Greece!!!

YES!!!!
I have arrived on Corfu, my first small crossing. Distance 169 miles, but due to tacking, travelled distance 207 miles. Duration 54 hours.

And what about Montenegro? Well I spent 6 days there and they passed in an eyeblink.

Boys will be boys

Dubrovnik is a lovely city. Actually the entire old town is like a museum. There are only a few enterances through the city wall, to enter the old town. The entire city wall is intact. Well, during the last war in 1991 the wall was severely damaged, but by now it has been completely restaurated.

City wall of Dubrovnik.

It is possible to walk around Dubrovnik on the city wall. From the wall you can oversee the entire city. On the corners there are guard towers. On the picture below, which I took from a fort located higher on the mountain, you can see the entire city wall.

Old town of Dubrovnik.

From the city walls I could see everyday live in dubrovnik. Despite the many tourists invading Dubrovnik during the summer months, there are still people living in the old town. From the city wall I could see some  playing soccer  with a bright red ball. They had placed some small goals in between buildings. Let's play!


Not being disturbed by the tourists, these kids were playing soccer.
The grafiti on the wall is the only grafiti I saw in Dubrovnik.

From the city wall I could see that they were becoming less en less carefull. And surely, the red ball flew over the wall surrounding the monastary/church. At first there was shock, but right after that I could see the naughty look in their faces. How to get the ball back?  I could follow the boys on the city wall. A little further some reconstruction work was in progress, and they could use this construction to climb on. From here they could see the red ball in the monastary garden.

The view onto the monastary garden.

Then a big discussion started. Who should climb the wall? It was clear that they all had some fear of doing it. Just as one of the boys was showing signs of being willing to do it, a local lady, also walking the city wall started shouting at them. After some shouts and explanation between them, the woman gave up, and continued walking. The biggest kid, climbed over the wall, with iron spikes, and jumped in the garden. He ran to the ball, being carefull to stick to the paths in the garden, and not tred on the plants. the ball was immediately thrown over the wall. But how could he get out? The boys overlooking the garden were now tough again and started shouting advice. Fortunatly there was a tree near the wall, and the kid could climb out!

This wall was at least 2.5 meters high!

While I continued walking the ciyt wall Icould hear them playing soccer again. Right in the middle of what I consider to be an open air museum!

Meeting at sea

Last week, I was sailing towards Dubrovnik, and the weather was very variable. In the morning no wind, than slowly increasing to a lovely sailing wind, and then thunderstorms accompanied by rain, but not by wind. After the thunderstorms, it was back to a lovely sailing breeze. With just the genoa hoisted, I was sailing 3-4 knots towards Dubrovnik. Quite a while there was a larger sailing boat behind me, sailing in the same direction. The boat was sailing a bit faster, so the boat was slowly gaining on me. Then I heard the music playing on their boat, and the two boats were close to each other. I waved cheerfully and shouted:" see you in Dubrovnik!". The 3 men shouted back: " we are cooking spagetti in Dubrovnik, will you join us?".

The Austrian boat just passed me.

Sure, that would be nice. Because they were sailing a little faster than I was, I added: " I will be a little late!". No problem. Unfortunately within minutes the wind died completely, so we had to engine the last bit. Just about at the same time, the both boats arrived in port. The spagetti tasted great, and the company was excellent.

Madame Curie (picture taken from the Austrian yacht).

Where did they come from?

Since the first of May the sailing season has started. All of a sudden I see loads of charterboats, and the number of private yachts I have seen has increased. So from one day to the next there are collegue sailors in port.

Madame Curie is often the smallest boat in port.

Because the travel guide was very positive about Makarska, I decided to sail there. It was actually a little bit to far, but if I sailed till nine in the evening I should be able to make it. Upon arrival I was sent away by someone on the quay. The harbor was full!!! I could not have imagined this before May 1st. But the sun had already set, and I really wanted to walk the famous boulevard the next morning, so I decided that what the man on the quay was shouting, got lost in translation. Beause there were still some empty places on the quay, I just tried again a little further down. Usually there places are reserved for tourist boats. But you cannot blame me for trying.  But the guy on the quay was also very persitent. He sent me away again. Hmmmmmmm what now. Well simple, just try again. Then the guy came over, and told me he did have a spot for me. I could take berthing near the gas station. But, I would need to leave at 7 o' clock in the morning. By now I was very happy that I could stay, and I would try to extend my stay in the morning. The next morning I was awake long before 7 o' clock. I turned out that I was berthed next to the only fishstall on the boulevard.

Staying till eleven in the morning was no problem what so ever, so I got to walk the boulevard.

Tasty fish

Today I sailed from Korcula to the National park of Mljet. Like I mentioned before, marinas are rather expesive, somewhere between 45 and 50 euros per night. But... there is an alternative. Many restaurants have a small jetty, and when the entire crew eats at the restaurant, the berthing is for free. In my case, eating with the entire crew is cheaper than a marina fee, and I don't need to cook!. I would call this a classical win-win situation. There is one small disadvantage, there are no showers. But I don't consider that as a big problem, I have a porta shower. A porta shower is a portable pressure shower, which is pressurized manually. It works fantastically. So is I have the possibility, I berth at a restaurant, to save money of course, not for the food (yeah right).

Mljet isle.
The isles here are so much greener than the previous isles.

Today I felt like treating myself to a nicely grilled fish. This means I have to look at a couple of dead fish laying on ice and picking one. I choose a scorpion fish, just because it was recommended to me. Then one of the restaurant employees takes the fish to the sea to clean it. The cook then receives it, quickly picks some fresh rosemary from a bush next to the BBQ, en seasons the fish, and generously pours homemade olive oil over it. And the grilling can start.
Just seconds before the cook wanted to place my fish on the grill, he turned away to check the fire. A seagull took advantage of the moment and tried to snatch my fish. One of the other employees of the restaurant was quick enough to prevent my fish being stolen.

Even after my fish had safely been placed on the grill, the seagull did not give up. He remained on the roof, and kept staring at the fish on the grill.

Seagull staring at my fish.
In the upper left corner you can see the Dutch flag onMadame Curie.

But I can understand that the seagull was persistent, because I received a very tasty fish on my plate. Because I must have looked a little helpless, the waiter offered to take the bones out for me. The result was fantastic!

Sailing

While reading my last few post I realise that most of my blog is about my discoveries ashore, and that I hardly mention anything about the sailing. Actually I spent most of my time on board, and sail quite some time. The first problem is that is very difficult to take pictures of sailing. I'm on board, so I can only capture a small part of Madame Curie in a picture. Last week some people I met took pictures of my boat sailing. When I receive them, I will post them on my site.
The wind is rather variable here. I really mis the steadiness of the Dutch wind. Here in the Mediterranean, the wind can go from windforce 2 to 8 in 5 minutes, and during these 5 minutes it can also shift 180 degrees! And I don't see it coming. It is still sunny, and there are no threatning clouds. And local weatherforcast do not always pick up these sudden changes. So everytime something like this happens, it surprises me.

Last week I wanted to visit the "Blue caves" on Bisevo, and that is a pretty long sail from the mainland, about 42 miles. These caves have holes in the ceiling, and the sun shines through and colors the water underneath blue. One of the Germans I met showed me a video, and I must say, it looked really pretty. But I was reluctant to motor 42 miles, so I waited for a nice day with wind. With a lovely windforce 6 I sailed beam reach to Bisevo. Upon arrival there was a large swell in port. I saw a pick-up truck drive down from the mountain to the harbor. An old man got out of the truck and assisted me in berthing Madame Curie. But I was not happy with this situation. With every wave Madame Curie came up 1 meter. The old man spoke italian, and asked if I wanted to buy wine of fish. I bought two bottles of wine. I asked him if he thought the sea would calm down. His answer was: "nobody knows, but we will know tomorrow". He also thought it would be better if I left to Komiza, which is a more save harbor, especially because I sail alone. But before I could leave he asked if I could come ashore. He gave me 2 kisses on the cheak to congratulate me on sailing alone. Then he gave me a two teeth smile. He told me to only come back to Bisevo if the sea was calm. Because it is not possible te visit the caves when there is a swell.

The next morning in the port of Komiza (safe harbor) I went to the tourist information to ask if the Blue caves were open today. Because during the night the wind had picked up, and in the morning there was still a strang breeze. The ladies at the tourist information thought it would be closed. But did nothing to verify it. Just shook there heads and said: "maybe tomorrow?". It was lovely weather, so I decided to sail. First to Bisevo to see about the swell and then sail on. Near the caves I saw it would be impossible to enter the caves. The entrance is about 1.5 meter, and the swell was still 1 meter. No way, this was going to work. In hindsight it was a bad decision to sail for the caves with wind. A lot of wind means a lot of waves!

One of these arches is the enterance to the blue caves.

After this I sailed to Palmizana. The blue caves I will save to my next visit to Croatia. I left with the first reef in the genoa, en the first reef in the main, and did not hoist the mizzen. It started out still rather comfortable as you can see in the videos.

In the mean time I just sit behind the windscreen, all is comfortable.

Later that afternoon everything became not so comfortable. The wind picked up even more. At the end of the afternoon I had only a small piece of the genoa (second reef) hoisted and I was doing 6.5 knots down the waves. This is above my hull speed, so I was surfing the waves. Not funny!! I was not dangerous, Madame Curie handeld it fine, but I  was bruised and thrown around. Entery of the port of Palmizana was rather difficult. It is a well protected bay, but you are only protected when you actually in the harbor, after passing a very narrow enterance. So I could only furl the last bit of the genoa when I was already in port. On that moment I also decided I would not sail the next day. First I needed to rest en recover from my bruises. So for Frits and Charly, two sailors I met in Komizana, I hope your trip was more comfortable.

Madame Curie moored in the harbor under the arrow.

The following morning I took a taxiboat to Hvar, on the next island. Hvar is a beautiful old town, and from the castle that towers the city I took this picture of the islands.

All is well

Just a short post to say I'm okay. The last week I have had very slow, of no internet connection at all. So updating my blog has not worked out. The last period it has been rather windy (a post on this subject will follow) and from one day to the next the sailing season has started. All of a sudden there are more boats in port. Tomorrow I will try to post some pictures on my blog.

Best wishes from Croatia

Waterfalls and a monastary

Klooster=monastary, Afmeerplek=berthing

I am back on the mainland of Croatia. One of the kodakpoints in the area of Sibenik are the Krka waterfalls. To visit these waterfalls, I sailed (on engine) up the Krka river with Madame Curie, but last 15 minutes I had to take a taxiboat. Behind the waterfalls, I took a second taxiboat to the monastary, and then it continued to Roski Slap. The waterfalls were very impressive, but judge for yourself.

In the small pools in between the waterfalls, in very clear water, I could see the fish swimming! Not really big fish, approximately 20 centimeters, but there were very many of them. In het water tussen de watervallen, wat extreem helder was, kon ik de vissen zien zwemmen! The rumble of the falling water was locally exceeded by the noise the frogs produced. During there croaking, the frogs inflate small bladders next to there head. A lot of noise for such a small animal.


 After a long wait (2 hours), it is still low season, and the toeristboats drive rarely, the boat left towardt the monastary. The approach to the monastary was impressive. The little island is full of vegitation, and the monastary and the church contrast nicely.



Church and monastary on Visovac island.

 The guided tour on the island was very disappointing. Within 20 minutes we were rushed over the island. There was no time to look at something, and walking back was not alloud. I can't imagine that you are supposed the leave a monastary more stressed, than you were upon entery.

Roski Slap, near the start of the Krka river, was not so very impressive. The approach on the other hand was. Huge cliffs rose on both sides of the channel, and the channel kept getting narrower and narrower.

It was already after five o'clock when I arrived back in port. So I stayed in Skradin an extra night.

Living on the edge, or taking risks?

Living on the edge, or taking risks. That's up to you, but I'm not sure at the moment.

Last week I sailed through the national park of the Kornati. The park consists of approximately 89 bare isles, hardly inhabited. Last year, during my reconnaissance in Croatia, I visited the Kornati isles as well, but because they are known as the pearls of Croatia, I decided to finish them again. I decided on an other perspective. I read the touristic books in advance, and on the biggest isle, Kornat, there are ruins of a fort build in 600 AC. I wanted to visit these ruins. The nearest port was a small village harbour, about 3 km distance. A plan was born. While sailing in between the isles I also saw a desolated church on Kornat, and decided to visit that as well.

Kerkje is church.

Upon arrival in het village harbour it turned out to be a lot smaller than I had questimated after looking on the nautical chart. The recommended berthing spot was alongside a quay. In reality this quay was rocks stacked upon each other, not nearly smooth enough to berth Madame Curie safely alongside. I was not to sure about the depth eiter. There was a mooringblock about 5 meters from the quay, cleary ment to be used by smaller boats. But I'm not a quitter. The picture below is of the recommended berthing spot. Everybody can see that it is not very suitable. I ended up tying the mooring line to a cleat in the middle of Madame Curie, and berthing bow to (the bow is shallower, and less vulnerable). The result was as is shown on the first picture of this post. Berthed, diagonal, just outside the real port.I was really in doubt. Could I leave Madame Curie like this? Was it safe enough? Should I walk to the ruins and the church? I decided it was okay.

Just to make sure, I double checked the route to the ruins with the only 2 people I could find in the entire "village". Then I started walking. There are no actual routes. The locals walk alongside stone walls they have build on the entire island. Upon arrival at the church, it was closed. This happens to me quite a lot Croatia, after a very long walk, usually up hill, a church or chapel turns out to be closed. I was about to continue my walk to the ruins when I noticed a ring just underneath the window on the leftside....



Found it!!!!!

So I could enter the church!!! The inside was very plain, but it felt like I had made a ver sneaky discovery. After leaving the church I locked up again.
The walk to the ruins was uphill, and rather challenging. There were may sheep, and they had created paths. Well, actually, ik was short patches of path in between the rocks. But the view was fantastic when I reached the ruins.

When I came back to Madame Curie, she was happily rocking about in the harbour. So in hindsight it was "living on the edge" instead of risk taking. But I'm not sure that I will leave Madame Curie in this manor the next time. I'll have to think about it..... Afterwards I left to a safe harbour for the night.