella was pretty much full of mooring buoys, but there was room for boats to anchor around the moorings. After 1 failed attempt to get good holding we picked up a buoy and stayed for 2 nights on it. No-one came to take money or shooed us off – it was probably a private mooring and we were just lucky that the owner had vacated it for a while.
Anchoring
We take our anchoring seriously and that is why we have so many failed attempts. Let me explain that – many yachts just drop their hook any-old how, pile several metres of chain on top of their anchors and stop their engines – often, to be fair they are just stopped for lunch or for the night in a fair-weather anchorage. 15-20knots of wind ( an average sea-breeze) seems to sort them out and they start to drag their anchors, causing havoc amongst the other anchored boats (forgive me – the French appear to be the absolute worst at this – everyone assumes the worst when a French flag appears in an anchorage!)  Being used to anchoring in Brittany in strong tides and in the UK with 180 degree wind-shifts and unexpected gales we take it a bit more seriously – we drop the anchor and slowly drift backwards letting out chain as we go. We put out 3-4 times the depth of water in chain and slowly motor astern to encourage the anchor to bite into the sand/mud/weed/rock. If it bites we then motor astern at half throttle, mimicking the effects of a gale to see if we drift backwards. If don’t move we are happy to sleep well at night (apart from knowing that there is a French boat upwind of us!) If it doesn’t hold like this, we pull it up and start again. Hence, if our anchoring attempts seem to reflect a poor anchor, it is not a fair assumption. It just means we are trying harder to be secure at all times.
Cala Badella was a comfortable combination of small tourist development and un-spoilt beauty. The English family tourism had encouraged competition between the bars, so they were good value and with good services – we found free wifi internet in a beach bar so we stayed all afternoon (working hard  you know! ) for the price of a few beers!

There was a small bonus for Stuart and Davey – a model sunset photo-shoot was taking place just on the rocks to the stern of our boat. We don’t think that Matador was forming the backdrop to their shoot – it wouldn’t have looked proper with the reflection from the binoculars in the background or the long slavering tongues!

Puerto de San Antonio : 8 June 2007
We arrived here well equipped with info as to where to anchor from ‘Huit Huit’ who had spent many seasons here. They were absolutely right and we dropped anchor in good holding inside the green marks but just before where the anchorage proper is marked on the charts. We didn’t expect them, but they arrived a few days later to find us in their favourite spot!
A good safe anchorage was appreciated, as we wanted to experience some night-life here. It is the second club city of Ibiza – two of the big clubs are based here, Paradis and Eden – and there are good bus connections to the real city of clubbing – Ibiza town. Both these options mean that we needed to be comfortable to leave the boat unattended while we spent a good part of the night ashore out of sight of Matador. 
Well we dug our anchor in well as usual and within a few hours the 20 knot test blew up. 5 boats dragged their anchors and ended up in the channel but we were confident that we were safe and sound because we had done the ‘full gale’ test.  Roamer anchored too, and they were well acquainted with San Antonio, having holidayed on the island before. They insisted that we visit the west end of San Antonio – a neon lit strip of bars and clubs bursting with lobster-red loud-mouthed Brits on cheap boozed-up holidays. This is the smelly armpit, zitty chin, sweaty crotch of Ibiza but luckily the town planners seem to have contained it all within a small area. We took advantage of cheap beer and sat and people watched for many hours – fascinating anthropological study !

Along the sunset strip the up-market chill out bars were an improvement – the original Café del Mar still exists here amongst several competitors- we just felt out of place – not on holiday, not burnt bright red, not living or working on the island, too old and frankly couldn’t wait to move on.
As our first San Antonio hangover waned we popped on the bus to Ibiza town, arriving about 5pm. We walked all around the impressive fortifations of Ibiza, the Dalt Vila, climbing to the highest vantage point enjoyed by Greeks, Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans, Vandals, Moors and Catalans as they successively ruled the island. The evening heat hangs heavily as you slowly ascend the many steps to the top of the old town. We were glad that our hangovers had precluded an earlier start !

Later we sought out the nightlife, exploring the hip gay area of the old town, the pre-clubbing bars with their touts trying to encourage you in – to overpriced beers and over-hyped transvestite parade. San Antonio had been a good practice run and we got off without too much ripping off, heading home on the night-bus at 3.30am. We could have spent 30 euros each on a ticket to one of the big clubs just for the experience, but it was still early in the season and any atmosphere in the pre-club bars appeared forced, false and directed at tourists with too much money to spend.

We’re sure that the foam parties and water parties are great fun if you are part of the crowd, in the mood, slightly drugged (no-one could afford to be drunk at 10 euros minimum for a small bottle of beer!)  and younger than us !

Before leaving San Antonio we decided to fill our water tanks. 540 litres of water in our tanks seems to last us around 2-3 weeks if we are sensible , so it is not too much of a chore to fill the tanks when it is convenient. However, filling with water in San Antonio involved queuing in the office, presenting ship’s papers, captain’s passport, a 30 minute time slot, a dirty oily quay, no cleats to tie to, a special hose fitting only available in the Balearics, and 4.35 euros in exact change, if you please – but for the freedom of anchoring where and when we want for free, it is a small price to pay and only a mornings toil.
We headed for the less-developed north of the island and enjoyed spectacular scenery again before anchoring in Cala San Miguel. This was another beautiful cala with a combination of laid back charm and Thomson holidays apartments. A small supermarket met our immediate needs. The inflatable kayaks came out for some exercise. Roamer joined us for a surprisingly good Chinese meal and we were happy bunnies indeed.

We were finding that some calas would suffer from an invasion of jellyfish in their hundreds for a day, but often the following day they were gone. A sort of jellyfish cruise thing going on maybe, like the huge cruise ships that spend 12 hours in port, disgorge 2000 people into the town and then depart as quickly as they came. We quickly learnt that you do not swim if the little evil b***ds are in town. They certainly do not try to get out of your way, and they have chemical warfare knowledge second to none. We thought we’d cracked a new cure, saltwater scrub, antihistamine tablet, hydrogen peroxide to clean, ammonia to neutralize the sting followed by a burn-jel dressing to relieve the intense heat. This resulted in an impressive immediate cure, but unfortunately it just lay dormant for 7 days and came back just as bad as if no action had been taken. A month later the skin is only just healing. Alas global warming is raising the average sea temperature, leading to huge increase in the numbers and size of jelly fish, and their natural predators, tuna and turtles are  in decline.
If only we could wage war on mosquitos and jellyfish instead of innocent people.

Our last stop in Ibiza was Cala Portinatx, an attractive cala with sane tourist development. Along with Roamer we found an excellent Asian restaurant at the top of the town overlooking the bar – not cheap, but excellent quality – and there was a swimming pool on the terrace in case anyone fancied a quick dip between courses. It was a real treat to enjoy a meal like this- the sort of meal we would have had at least weekly back in the UK- but we can afford to do this occasionally now that we are not paying for overnight marinas. We love swinging to our own anchor for free– long may it continue!!

A 50 mile passage took us to Mallorca, we had a target to meet, our friend Peter was about to arrive in Palma and we needed to be on our way. Ibiza was far more than loud clubs and bars, it also had many beautiful calas and spectacular scenery.
You’ll have to take our word for it, but this is a sperm whale we sighted between Ibiza and Mallorca. It jumped out of the water 5 times, getting a bit closer to the boat each time. It was an amazing sight but we were quite relieved when he stopped getting closer and disappeared, just in case it hadn’t seen us!

Costa del Sol, Spain

We had been warned about the high cost, lack of berths and indifference to English yachties on the Costa del Sol, so we had planned to zip through this part of the coast without too many stops.
7th May 2007. Our first scheduled stop was at Estepona, which we thought would be a reasonably priced marina, as we knew several boats that had wintered or stopped overnight there. We tied up alongside the waiting pontoon, which claimed to have 24 hour staffing. It was about 7pm and there was no-one to be seen. We wandered around the pontoons – no-one to be found, so we cooked our dinner and planned to spend the night on the waiting pontoon and be gone early in the morning. At 10.30pm the marinero knocked on the side and asked us to fill in his papers and check in. When we found out that it would be €50 for the night we decided to move on briskly and do an overnight passage instead. The mariner was kind enough to let us eat our dinner before we left and turn a blind eye to our short stay on the waiting pontoon. A lunch stop here is €25 so we were pleased with his generosity!
We had an uneventful motor along the coast, with virtually no fishing boats, no ships to be seen and a tranquil flat sea. The peace was briefly broken at about 3 am, by the deep sound of a high-speed boat that showed on radar at 1 mile but had no lights. It disappeared quickly into the night and off radar. Drug boat, we both agreed and Stu went back to sleep and I continued my watch. The lights of Marbella and Malaga winked past in an unbroken line along the coast but by morning we were sailing past the fairly undeveloped coastline of Almeria, still showing the benefit of starvation of development by Franco in the 60s, but now starting to catch up with its neighbouring costas, and the snow-capped Sierra Nevada mountains in the background. We studied the pilot book, and found a reasonably sheltered anchorage at La Herradura. This was close to Almenucar where Laurie Lee witnessed the outbreak of the Spanish Civil war in 1936. We had a restful couple of nights at anchor and our first swim of the season. The water was already warmer than the UK at its best!

 The Sierra Nevada and Costa de Almerimar

Our own anchorage at La Herradura in fine settled weather

Almerimar : 10-23 May
We next found ourselves at Almerimar marina. We just popped in to find out the costs, preparing ourselves for a quick departure based on the Estepona experience. We were amazed to find it was €9 per night (water and power extra), so we booked in for a couple of nights. This marina has 1000 berths in 3 large basins, surrounded by shops, apartments, beaches, restaurants. It is a boat city, but completely lacks character and atmosphere. We were pleased to be able to get wifi on board the boat, and that there was a huge well-stocked Mercadona supermarket on site. There is also a VHF net broadcast every morning, similar to that of Lagos, so you could keep up to date with events, buy sell and swap gear, and find out a daily weather report. This turned out to be immensely valuable as Cabo de Gata headland is the local nasty to be avoided in bad weather and almost impossible to round in a north easterly due to the sea-state and currents. Almerimar had us hostage for 14 nights in the end, as we waited for the right weather slot to move up the south east coast safely.
A few Lagos boats arrived – Dawn Chaser, Roamer, Birvidik, and we made some new acquaintances – Pam and Dave on ‘Will You’ and Pete and Lyn on “Huit Huit” who were full of useful information.  Pete and Lyn had cruised the Spanish coast and the Balearics several times so we had a pilot book party and made notes in our new pilot book from their suggestions as to where to head for, good anchoring spots and where to pick up water supplies.
A German live-aboard was selling LED lights that he makes up himself to your specification – we had been searching for the right ones for sometime, so we availed ourselves of his services. LED lights use very little power, so they are great as anchor lights, and saloon lights, reading lights etc. If you are anchored and need to watch your power consumption vs. battery charging ability, LED lights are invaluable. All that we needed now was the right light shades …..

David, the weather man, introduced us to a couple of really useful weather sites:
www.inm.es  the Spanish met office website and www.meteosim.com . By studying the weather buoy data we could check whether the sea-state was suitable for departure, avoiding the hassle of leaving, having a nasty day on the water, only to have to return to Almerimar.
We got a lot of jobs done on the boat, varnishing the woodwork and protecting the sails and ropes from chafe – it was a useful and cheap stopover, but finally a weather window developed and we were off like a shot.

We rounded Cabo de Gata in a still lumpy and rolly sea and even managed to sail in light winds. We had decided to head straight out to the Balearic Islands overnight as we were having such a nice sail in 8 knots of wind, with twin head sails poled out and no main sail. At about 2pm Stuart looked behind us and saw the water getting choppier, so we decided to drop the big lightweight hank-on genoa in case the wind speed was on the increase. At this point the Navtex spewed out a gale warning for all areas of the western Mediterranean.
Luckily we got the lightweight genoa packed away and down inside in good time, but no sooner had we done that, we had to wind away the roller-furling genoa bit by bit. The wind swung around to the NW 120 degree swing, and increased to35 and peaked at 45 knots!!!  We were running around closing hatches, and getting the spray hood up as we were being soaked by the spray of the rapidly building sea. This transformation from light wind ghosting to full stormy seas took about 45 minutes, a Mediterranean speciality.  We decided to head into the lee of the mainland, as although we were in no danger, we didn’t know how long these conditions might last. We motored up into the lee of the headland and headed straight into a new cheap marina at Santa Pola, which had been recommended to us by ‘Will You’. We were very thankful that we had not been too far out to sea when this weather came through – it was a salutary lesson as to how quickly the Med weather can change. With no tides to overcome, the sea state changes and builds as rapidly as the wind speed increases, and then only dies away slowly after the wind has stopped.
Santa Pola marina has only just opened and is almost empty.  It was €11 a night, the pontoons very solid and the bathrooms luxurious. We were happy to tie up for a few days – first job being to wash the salt crystals off the outside of the boat.  Santa Pola is a nice town, not touristy, and has Chinese shop warehouses where you can buy almost anything. Every town in Spain and Portugal has a Chinese shop – however small the village –well stocked with all sorts of tat, amongst which you can usually find something useful – a tool, a plastic tray for the fridge, a kitchen utensil. In Santa Pola we found 2B pencils for chart work at 35cents each, and some teak pencil holders for 65 cents, which Stuart is making into LED light shades!  Bargains galore!
Leaving the marina, and heading out from the mainland we had a rough and windy start to the 100 mile passage to the Balearics, thinking – here we go again! – But thankfully the wind moderated after a couple of hours and we motor-sailed overnight. Again it was a very uneventful passage, with just a few ships and fishing boats sighted. We take it in turns to be on watch for 2-4 hours at a time, for short trips overnight this is no problem, as you can catch up on sleep once you arrive.
It took 24 days from Ceuta to reach the Balearic Islands. We were lucky to have anchored in settled weather when possible, and to find a couple of cheap marinas. The marina charges were due to increase to summer rates within a few days of our departure from each place, so we had got in just in time. Will we be so lucky in the Balearics, given all the tales of woe that we have heard from ‘helpful’ souls who wish to fill our heads with all sorts of information?