We've been sailing between the Maddalena islands of northern Sardinia and the east coast of Corsica for the past three weeks. It's been a delightful mix of pasta and french wines, aperitivos and aperitifs, and all the beautiful breads and pastries at the boulangeries and patisseries. Oh and also some sailing, some motoring, anchoring, weather watching, water making, schoolwork, swimming, and land exploration. We've been busy! And Hans has spent the past three weeks in the climate controlled 72 degrees and flourescent-lit atmosphere of the hospital. He definitely drew the short straw.
La Maddalenas
We dropped Hans off at the ferry terminal on Madalenna island to start his trip back to the states via ferry, plane, hotel, plane, plane, car. It's no short distance to get from an island in the Mediterranean to Wisconsin. Together with our friends on s/v Kendra and a new friend, Hazel, a singlehander from Germany, we rented bicycles and spent a day biking aound Maddelana island. It was hillier than we expected, but we were rewarded with beautiful views and quiet swimming spots.
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| We found the most scenic cafe in all of the Maddalenas. I told everyone they could just pretend we were at a strip mall in the States. |
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| Grocery store finds. |
Corsica
The next morning, we took advantage of lighter winds and sailed north to the SW corner of Corsica. The prevailing weather pattern in the western Med is the Mistral, a strong wind that comes off the Pyrannese mountains that border Spain and southern France and just empties out into the Med. There will be days and day, even more than a week, of strong NW winds. It all seems to concentrate in the strait between Sardinia and Corsica and just funnels straight through with intensity. Unless you want to practice storm sailing tactics, it's a good idea to wait for non-mistral winds to cross between the islands.
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It's hard to imagine just how big our main sail is, and in light winds we always wish for a taller rig.
Freja helps show the proportions! |
We first anchored in a beautiful bay just north of Bonifacio. The water was crystal clear and there were only a few boats in the anchorage. Just enough to entertain us with their anchoring shenanigans, but not too many that it felt crowded. The next morning we dinghied the couple miles into Bonifacio harbor and spent the day exploring the town that is literally perched on a cliff's edge. Back to the boat after lunch and a quick grocery shop, and the kids did their schoolwork. Matilda is taking a novel writing class online every Tuesday afternoon so we always have to make sure to be home for her class.
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| Exploring a cave via dinghy. |
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| Wandering around Corsica. |
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| A French island means two things: crepes and orangina! |
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| overlooking the water from the old town in Bonifacio, maybe 250 meters up. |
The forecast unfortunately showed some west winds building, and, since the bay was wide open to the west, it was bound to get uncomfortable. We moved anchor to a bay a few miles north where we hoped for better protection. It was great until the wind started building at 9pm and it just blew all night long, at least 20 knots of wind and accompanying wind chop. Needless to say, I didn't get much sleep. I was happy to weigh anchor bright and early and move the boat around Corsica to the east side. It was an easy motor until we turned the SE corner of Corsica and the wind started funneling up the coast. Luckily for us it was right on our stern so I was able to sail under genoa alone for the last half of the trip. The kids did their schoolwork underway since the seas were so flat.
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| Sailing north up the east coast of Corsica and hoping this storm stays over the island (it did). |
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| right as the wind started filling in and Kendra moved before we did, we came really close, stern to stern! |
While the Italians, generally, seem to enjoy spending time eating, drinking, and socializing with friends and family, the French, generally, seem more outdoorsy. At least that's the case in this part of the world. Sardinia has lots of restaurants and beach bars, while Corsica has lots and lots of campgrounds and rustic tourism. (Side note: if you want to go on a camping vacation, come to the Corsica!) Most of the anchorages have just a few houses, if any, but at least one or two campgrounds. The campgrounds all have a general store and a restaurant; some have a pool. So we spent a few days at an anchorage with crystal clear water, a nice beach, and a campground. It felt a little like we were fringe camping. Traveling via boat is a bit like glamping, but on the water. And being around campers, well, it had that feeling.
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A little hike around a peninsula and past some gorgeous summer homes.
I guess the owners want some quiet. |
More west winds were in the forecast, so we moved anchor the next morning to a bay a little north with a lot of westerly protection. Maybe too far north. The west winds (which were strong) didn't really reach us, but instead the swell worked its way down from the north and it got a little rolly. Not too bad, and not bad enough to move, but just a little annoying.
Daily life
Watching weather, moving to different anchorages, choosing the best anchoring spot. What else do we do? The kids spend 3-4 hours a day on school. It was 4-6 hours when we were at our winter marina, but now that the weather is nice and we're exploring new places, it's a little less. I make water, about 50-80 liters per day. That more or less keeps up with our usage: showers, dishes, laundry every now and then, cockpit cleaning. Cleaning. So much cleaning. It's a small space but it gets messy quickly and there is so much dust. It's rather inexplicable. Grocery shopping. That can take anywhere from 2 hours to 4, depending on how close the closest store is to the anchorage. Putting it away isn't simple either. We have food scattered in different lockers all over the main cabin, and the fridge is top loading so all the food is separated into different boxes. It's a good system, albeit annoying when you have to remove 3 different boxes just to get to the mayonnaise. Passage planning, life planning, general admin. We're planning on sailing to the Canary Islands in September and the Caribbean in November so we're spending a fair bit of time looking at the calendar and historic weather patterns and anchorages to plan the trip. We're also going back to the US this summer and Freja starts boarding school in August so we've been organizing plane tickets and general travel plans, and boat-keeping plans while we're gone. I recently had to renew our health insurance which took hours. Such a fun job! Hull cleaning. The boat sat still for 6 months in the water and we shoulda, woulda, coulda hired a diver to clean the hull before we left. We didn't and the subsequent growth has taken about a knot of speed off our hull speed. Almost 20%. We paid some teenage boat kids to help us and I worked alongside and after probably 7-8 hours of labor, we're almost back at hull speed. Hans bought a battery operated submersible rotational scrubber tool on a stick that might just be amazing. Or it will be completely ineffectual. Swimming, hiking, beach hangs, reading, happy hours. Especially now that we're in early summer, we're doing a lot of hiking, exploring, and just generally spending time outdoors in each new location. We've been sailing with friends for over a month now which makes everything more fun. Sometimes we see each other every day, other days we don't. It's great for the kids to have other teens to hang out with and us adults also like to have a social life too. It's been a lifesaver for me since Hans has been gone for three weeks to not only have the security of traveling with another boat, but also to have the adult company too. There are many times Hans goes to work and it's just me and the kids. For weeks.
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dying Matilda's hair pink, sans gloves.
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| Matilda made us sushi for lunch one day. |
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evening stroll around Porto Vecchio
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| Waiting for Matilda to fetch me and the groceries in the dinghy. |
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| And now I have to put them all away. |
Back to Corsica. Ready for more entertainment than the campground anchorages, we moved south to Porto Vecchio, still on the east coast. The old town is built on a hill overlooking the harbour. The harbour is built up with new restaurants and tourist trappings; the old town is also filled with restaurants and tourists trappings, but in a historic setting. We rented cars for a day and drove up into the mountains. The temperature went from 24C to 14C and windy at the highest point. I've never seen so many hikers and van nomads in one place. People were either hiking, biking, motorcycling, or driving a VW van. I felt like we were the odd ones out in our basic 4 door sedans.
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| Matilda jumping in the pool of a mountain river. |
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| Jon making friends with the animals |
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| We drove up for a couple hours and suddenly felt like we were in the Alps, not the Mediterranean. |
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| Friends - almost siblings. |
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| side-eyeing each other. |
We made one last stop in Corsica before going back to the Maddalenas: the southest corner of the island has a massive sandbar which has create a shallow, perfectly protected anchorage. I anchored in 1.8 meters of crystal clear water (the boat draws 1 meter). But I forgot about the tide....Just before going ashore for a barbecue one evening, I jumped over for a quick swim and landed hard on my feet. A little shocked, I put a mask on and we had about 20 cm of water under the keel. Yikes! I jumped out almost as fast as when I saw the alligator swimming in the St John's River in Jacksonville, Florida years ago. Reanchored in 2.6 meters and felt much better.
We had a fun BBQ beach party with the families of s/v Kendra and s/v Roam. Big thanks to Dave for organizing and bringing the grill and makeshift table. We were chased off the beach by mosquitoes right around sunset, but thankfully the sun is setting close to 9pm these days so we were still able to have a good party.
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playing soccer? hackey sack? on the beach before the mosquitos ran us off.
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La Maddalenas
The next day was the best solo sail yet. I only had about 15 miles to go, but it was across the strait between Corsica and Sardinia which as a tendency to funnel the wind. I started sailing close hauled with no waves and it was glorious. Fast and easy and calm. As the wind picked up I needed to sail more easterly, so I fell off and ended up running wing and wing without our usual spinnaker pole set up. It was just a short distance so I was able to keep the genoa under control without it flopping around. The spinnaker pole acts like an arm that extends from the mast and clips on at the corner of the sail, essentially pushing the sail out and forcing it to stay on one side and behave. I did rig up the preventer line which is a line from the end of the boom and runs a little forward of the mast to prevent the boom from accidentally gybing. The final mile toward the anchorage was a very fast close reach alongside a 50 foot boat. I started going almost 8 knots so I furled the genoa and went under main alone. It slowed us down to about 5 knots. I was glad we were a little more under control, but bad for two reasons: 1) the 50 foot boat beat us handily whereas I'm certain I would have won if I kept all sails up; and 2) and catamaran motored past me and took the best spot in the anchorage.
We spent the next couple days sitting out some wind giong for a short hike, and getting some groceries before it was time to pick Hans up from the ferry. Whew. It was a long three weeks to sail and parent alone, but I was happy to be with friends on Kendra the whole time and pretty proud of myself for managing it all and sailing every 3rd day or so. And we finished our school year! 7th and 9th grades are in the books!
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| Overlooking our anchorage. |
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#diva #schoolsout #peaceout9thgrade
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| Hans is home! |
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