Deja Vu

Crossing the Adriatic

Wednesday 24th July dawned bright and sunny with a good forecast of moderate North Westerly winds arising late morning and lasting overnight. We were up early preparing for the 120 mile passage from Bari in Italy to Bar in Montenegro, just dropping an ‘i’ in our destination. We left Italy soon after 9am.

In spite of the forecast we had North Easterly winds for a large part of the day which sent us off course towards Durres in Albania, but instead of steady winds from the right direction as promised, the North Easterlies died altogether early evening which gave us the opportunity to correct the course as we motored north.

The first part of the passage was uneventful apart from great excitement when a pod of some 20 or so dolphins swam alongside for over an hour, playing in the bow wave and doing all sorts of acrobatics. It was a wonderful sight and a great treat to brighten up the journey.

We found the North Westerly wind in the early hours under a full moon on Mo’s watch, so sails up again and then Mo was entertained by the dolphins once again. It was quite eerie with them leaping about at night! Later at 0545 came a brilliant sunrise over the Montenegrin coast.

As we got closer to land we hit a large coastal fog bank reducing our visibility down to yards. Fog horn out and radar on, we crept forward, sailing silently towards the harbour entrance. The harbour at Bar loomed out of the fog that was falling off the mountains and we tied up on the customs quay at 8am to check into Montenegro, a process that involved waiting at the harbour office for an hour, visiting the bank to make payment and then off to the port police and finally customs. In all this took nearly two hours. After all that we were ready for a swim so motored the boat round to a nearby bay where we anchored and swam. Water a lot colder than in Italy!

Naples

It was an early start for us on Monday 22^nd July as we had to get a taxi to take us to the bus stop by the railway station to catch our bus to Napoli, due to leave at 9am. Fortunately we had bought our tickets the day before, a frustrating exercise that had taken nearly 40 minutes, for reasons best known to the bus company’s computer system! Unfortunately the bus was very late and we waited on the hot and dusty road until well after 9.30am, very Italian, we understand.

Waiting for the bus — Waiting in Bari for the bus to Napoli

The journey west across southern Italy showed us olive groves, vineyards, sunflower fields, massive wind farms, few solar farms and much flat and barren land. It got more interesting as we approached the west coast as the landscape became more undulating and old villages with church spires were evident on the tops of the hills. As we approached Naples, Versuvius loomed over the city, a still active volcano so close to a massive urban sprawl with acres of run-down residential tenements crammed together for as far as the eye could see.

We met up with Nick and Elin in Garibaldi Piazza by the main railway station and took the R2 bus to see the wonderful historic castle, Castel Nuovo and Palace Piazza close to the wharf area of Naples. The 12^th century castle, adorned with a triumphal arch added in the 15^th century by Alfonso the Magnanimous, was most impressive. We admired the beautiful theatre, gallery and 19^th century palace and looked out over the harbour with Versuvius once again dominating the skyline.

Naples historic district — Naples Historic district

It was excessively hot and the bus journey back to the station was a drama as Mo had an attempted raid on her rucksack. Thankfully the attempt was foiled before anything went missing, but a salutary lesson to us all.

A train ride to Maria’s home town of Marcianise and we received a very warm welcome from Maria, Mia and Maria’s parents into their lovely home.

It was a fleeting visit, but we thoroughly enjoyed seeing them all and enjoyed some fun with the girls, Elin and Mia, who were a great delight.

Nick and Maria took us to Caserta old town, and then showed us the palace in Caserta, which unfortunately was closed, and before long we were doing the journey in reverse to take us back to Bari.

We got back to Bari on Tuesday at 16.30, having enjoyed our trip to Naples. Mo was pleased to have seen just one of the places her Dad had talked of in his wartime reminiscences of Italy. It was so good to see Nick and Marie, Elin and Mia, at home in Italy, and to see Maria’s family home too. I cannot believe that we failed to take a family photo of them all, that was an oversight!

Bari

It might not have been one of our better decisions to leave Vieste on Wednesday 17^th July to sail to another coastal town further south, but set off we did. The moderate northerly wind was no problem but the sea was still boiling from the strong winds of the previous few days and even getting out of the north facing harbour was excitement we had not bargained for.

It was a downhill sail and very fast which was a great relief to the crew who had to don the sea bands to maintain equilibrium! Trani and Bischelie, the ports we had hoped to visit were going to be untenable with the big onshore swell, so we kept going a full 55 miles to the major port of Bari. We arrived just before 7pm to a warm welcome from a private sailing club who helped us moor up on their visitors’ pontoon. We were a long way out of town, but the bikes came in handy and we enjoyed exploring the old medieval town of Bari, complete with castle, lots of churches, residential back streets and most famously the shrine and tomb of Saint Nicholas, who is, amongst other seasonal obligations, the patron saint of sailors.

On Saturday 20^th July we sailed 12 miles down the coast to Mola di Bari, a smaller characterful fishing port that had been commended to us for the fresh fish being landed, traded, cooked and served straight onto your plate! The harbour was very shallow and despite going aground where the pilot and charts promised us deeper water, we made it into the small harbour and secured the penultimate berth in the Nautical Daphne Marine.

Carnival time — Mola di Bari carnival time

Mola di Bari square — Mola di Bari central square

We just happened to be in Mola di Bari on the same night as a great commotion. This turned out to be the opening ceremony of the area’s ‘Games’, due to start the following day. It was like the Olympic ceremony all over again only without Danny Boyle’s input and short of a few million quid in the kitty for special effects. Despite a charming lack of organisation, several teams, led by rather good drummers and talented flag wavers, converged from various side streets on the town’s central square. We were royally entertained along with what seemed like thousands of others spectators. After enough of the festivities we fetched up in a fish restaurant alongside the fish market to enjoy the day’s catch. Nigel devoured an octopus and Mo enjoyed a Spingola, or sea bass.

Back to Bari, we are now moored in the Marina Ranieri as we are leaving the boat here to take a bus to Naples to meet up for a day with nephew Nick, his wife Maria and children Elin and Mia, who are spending a few weeks with Maria’s family in the town she grew up in.

East coast of Italy

Lastovo is one of the western most islands of Croatia and makes an attractive setting off point for Italy as the distance to cross to the tip of the peninsular jutting out from the east coast of Italy is only 60 miles, a manageable day sail. Fun and games as usual to clear customs out of Croatia, but the police were very co-operative and met us out of hours at 6am to give us the necessary departure stamp, so we could get an early start to ensure our landfall in daylight. The policeman was anxious to ensure that we left immediately, which of course we did. We don’t think the Lastovo police know that Croatia has joined the EU, or more likely the central authorities had no plan lined up to roll out after July 1^st to ease all these departure regulations.

We motored for 3 hours, sailed on a beam reach for 7 hours and reached the Italian coast soon after 4pm. It was a great sail with the autohelm on most of the way.

We received a warm welcome onto the one and only viable yacht pontoon in Vieste, but we were surprised not to find the larger marina that the pilot book had promised. We subsequently found out that there had been a marina but someone absconded with all the EU investment money and left a huge infrastructure in such debt that the project was frozen. What Vieste is left with is the basis of a fantastic marine facility, smart wharves, pontoon facilities, all new, but abandoned and not being developed as there is no more money. It is in the hands of the local community now, so in true Italian style it may never develop further which is a great shame for visiting yachts.

We spent 4 lovely days in Vieste, exploring the old and new towns and soaking up our first real taste of Italian life. Vieste is a busy seaside resort with long sandy beaches both north and south of the town, which itself has bustling main streets with shops, cafes, ice cream parlours and markets. An old part is built on a rock peninsular which has a myriad of quiet meandering backstreets containing houses, restaurants, shops and cafes winding up to a castle and church from which there are magnificent views.

Backstreets of Vieste — Backstreets of Old town Vieste

view from the castle — View south east from castle

We enjoyed good food and good wine, stocked up on proscuttio and pasta, lovely fruit and vegetables and spent much time people watching, entranced by the Italians’ ability to speak loud and fast for hours on end. Even buying one loaf of bread seemed to take the locals several minutes of dialogue each!

Local produce — Lovely displays of local produce

Our inability to speak and understand any real Italian was frustrating for us and for them as we found very few Italians who could speak much English. Thank heavens for Catrionna, the lady who runs the pontoon we are moored on. She is the local Mrs. Fixit and fount of all local knowledge, organising laundry, gas and many other things requried. She is also the local HLR for the Cruising Association.

Hoping to leave Vieste on Wednesday 17th July, but we have to wait for the strong winds to abate which with any luck may happen during tonight. Heading south towards Bari.

Korcula & Lastovo

We had been planning to go to Vis but the wind dictated our direction and we ended up in Vela Luka on the eastern end of Korcula. We were pleased to note that the dusty work in progress on road construction that we encountered last year, was now complete and we enjoyed our visit here much more than expected. It is a lively holiday town with local market and shops, great for re provisioning the boat.

The internet access from the Casablanca cafe was the best we have come across so far on our travels and Mo was pleased to have had a good connection to enable her to speak over Skype to Mum in New Zealand. Many miles between us, but I know my sisters Angela and Christine are able to read Mum the blog so she knows where we are and what we are up to. We want her to know that we are thinking of her and sending her lots of love, even though we cannot call more often.

Many cafes were unusually boasting TV’s and we realised we had the chance to see the men’s Wimbledon final next day, so we stayed on and enjoyed a great afternoon inside an empty bar watching Andy Murray take the title in fine style. The fact that Murray was playing a Serbian perhaps ensured that no Croatian was interested in the match, for we were completely alone in our enthusiasm for the tennis!

Murray final — Watching Murray in Mens final at Wimbledon

Monday 8^th July we set sail for Lastovo, stopping off at Triluke, an anchorage on the south east coast of Korula, for a swim. It was pretty and very blue, but there was not a lot of room for many boats in here.

Arriving on Lastovo around 3pm we anchored in the company of several other boats in the bay of Mali Lago on the North coast. It was very settled and balmy, so we deemed it time for a first BBQ. Sadly it was not a huge success as the charcoal would not light easily and when Nigel did get it going black storm clouds arrived and dumped heavy torrential rain on us. We finished up eating down below, the food a trifle wet and soggy.

Lastovo is a truly beautiful island and very relaxing in settled weather, great for swimming and snorkelling, although Nigel has not found a great deal of interest when he has been swimming with snorkel and flippers.At least it is good exercise!

Whilst cruising around the island we have come across many of missile launcher hide aways, part of the old Yugoslav military past.

We plan to stay here for a few days whilst we contemplate the weather outlook and perhaps think about crossing the Adriatic to Italy to explore a section of their Eastern coastline.

Getting to Vrboska on Hvar

Tuesday 2^nd July, we left Split well after midday hoping for the afternoon sea breeze to blow us to the island of Brac. The westerly wind finally obliged at 2pm and we went from no wind to 20knots in just a few minutes in true Croatian style. A fast sail took us past Milna on the south coast of Brac and into Lucice Bay, recommended to us by the Hubbard family as a good overnight stopover. It was a friendly place and we enjoyed a calm night. Next day we left similarly late heading east to the north east coast of Hvar and stopped in the pretty bay of Blaca on the south coast of Brac for a much needed cooling off swim in the bluest of blue waters, clear and deep. It was lovely.

We eventually caught the afternoon breeze in a broad reach all the way to Vrboska where we tied up on the harbour wall. We had been worried about depth here as some of the pilot books are very conservative suggesting little more that 2metres, but we found over 4metres on the wall and no problem at all to go in stern to. What a gem of a place.

Approach to Vrboska — Approaching Vrboska

We dubbed it the Bradford on Avon of Croatia, probably something to do with the old stone bridges that crossed over the river entering the head of the inlet. Lots of facilities here for food, supplies and banks, access to the ACI Marina services if required, and yet very unspoiled. Vrboska boasts two medieval churches, St Mary’s and St Lawrences and some extremely desirable residences flanking the estuary.

We spent Thursday 4^th July on our bikes, riding on the cycle trail round to Jelsa, a charming town, abuzz with a holiday atmosphere and a little more touristy. Room here for half a dozen boats on the harbour wall and plenty of depth for yachts to tie up.

We continued our cycle ride around the peninsular on the other side o f the estuary and discovered lots of swimming opportunities off the rocks, which of course we took advantage of.

San Giorgio to Split

Thursday 20^th June, our first stop to clear immigration into Croatia was at Novigrad where we admired the old church and sampled some Croatian beer.

Cafe in Novigrad — First beer in Novigrad

On our way in we suffered complete instrument failure which was worrying. Nigel even had to resort to reading the manual to identify that the main fuse had decided to blow. The next morning Nigel and Peter set off in search of a new fuse. The chandlery had closed but amazingly the local electrical store stocked exactly the right fuse. It was duly replaced, local wine in plastic bottles purchased and we were ready for the off. The next few days saw us making miles down the Istrian Peninsular calling in at Pula for some culture and shopping and then the quiet anchorage of Soline for some swimming.

Our next stop en route to Split was Mali Losinj where we moored up in time to shelter from the storm that had been brewing after the long heat wave. We revisited the WWII constructed tunnels and out buildings, all now in a sorry state of dilapidation, but had clearly provided an outlet for some rather good local graffiti artists.

Tunnels in Mali Losinj — Mali Losinj WWII tunnels

A fresh sail took us from Mali Losinj to Molat to overnight on Tuesday 25^th June and then we journeyed down Dugi Otok to its southern edge where we moored up in the town of Sali. By this time Mo was having a serious dental problem that needed attention, and being warned off the resident dentist by the locals, Mo and Sharron took the 6am ferry into Zadar to visit a dentist kindly recommended by one of our English friends in Sukosan. It had been a bad night for Deja Vu as a strong North Easterly had sprung up, blowing straight into the harbour of Sali, bouncing the boat rather viciously. Frenetic night time activity of all the crew to move the boat forward to avoid the rudder grounding on a ledge in front of the wall, ensued at 3 am. Ther wind never died down that night and in the morning was gathering in strength.

With Mo and Sharron in Zadar, Nigel and Peter set off in the remnants of the gale for a 30 mile sail to the mainland port of Vodice which was the agreed rendezvous with Mo and Sharron who had planned to reach it by bus from Zadar. Dental treatment painfully received, Mo, with multiple antibiotics to take, could only get better!

Vodice was rather fun. A busy tourist resort but which had some interesting old backstreets and a fine line in religious artefacts including two very striking depictions of Christ crucified, no doubt left over from Easter, and a plethora of bars and restauraunts. The Marina facilities were good and we all enjoyed long showers, before the excellent Hornsby omelettes.

In the galley — Hornsby omlettes underway

From Vodice we travelled to Vinisce, a lovely anchorage near to Trogir. The next day saw us in Trogir where we said farewell to Peter and Sharron who had been great crew and fun to be with.

Midnight on June 30^th saw fireworks unleashed over Trogir and there were reports of parties all over Croatia, especially in Zagreb, as Croatia finally joined the EU. Unfortunately Angela Merkel and other EU heads of state were too busy to attend the celebrations. Shame on them! Makes you wonder whether the whole European project has gone stale.

On to Split on July 1^st, where we anchored in the bay and visited dentist for a check up and hairdresser, topped up on provisions and headed south, stopping our first night in Lucice, a pretty bay on the south coast of Brac. Good moorings.

San Giorgio

Deja Vu’s re-rig by Sunbeam Yachts went well, according to plan and on schedule. New stays, spreaders, fittings, wind instrument and refurbished genoa furling gear had all been installed and set up, under the excellent expert supervision of Sunbeam’s director Manfred Shoechl and we were ready to leave San Giorgio and the sweltering 30 degrees C, mosquito-ridden river marina.

We stocked up with a variety of Italian goodies at the nearby supermarket we had pedalled to via the cycleway running alongside the busy dual carriageway, and we awaited the arrival of Farnham friends Peter and Sharron Hornsby. They duly arrived in time for seafood pasta at GiGi’s, unpacked in the comparative cool of late evening and were ready for their onboard safety briefing before our departure at 9am on Thursday 20^th June. Farewell to Northern Italy this time round.

Arrival in Italy

We made it into Italian waters on Saturday June 1st after a good sail from Umag. Crossing the Gulf of Trieste was quite hazardous with lots of floating logs and tree parts around, presumably washed down the Italian rivers. It gets quite shallow in the northern most part of the Gulf and acts as an anchorage to many ships waiting to go into the port of Trieste, so we navigated around quite an array of vessels to find the small buoys marking the channel into Porto Buso, which was the gateway to the Lagoon and eventually mainland Italy.

The Italian flag — Hoisting the Italian flag

The flat rough ribbon of land that was Porto Buso was littered with a few trees and a couple of derelict buildings and beyond this the lagoon stretched three or four miles across to the actual mainland of Italy. It was surreal motoring through the narrow channel, dredged to about 6 metres with the surrounding water being very shallow indeed. Channels across the lagoon, marked with red and green buoys were actually signposted…Grado and Trieste one way, Murano the other. We went straight across and into the River that led us up to Cantieri Marina San Giorgio, where Sunbeam yachts have their yard.

It was all very rural in one direction but we passed ship yards and signs of industrial activity in another before reaching the Marina and finding ourselves a berth to tie into. We were faced with stern-to moorings with tall posts which Mo had to lasso ropes onto to hold the bow! Nigel moored up perfectly but Deja Vu had to breathe in as the berth was obviously meant for less beamy boats. Ashore we found very little English was spoken by the locals so were grateful to meet Gigi in the Marina restaurant who helped us with some of the translations. We had to wait until Monday for Pierre Angelo to turn up for work to get any sense at all out of the Marina officials, as fortunately for us he spoke quite good English. We feel as if we have discovered the only other nation with the same application for language learning as the English!

We have met a lot of other Sunbeam boat owners as it is a very popular and convenient place for the Swiss, Germans and Austrians to keep their boats, being only a three or four hour drive to their homes. We were even invited to a German couple’s launch party for their shiny new Sunbeam 42 which took place on the same pontoon we were on. Champagne and canapes at 1600 was very pleasant!

Safira lauch party — Safira Launch party

We have been here now for 4 days and return to UK on Wednesday 5th June. We have noticed a stark contrast between what we have been used to in Croatia and what we find in this relatively sleepy Marina. Admittedly they are not used to visitors, especially not English ones, but there is a very ‘demani’ attitude where nothing seems to matter. How this contrasts with the relatively teutonic approach of the Croatians!

The marina has a pleasant swimming pool which was very welcome after the bike ride into the town of San Giorgio, about 4 km away. The purpose was to replace an empty gas bottle. A mission duly accomplished after a few wrong turns.

We are here in San Giorgio for Sunbeam to replace the rigging on Deja Vu II whilst we return home for a couple of weeks. At last on Tuesday Manfred from Sunbeam yachts duly appeared and confidence that the rigging job might eventually get done improved. Time will tell, we leave tomorrow for home!

Rovinj, Porec and Umag

This next blog entry is being written from the main cabin of Deja Vu, 1030am on Friday 31^st May. The torrential rain started yesterday, continued through the night and still pours down. We have literally battoned down the hatches, grateful for being in Umag Marina with power to run our fan heater (it is 10 degrees) and the computer!

Going back a few days, we spent a couple of nights in Rovinj, the first of which was sleepless due to being on a Marina berth totally exposed to the unexpected south westerly winds that lashed through overnight. The stern lines of the adjacent Swedish boat broke during the night and we were up most of the night checking and tightening our lines, laying more lines and increasing the fendering. We moved early in the morning to a more sheltered berth inside the marina and then set off to enjoy the lovely town.

Rovinj really is one of our favourite places with fascinating architecture, plenty of interesting artisan shops and real Croatian restaurants as well – as the traditional tourist markets. We revisited some of the treasured places we had discovered with Sue and Dick last September and can confirm that the Prosecco is still good and the walls of Number 13 opposite our position sitting on cushions on the street steps, have been repaired!

On Tuesday 28^th May, we said goodbye to our friends Sharon and Peter who had shared a happy week with us, and set sail to Porec, about 10 miles further up the Istrian coast.

We had briefly visited Porec last year and were keen to spend more time exploring ashore. We sat Deja Vu on a buoy behind the harbour breakwater to gain most shelter and took the dinghy ashore for the day. Rather disappointed this time round, perhaps it was the cool, windy weather, but the pretty streets seemed spoiled with tourism and we were hustled at every doorway to buy, eat or drink, none of which were top of our agenda.

We found the deserted back streets much more to our liking, they contained most interesting buildings and varied facades.

Porec building — Desirable residence in Porec

Event location in Porec — Great event location

It was not long before we were back in the dinghy with some provisions to spend the rest of our time there on board.

We freed our lines at 9am on Thursday 30^th May and encountered a very confused sea to make the trip up to Umag, 13 miles further north, very uncomfortable.

Angry sky — Threatening skies between Porec and Umag

The harbour of Umag is very sheltered and grateful for a Marina berth, we cleaned up before going ashore to explore. The bikes came into their own to cover the two miles distance to the town but it was not long before we were pedalling back ahead of more black threatening clouds. The town is poor and depressing, the old parts of the town dwarfed by ugly concrete blocks, relatively new, but old and in poor repair long before their time. So here we are on May 31^st, waiting for a break in the clouds to get out and about again.

Our plan is to check out of Croatia from here tomorrow 1^st June and sail across the Gulf of Trieste to Porto Buso and then up to the Sunbeam Yard at Cantieri Marina San Georgio di Nogaro. It will be our first excursion into Italy.