Onto Spain (yes again!)

Ria Formosa to Ria Gaudiana (Ayamonte)

A nice leisurely sail east, we had south easterlies when they had forecasted northerlies but winds were light and sun was shinning.  Was quite interesting to come across our first tunny (tuna) nets, they stretched for miles but were thankfully well marked and visible so we were able to stay well clear.  We arrived in the Ria on a rising tide and it was running fast, as always we were looking to save money so attempted to anchor in the Ria, after successfully anchoring with a tide of 4knots running we settled down of the night but wasn’t a quiet one, the wind got up to 25 knots and the turned so we had wind over tide and the boat rocked all over the place for the entire night. We were glad when morning arrived and we moved into the marina ASAP!

Almost as soon as we arrived at the marina we were approached by some fellow cruisers who we had seen both in the Lagoon anchored behind us and sailing the previous day on route to Ayamonte.  They were from a boat called Cosmic Dancer and funnily enough about 10 minutes earlier Mark had mentioned that he recognised that name and was sure we had looked around the boat when looking to buy Magnum.  The owner of Cosmic Dancer had realised exactly the same, he had looked around Magnum when buying his boat! What a small world that 2 boats bought from Berthon in Lymington, England would end up in a small Spanish marina on the same day! It was really nice to exchange stories on what the boats had been doing since bought and plans for the coming year.  Cosmic Dancer was actually going to participate in the ARC (Atlantic Rally for Cruisers) for those of you not sailors basically this is an organised crossing of the Atlantic which takes place every year, leaving the Canaries in November.  Also as the boat was British flagged and had looked lovely sailing with her spinnaker up, I had taken a photo and it was nice to give this to them as always difficult to get a photo of your own boat sailing without having to pay a professional.  I now wonder if our paths with cross again.

Cosmic Dancer

Ayamonte was only a day stop and because of the awful nights sleep we never managed much exploring just off to the Supermarket and quick look online – had wifi but limited, as always! 

Ayamonte to Rota

With a forecast of north westerlies and no wind for the remainder of the week we rushed off to get to Rota and Cadiz, excited that we were meeting Michelle and Ziggy at the weekend (it was only Tuesday when we sailed) and Alan, Karen and Daniel the following Tuesday (26^th July).

We sailed 70 miles with variable amounts of wind so did have to motor for a couple of hours and Mark attempted the spinnakers 3 times, glad that we still arrived in exactly 12 hours.  We were both pleased it was a dolphin day and saw a pod of over around 50, kept us going for a while. 

Good news was that the Rota marina was one of nine marinas along the South coast of Spain that are subsidised by the government so only costs around 25 euros much better than the 45+ euros in the Algarve.  Rota is on the South West corner of Cadiz Bay and is a bit of a Spanish holiday resort but also has a large Naval Base which in the past was US but more recently is more Spanish.  Even though a tourist resort the town maintains a lot character and has not been developed in the same was as many of the Andalucía tourist resorts on the Mediterranean coast – where you find lots of Brits. .Again our travels took us along the promenade and then into the old town!

Rota Castilla 

Trying to stay cool in my BIG new hat

The volume of Spanish tourist was quite unbelievable and the beaches were absolutely packed, we were glad just to walk on by! 

After a hot night in the marina and the chance to use a washing machine – hurrah all my bedding is nice and clean!  We headed out into the bay to anchor just of the beach unfortunately for us due to the direction of the wind we were not very sheltered, winds were only very light but meant that we had a bit of a swell and yet another awful nights sleep!  We spent the day at anchor and enjoyed swimming off the boat; the water was the warmest yet. We also had a show from the Navy, it was obviously practice day and the helicopter initially went very low overhead and into the base. Then it came out into the bay around 200m away from us and started dropping people into the sea!! They were promptly picked up by a rib taken into the beach and the next lot were then collected from the base & it happened again, about 6X in total, no exactly a quiet morning in the anchorage but spectacular!

If you look closely you can see someone dropping into the water

We were back into the marina to get some sleep and also for the arrival of Michelle and Ziggy, we had not seen anyone we knew since April so this was fantastic! We had dinner on the boat whilst we warmed Michelle up to the idea of having a sail later in the weekend.

Dinner on boat

The following day Michelle picked us up to visit her luxury hotel and sit by the pool, unfortunately the sun had been scared away but there was still no stopping Ziggy getting into that pool! We had a lovely day catching up, entertaining Ziggy and basically relaxing, we even managed to go out for some Spanish food in the evening – a rare treat. 

Ziggy enjoying himself

Ziggy smiling (as always!) on bumper car

Then another rare treat Michelle came out for a sail, winds were light and we just stayed within the harbour but Ziggy loved it and it was really nice to enjoy time on the boat with other people.

It was sad to say goodbye but still hoping we will get to see them again when we reach Gibraltar.  Thanks so much to Michelle for such a big effort to visit, it was very much appreciated and so so lovely to spend time with them.

Rota – Cadiz

We were already in the Bay but we had short hop over to Cadiz on South West coast to wait arrival of our next visitors.  We had a day to get ourselves organised and after a long walk from the marina explored Cadiz town.  Cadiz is supposed to be one of the oldest (if not the oldest) cities in Europe, founded by the Phoenicians Full of history including the fact that the English have not been too kind to it in the past, we burnt the city down twice in the 1500’s. But lots of the old walls and fortifications remain.  Also the parks and streets have a large number of really old trees which were originally brought back to Cadiz by explorers such as Columbus and they have thrived in the Spanish climate.

Pretty park, spectacular old trees and parakeets!

City walls

Cadiz Cathedral

Alan, Karen and Daniel arrived on the cruiseship Oceana (July 26^th) their first stop on a 2 week Mediterranean cruise. We had a really lovely day having a walk around the town, a trip to the beach (where Dan was turned into a girl!) where we all went in for a swim and a good catch up.

Dan is a girl!

Alan & his wonky hat

Dan getting tall!