Adrian and Jacqui Evans

Action Photos

Adrian — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 11:17:00 +0100

Whilst sailing across form Ithaca to Levkas recently, we were hailed down by a small motor vessel out of Kioni that was able to follow us for a while and take some action photos...

www.sailingpics.com

Greece again

Adrian — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 08:13:00 +0100

Bit of a random catchup blog – we never did make it across the pond for the med Caribbean season – financial crisis hit us as our house sale fell through (we’d exchanged, had the deposit etc but the guy didn’t complete) – currently suing him for £80k. With all money tied up in the house and two mortgages we hunkered down have been working back in the UK for the past few months before the Med charter season starts.

I did get a job as IT officer on Le Grand Bleu (113m ex Abramovich superyacht) but the day I was due to leave the job was cancelled because of finances and change of ship plans!

We’ve just been in Greece for the past few weeks on Vagari – having a very nice time cruising around the Ionian and getting some sun and relaxing before the guests arrive. We’re moored up in Preveza, which is just south of Corfu on the mainland. Nice and cheap and facilities fine. (€300/mth in water €200 out). We spent a lot of time working out here the end of last year so know the area pretty well.

We’re actually quite enjoying Greece – its so different to Croatia, very relaxed and no one hassles you for mooring or anchoring fees. Had to pay once in the whole 3 ½ weeks we’ve been here. Usual job of dodging flotillas and other charter boats, but that comes with the territory. Cruising area is so nice, loads of lovely anchorages, nice little ports, a scattering of marinas for the larger forays back to civilisation…

As expected, it seems far more pricey now though with food and euro rate. It seems people have pushed prices up recently. Even in Greece, eating out just doesn’t feel cheap - €20 to €30 per person is pretty much like England!

Have spent some lovely times in secluded anchorages and small quaint fishing ports. Returning back to UK soon, but back again shortly.

More photos

Greece

Adrian — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 07:49:00 +0100

Back again.

Its been a while since the last blog entry. Since heading to Geece we’ve had quite a few adventures and have done quite a few things.

When we arrived in Greece, we headed to Corfu, and Gouvia marina, which was to become our adopted home port for the next couple of months. We tidied the boat up as we were leaving it for a few weeks whilst we headed off to work.

To get to Midnight Sun, we flew via Athens, and fortunately our connecting flights gave us a few hours to see the sights. We headed for Acropolis and did the tourist thing of wandering around amazed at the scale of the whole thing. We paid for a tour guide and discovered a number of fantastic facts such as:

- Acropolis is actually the name of the town perched on the hill.

- It was built using Spartan war spoils entirely by free labour and craftsmen – no slaves.

- The entire construction of the temples, Parthenon etc took only 14 years to complete.

After our whistle-stop tour of Athens we flew out to Kos, and joined Midnight Sun.

Things went well for a while and it was very interesting getting used to sailing and living on a large boat. The boat is over 20 years old and is suffering a bit from lack of maintenance and layer upon layer of additions, stop-gap solutions and modifications. But overall it is in a good state and handled the weather very well.

The Aegean during August is renown for its strong winds, and this year was no different. We had consistent force 6 and above. Fortunately the 82’ steel racing hull handled waves and weather fine, so we were quite safe. Our first charter started violently with a F8 gale and for the first night whilst at anchor we had gusts of up to 49 knots. The guests were ok but since this was their first introduction to sailing, were a bit perturbed.

We travelled around the Aegean to Ios, Kos, Santorini and many typically greek islands and towns. Santorini was stunning.

Things were fine, but after about three weeks Jacqui and I were having problems with the skipper and felt compelled to leave. It was unfortunate as it was great experience and we were looking forward to the route over the next few weeks to Sardinia and Cannes.

On arriving back at Gouvia in Corfu we quickly picked up another job until the end of the season (end sept) working as lead crew on a yacht flotilla. It is pretty good fun, hanging out in the sun, helping our crews and watching everyone mess up mooring etc, pretty much like our normal cruising!

We’re based in Corfu and spend two weeks out at a time sailing south to Levkas, Mevagisi, Ithaca etc. Vagari is in the company’s home port safely tucked away until we get back to her in a few weeks to put her to bed in a greek marina for the winter.

Its going pretty well, with busy times in the morning where I have to do briefings and maintenance for our 8 – 10 boats before we let them go for the day. We then (generally) motor to the destination, grab an hour to ourselves then Jacqui scouts around for tavernas, bars, rubbish, showers etc before the boats start coming in between 4 and 6. More maintenance, grab a shower then off to a taverna for a group meal (which fortunately is usually free for us in true holiday rep style).

Weather is great here, suns out, warm evenings etc… we’ve been following the weather in the news and it sounds very shitty in the UK.

Will be back 1st or 2^nd week of Oct and are looking forward to being at home for a bit – although I’m trying to arrange an Atlantic trip and Caribbean work for later in the year so it may be a short stay in Blighty.

Welcome to Greece

Adrian — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 17:08:00 +0100

We've just this minute arrived in Corfu, Greece. We've just covered 199 miles in 33 hours. Not bad going. Unfortunately light winds meant we had to motor all the way, but at least it was calm and uneventful.

Time to relax this afternoon and sort out paperwork before slowly packing the boat up over the next few days. We've decided to leave the boat in the water for a month whilst we're away on charter, then since we'll most likely be back here at the end of August we'll arrange to take it out for the winter then. That way we can relax a bit now and have an explore.

Some stats:

We returned back ton the boat on April 20th in Sicily

since then, we've been to Malta, Italy, Croatia and now Greece.

We've travelled just under 2000 miles.

We've used about 617 litres (137 gallons) of fuel and travelled 241 hrs on the engine.

Fuel consumption: 2.5 litres / hr (approx 12mpg)

Approximately 40% of the time we've been motoring (thats the med winds for you!)

Goodbye Croatia

Adrian — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:21:00 +0100

We should have know it wasn’t going to be easy.

We’ve just sailed 300miles down the whole of Croatia and have been planning our departure.

We had to get fuel, we had to get a Greek courtesy flag and we had to time our departure so that we’d arrive in Corfu at a reasonable time of day.

The plan was to head up to Dubrovnik Marina, where I refuelled whilst Jacqui ran up to the chandlers to get the flag. This all went according to plan so we headed out to the southern most port of entry, Cavtat, 15 miles down the coast. We said our goodbyes to Dubrovnik on the way by sailing around the outside of the city wall to get the sea view.

Last view of Dubrovnik

On arriving in Cavtat we discovered that once we had completed the paperwork and had officially signed out of Croatia we had to leave immediately and directly out of Croatian waters. The only problem was that the harbour master and customs offices were only open from 8am to 8pm at night, so our plan of leaving at 6am to arrive in Corfu mid afternoon the day after were scuppered.

Cavtat harbour - small boats not allowed as they try to pitch themselves as the new Monaco!

There were no concessions given by the harbourmaster either – we couldn’t moor on the quay (despite there being room) because they didn’t want small yachts in the town and we weren’t allowed to wait on the customs quay despite everyone going home. We had to anchor off for the night and plan to get to the office as soon as it opened at 8am. This would get us into Gouvia marina in Corfu at around 5-6 in the afternoon, which is ok, but doesn’t give us much margin for error or ability to go a bit slower than our planned 6 knots at any stage.

Anchoring was fun (we were charged £30 of course). It was quite crowded and the bay was deep so we didn’t have much room to swing around. When the wind started to gust a bit after midnight we got up to find a large catamaran nearly dragging into and a lot of concerned crews on anchor watch. We decided to up anchor and head to the quay – hoping that at that time of night there would be no one around so we could slip in quietly and wait until morning. No such luck! The customs quay was patrolled by police officials so we ended up rafting up alongside another British yacht that had moored alongside the harbour wall with a broken anchor. We were looking forward to a relatively calm few hours before heading off when another official came over and tried to turf us both out. After a long and heated debate he relented and let us stay - provided we leave before daylight.

So, 4 hours sleep later we were up again and this time snuck onto the customs quay to wait a couple of hours before 8am and the offices opened.

Back any forth a bit between customs, police and harbourmaster offices and we had our permission to leave. We were off. At 0820 we left Croatia. Tired, a bit bothered and a bit annoyed at the bureaucracy to the end…

Only 200 miles to go now, overnight, probably motoring all the way due to light winds.

Thats enough of Croatia

Adrian — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 06:08:00 +0100

Big news

We’ve just turned around and started heading south as we’ve just accepted our first professional sailing positions.

I was called up yesterday by an owner who had received our CVs from UKSA’s careers department. He needed replacement crew to work with him and his wife running a large 82’ (25m) Baltic Maxi sailing yacht for the rest of the med season.

The boat is based out of Corfu in Greece and has at least two charters booked in for the next couple of months. The first starts on August 10^th in Santorini in the Greek islands, the other in September from Cannes in the South of France.

He liked the look of our CVs as he was looking for a slightly older and experienced crew couple familiar with med sailing. Our experience running and sailing our own boat was another major attraction. The boat is huge and an ex-round the world racing boat converted for luxurious charter. The owner and his wife work on the boat and need a First mate/Engineer and interior/deckie to make a crew of 4. The owner is the skipper with 12+ years experience in the industry and his wife is a professional chef who does the cooking for charter guests. I’ll be responsible for keeping the boat spic and span and be the skipper’s right hand man whilst Jax will be responsible for guests when on charter and cooking when not, as well as helping sail the boat.

Since Corfu is one of the places we were thinking of taking Vagari to for the winter, it all works out quite well, so`we’re heading down there now (500 miles away to the south). We plan to arrive on Wednesday which gives us a couple of days claning and winterising before getting a plane to the boat in Santorini next weekend. We’d just finished touring all of the Croatian islands and were just thinking about heading over to Venice before working our way south again for the end of the season, so this comes at a good time.

It does mean we won’t be home for a couple more months, but it’ll be great experience for both of us as it’s a vastly different yacht to the ones we’re used to and will stand us in good stead for all kinds of opportunities later, and is a great first step on the ladder. Theres even a remote possibility of an Atlantic crossing and charter in the Caribbean this winter, which would be fantastic.

So, lots to organise, get to Corfu, prepare our boat for being hauled out for the winter, get to Greece, sort out the Brighton house for rental, sort out cars, sort out Greenlands…

Yacht Midnight Sun...

larger pictures

Magdalus

Adrian — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 08:00:00 +0100

The crew of Magdalus are on constant 24 hour standby waiting for a call from their owners wanting to be picked up to come out to the boat. We were therefore ready to leave if they had to go to work suddenly.

Fortunately the owners didn’t call and we were invited to join the crew for the evening. Everything was very luxurious for a boat – flushing toilets, washing machine, decent ovens in the galley etc. Chris the chef cooked a fabulous meal and we all settled down for a couple of drinks, sailing stories and catching up.

Needless to say, the evening went well, and by 5.45am with the sun rising we finally got to sleep.

(note the daylight outside)

Its been great to talk to James about the boat and its day to day saiing and management and i've learnt loads. Much the same as any boat, but everything’s larger, powered and takes a bit longer to put into action. Fascinating.

We also met Graham the engineer, who showed me around many of the boat’s systems and Ben the new first mate who is just starting to get to grips with it all.

The boat is so heavy and large that in the bay it was not affected by the swell at all, whilst next door we were bobbing around as usual. This was quite useful for Jax, who nursing a hangover said “I need to get on the big boat so the world stops rocking”

more pictures

Meeting up with Kelly and James

Adrian — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 16:00:00 +0100

What an amazing change the last couple of days has been. We finally met up with our friends who work on the superyacht Magdalus Terzo.

For the past week we’ve been heading north up through the last few of Croatia’s islands into the notorious Velebetski Kanal. Today we had a break in the weather so headed out early from Krk harbour and motored then sailed around the Krk island into the Kanal in the lee of the huge Velebet mountains. The mountains were dark and forboding but fortunately our route north was reasonably clear with moderate 15-20 knot winds to sail in.

Jax had been in touch with Kelly on Magdalus and had said they were moored in a harbour called Novi Vindoloski. Needless to say by the time we reached there, we couldn’t find a superyacht anywhere. Bemused, we called and found they were moored at anchor a couple of miles away in a tucked away little cove.

We arrived amid slightly rising winds so anchored near to them and rowed over in out little tender to say hi. Fortunately the owners weren’t on board so we went aboard to catch up. The boat is 35m (115 feet) long and seems absolutely huge. Inside it is just like being on land – everything is so solid with a large galley, huge fridges, proper bathrooms, 240v mains power, proper rooms, etc. The boat has five full time crew that live aboard in their own quarters. Kelly is the stewardess responsible for the interior and looking after guests. Jax and her were room mates and drinking buddies back at the Sailing academy in Cowes last year. The captain is James, who we both met and knew whilst there. James is an amazing young man, who at 24 is one of the first new breed of superyacht captains that have specifically trained for the role through the new training structures, a bit like pilots.

Since the wind was forecast to get up and they weren’t expecting to be busy with owners, we were invited to come alongside and moor up in their shelter. They were tucked away filling a little bay with 75m of anchor chain out and about 6 heavy lines ashore keeping them from moving. The winds were forecast to get up to 50knots that evening so we were grateful for the shelter – otherwise we’d have had to shoot off to a different safe anchorage.

Our boat isn’t huge, but its been our home for the past two months and over the past few years, and seems well equipped and has all we need. Its amazing how small it looked next to Magdalus. We moored successfully and hung alongside them. They weigh about 150 tonnes, so our 8½ didn’t really make any difference.

Weather bound in Krk

Adrian — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 08:00:00 +0100

Day in port today as continued bad weather made heading out unadvisable. Free wireless internet in harbour let us catch up with work, emails and skype calls to family and friends.

Spent time with Caroline who was crew on a large Catamaran we’d met a few times on our travels who just so happened to be in the same port. Went aboard and met their owner, Andre, who is a disabled but very competent sailor from Slovenia with lots of experience around this coastline.

To Krk

Adrian — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 08:00:00 +0100

In two minds today whether to continue north or shay sheltered at anchor. Weather reports were mixed with the possibility of high winds.

After much deliberation we decided to push on 20 miles to the island of Krk. We had a couple of alternative destinations in case we needed a backup, so we headed off and motored into the light winds.

The winds grew… and grew… until we were sailing in choppy seas under two reefs in 25 gusting 35 knots. It was quite difficult as the wind was whipping down the steep mountain faces and stirring up the sea in all kinds of directions. When we reached Krk the land didn’t really give us any shelter and just funnelled the wind down onto us.

Ended up quite wet as waves and spray hit the boat and soaked us and the deck.

We opted for the harbour as the place to moor up, and after an interesting stern to mooring in 25 knots of wind where Jax manfully held on to the lazy line despite 25 knots pushing against the side of the 8½ tonnes of boat, to straighten us up and stop us being blown onto other boats, we settled down and finally relaxed.

Rab

Adrian — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 08:00:00 +0100

Called in at Rab on our way up north. Anchored in a huge sheltered inlet and took the tender into the town for a look around. Very pretty town, with a nice atmosphere. Unlike some other small Croatian towns the place seemed to be more relaxed and had parks, walkways and nice little streets for wandering around.

Returned to the tender to find it was missing. Fortunately though it had just been moved as we’d inadvertently parked it in a spot used by a returning tripper boat. They’d broken the padlock off we’d secured it to the quay with, but apart from the rising panic of not being able to find it on the quayside (they’d tied it outside their boat) no harm was done and our mistake, sorry.

Arrived back at the boat just before it went dark after a long (20min) tender trip out of the harbour and uo the inlet to the boat.

Northern Adriatic Islands

Adrian — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 22:04:00 +0100

Still under a weather warning so headed 30 miles north to a remote island called Unije to find a nice sheltered anchorage for the night. Turned out to be quite a lot of swell, heavy rain and gusty 20+ knots of wind on the nose. So it was quite a busy sail with reefs in and out regularly.

Eventually rewarded by the weather clearing up and fnding a lovely finger of an anchorage that thus far has proved to be free as well. Bargain! Dinner, bbq'd stuffed peppers, corn on the cob and sausages - very relaxing and quiet. A lovely sunset and a full moon tonight so very bright out.

Officials - don't you just love 'em

Adrian — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 06:59:00 +0100

The weather forecast said there was unsettled weather coming in so last night we headed to a channel between two small islands just south of the island of Losinj.

The channel provided shelter from the predicted wind direction and luckily we arrived just in time to get the penultimate mooring bouy - so we were nice and secure for whatever weather picked up.

The only problem we had was that when swinging around we'd occasionally come quite close to the boat on the next swinging mooring if the boats moved in different directions due to differennt currents. To counter this I decided to run a line to the shore 20m away to limit our swinging circle and ensure we'd be ok through the night.

This I did, to mine and the chap in the next boat's satisfaction. Only trouble was, when the inevitable boat man came around to collect our mooring fee (approx £15) he said I had to remove my line ashore. I said it was there because the moorings were too close together and I didn't want to swing into the next boat and cause any damage.

The official however wasn't having any of it and insisted there would be no problem and that I remove the line despite it being a thoroughly seamanlike thing to do and was not in anyones way, was marked by a fender to make it visible and was not causing anyone any harm. I was reluctant and slowly showed signs of working on deck to dismantle it, but not too quickly as I thought once he'd gone I might just leave it there to be safe overnight.

He obviously sensed my reluctance and after a few minuted came back and took a couple of pictures of the line and our boat on his mobile phone.

This started me worrying as I heard echoes of out friend Chris in Malta warning us about the officious Croats and how they'd fine you for any minor infraction.

I expected the police boat to come out at any moment and since the last thing I wanted was a €500 fine I decided to err on the side of caution and dismantled the lines and took my own picture (with timestamp) to prove i'd removed them. The chap in the next boat was tutting at the official's insistance as well - so instead of the safety of the line ashore we both fendered the sides of our yachts and tied the dingies across the back to hopefully stop and meeting of boats during the night.

The weather turned out to be quite still overnight but at 5am I woke up for some reason, got up for a look around (as you get used to doing when sleeping at anchor) and noticed the transon of the next boat nudging up against our sides.

Fortunately it was quite calm and there was no damage, but it was annoying that had there been wind and had I been forced to remove our safetly lines by the official we may have suffered damage.

Officials - they know best... don't you just love 'em

Onwards and northwards

Adrian — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 08:38:00 +0100

We left Zadar yesterday after Adrian getting his last job done - a haircut. Not too brutal, but a bit short and Croatian miliatary.

Fortunately the Velebetski Kanal wasn't too fierce so after a spirited sail upwind in 15-20 knots for 5 hours we anchored and spent the night in a small anchorage 30 miles north on a little island called Molat.

We're starting to reach the northern end of Croatia with one large set of islands to go before the coast comes west and we reach an area called Istra. Due to its proximity to Italy and a lot of Italian occupation over the years it apparently has a distinct Italian feel.

We aim to meet up with a friend of Jax's who is working on a superyacht in and around Rijeka - shes at home on leave this coming weekend so we'll probably mooch around these islands for the week then head in to the city for Monday.

After that depends a bit on the house sale situation back home, which looks like its going to fall through again. We'll probably head up to the Venice area to visit whilst we're close - since the adriatic is a bit of a huge cul-de-sac.

We still haven't decided where to leave Vagari for the winter, it won't be Croatia as it is too expensive so we may just sail all the way back down south to Crete in Greece or back to Malta where its cheap.

Skype old friends

Adrian — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 08:38:00 +0100

Whilst in the marina we also took advantage of the wireless internet and bought access for the day (£15 as I couldn't hack any free ones for a change).

Last night after returning from the cinema we noticed Amanda on skype. We haven't talked for ages so it was great to catch up.

Amanda is the girl who came across to Portugal with us on the boat a couple of years ago and became Jax's drinking buddy. She now lives in Brekenridge in the US with her soon to be husband and even sooner to be baby.

She's due in 2 weeks and via the webcam showed us her tidy bump. Good luck.

It was great to get in touch and hear all about her new life and forthcoming baby. Even Amanda has settled down and had kids. She's literally the 8th or 9th of our friends that has had a baby in the last 6 months!

Meanwhile we're still travelling...

Finally, something good value in Croatia

Adrian — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 08:38:00 +0100

We've finally found something good value in Croatia. Whilst in Zadar we found a lovely brand new cinema that showed all their films in English, so last night took ourselves off to see the movie "Hancock" which was actually really entertaining and enjoyable.

When we were paying we were amazed to find that the tickets cost 50 kunar for both of us, that's about £3.50 each - a bargain compared to home.

Well, there you go. Not everything is expensive in Croatia...

Zadar

Adrian — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 08:38:00 +0100

We've spent the last couple of days in the city of Zadar, which is 3/4 of the way up the Croatian coast on the mainland. It is just below a stretch of water known as the Velebetski Kanal which has become well know to us from the weather forecasts frequently forecasting gusts of 30 to 40 knots there.

This area of the coast is bordered by a ridge of really high mountains (2000m) that drop sheep into the sea - thus causing the severe local katabatic and sea winds.

We headed to Zadar because we've been in an area of "frontal disturbance" (ie bad weather) for a couple of days with some heavy winds and rain, so thought we'd head in to a port until it passes.

Zadar was a great surprise. It had a decidedly Italian feel to it and was actually very nice. The old town is on an island packed with interesting steets, shops and the obligatory ruin, but it seems every evening comes alive with markets, cafes, music and people generally milling around doing the "passagata".

We've managed to do a few jobs whilst here - we found a launderette, which means nice clean everything, and cycled 10miles with a gas bottle to a place we could get it refilled - so we now have a full spare.

We also found a huge Konzum supermarket like the ones at home, so stocked up on a few of the more unusual things we haven't found elsewhere in Croatia such as flour tortillas, squash, tins of sweetcorn etc.

All that took about a day to do by the time we'd found where things were and cycled to them.

Zadar Marina (with superyacht Northern Sripit on pontoon)

Statue on Zadar waterfront

Jax's coffee!

More Photos

Adrian — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 00:20:00 +0100

Whilst reading this you may want to see more photos here

Uvala Opat

Adrian — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 19:15:00 +0100

Before going to the bar last night we climbed up a large hill overlooking the bay to get a view of all the boats and the surrounding islands. It was quite steep with about 1km of path rising to about 300m high at the top and afforded fantastic views along the Kornati Islands.

Unfortunately it was a bit late and the sun was very low in the west, so we couldn’t get any decent pictures, so this morning we got up early (around 7, which is very early for Jax!) and went up again. Jax’s knee is still not great and she still can’t put much load through it, so I ran up and down it three times to get some exercise and Jax climbed it. After this we rowed back to the boat, I went for a snorkel to cool down then breakfast.

Vagari at anchor in the bay

Cocktail Hour

Adrian — Fri, 11 Jul 2008 16:15:00 +0100

At a nice anchorage this evening in the Kornati Islands. Very remote, just us and a few other boats. Single restaurant and bar on shore with a few motor boats moored up obviously enjoying being ripped off for some expensive grilled Croatian food and wine.

It’s sundowner time so Jax decides to make cocktails from a recipe she’s found for Rum Punch. Major ingredient is sugar syrup, so she spends ages simmering and reducing the sugar to the correct consistency. Meanwhile I’m on deck sorting out some chafe protectors for the lines we have ashore and come in to help. I’m told to get a few things ready for the punch but to wash my hands first. This I did, in the galley sink as usual, unbeknownst to me that the saucepan half submerged in the water isn’t actually waiting to be washed up (as one would assume) but is actually cooling the aforementioned sugar syrup. So wash I do. Only after a few seconds does Jax realise that I’d washed my hands into the saucepan.

I thought it’d be ok, but for some reason Jax didn’t want to use the slightly watery solution for the cocktails and didn’t want to spend another ½ hour making it again – so we had to go and have a little drink at the beach bar instead!

Must be a moral there somewhere…

The Kornati Islands

Adrian — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 15:15:00 +0100

Left the inland river and headed north to a group of islands called the Kornati islands. This 15 mile stretch of remote and unpopulated collection of 89 islands makes up the Kornati national park. Actually this is just an excuse for them to extract more money from you as it means you are only allowed to anchor in certain places and anchoring costs about £20 per night.

Ok, its pretty beautiful and unspoilt, but again it is expensive for just anchoring.

Croatian Prices again

Adrian — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 21:15:00 +0100

We returned back to the boat a bit tired after a busy day’s exercise so after a nice shower and clean up decided to head off to one of the local restaurants for a nice meal instead of us cooking again..

We should have known better as the majority of food in Croatia seems to be very plain grilled meat, fish and vegetables. In fact the menus are exactly the same wherever you go, which can be a bit disappointing. Jax had a large plate of shrimps and langoustines and I had a perfectly pleasant steak, We ate at a basic local restaurant and the food was fair, but it still cost the best part of £40 with a glass of wine, water and a coke. Not cheap. Its just a bit annoying that everything is so expensive, even when you try to eat cheaply.

Krka falls

Adrian — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 15:15:00 +0100

When we finally reached the falls we were a bit shocked at their popularity. There were burger stands, beer stands, crepe stalls and all kinds of tat stalls catering for a huge number of tourists.

The idyllic bathing in the pools at the bottom of the falls we’d been hoping for were crowded, rocky and a bit mucky. No thanks.

We instead set off on the path that toured up and around the line of falls. This was actually pleasantly surprising and tastefully constructed. There are actually a long line of falls and lakes spread over about a kilometre and the path weaved nicely around them, sometimes going over waterfalls and sometimes leapfrogging the water as it cascaded through a huge network of pools and small tributaries on the way down.

At the top was an interesting old (but working) mill and hydro plant.

After all the effort getting there, it was actually quite good.

To Skradin and the lakes - finally

Adrian — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 10:23:00 +0100

The reason for heading inland to Sibenik was to continue further inland to another large lake and then upriver to a famous set of waterfalls called the Krka Falls.

It was a strange 10 miles, motoring along a wide lake which then narrowed to a windy deep ravine criss-crossed by high bridges, then into another huge (3 miles across) freshwater lake and upstream as far as we could to a small picturesque town called Skradin, where we moored at the marina for the night.

It was a bit of a tourist trail and obviously one of the “must do” attractions of the area, with a steady stream of yachts heading up and down river.

The town is about 2 miles from the falls so instead of taking the tourist taxi boat we decided to set off on our bikes for what we hoped would be a pleasant ride alongside the river.

Unfortunately we decided to follow the signs instead of asking someone.

We were confident we were going in the right direction but the road started weaving uphill around a large hill. We thought, “fine, it’ll drop down soon” but it didn’t. We eventually reached the top of a rather large mountain after about ½ hour cycling, picked up another sign so followed it down… and down… and down… in fact it went down for about 5km ending up at the river but quite a way upstream of the falls we’d been aiming for.

Meanwhile we were quite hot and getting through our water, as it was early afternoon and the sun was ferocious.

We’d actually taken the signs to the wrong falls, which were still another 10km away up and down we didn’t know what. After a bit of debate we cut our losses and headed back up the huge hill again, stopping briefly on the way down at a small store for a very welcome soft drink.

When we finally reached the town we locked up the bikes and caught the water taxi with all the other punters. It cost the same and actually took us to the right place.

Oh yes, there actually was a nice flat road running alongside the river after all!!!

Sibenik

Adrian — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 15:15:00 +0100

After our windy day yesterday and divert to the shelter of Kremik marina, we set out today to finish our route up to Sibenik. This town is situated a couple of miles inland and is accessed via a long and deep narrow ravine leading to a large inland lake. It was interesting pilotage and looked a reasonable place to stay for the night. During the entrance in the ravine, the pilot book advised us to keep an eye out for the old WW2 submarine caves built into the rock.

We moored stern to on the quay in gusty conditions and waited around until another boat had come in next to us before heading off for an explore.

Unfortunately the town didn’t seem that fantastic. It had all the usual churches, narrow streets, smooth marble flagstones in large plazas and of course the castle on the hill protecting it from seaward invaders but seemed to lack a focus and character. The church was interesting, in that all around the edge were carved heads reputably of citizens too tight to contribute to its building costs – so everyone would know the tightasses… Bit harsh!

We walked around, tramped up to the castle in the sweltering heat to get some picture (as usual) and came back to the boat for a pleasant on-board bbq. It was a bit like feeding time at the zoo as people strolling along the quay would take a good look as they passed by. We even dug out some marshmallows to toast for desert, which wet down a treat and gained a few envious looks.

Heading north into a bit of wind

Adrian — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 09:14:00 +0100

Started heading north today into the northern Adriatic. True to form we encountered a steady force 6-7 with gusts over 30 knots. Deviated from our intended destination (Sibenik) to a sheltered marina called Kremik as the entrance to Sibenik is through long channel with very high sides that would have been very difficult in strong winds.

Wimbledon Mens final day

Adrian — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 08:17:00 +0100

A great plan today – we decided to head off to a lovely quiet anchorage, settle down, have a swim and then tune in my laptop’s TV card to watch the British Grand Prix and then the Tennis (we’d seen from the day before that both were being shown on Croatian TV’s sports channel)

Reception has been great everywhere we’ve been (not that we’ve watched anything apart from a few Euro 2008 football games) but we somehow managed to find a bay with a complete reception hole.

We couldn’t get anything but a very very flickery picture – disaster!

Given there was nothing we could do we resorted to the shortwave radio and the Word Service, but even that reception was poor, so we ended up in strange positions holding the radio up high with one hand on the aerial and the other on the boat rigging to get the best reception.

We managed to listen to most of the game – albeit in a short wave fading in and out sort of way. After 7pm BBC World service stopped broadcasting so the last few games of the mammoth 5 setter were “watched” in desperation via the laptop and mobile phone data connection on Wimbledon’s web site scoreboard, with us tracking play by firstly the “speed of serve” indicator being updated (telling us they’d served) followed by a delay (whilst they played), then the scoreboard changing. Not much action, but tense for us anyway watching the numbers change.

How we watched the men's Wimbledon final!

Meanwhile Beck was at the match! Quite envious today!

What an epic, and for us relief when the ticker finally ticked over to Nadal “9” instead of deuce again.

Bye to Tony - off to Split

Adrian — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 08:03:00 +0100

Yesterday we anchored off the town of Trogir, where we picked Tony up a week ago. A pleasant evening and then up early to get him off to the airport.

Jax and I then came back to the boat, loaded up the bikes and headed off to Split 20 miles around the coast. The ride was hot, but good exercise. On the way we found a mall and quite unusually headed in to a MacDonald’s for a cool drink and milkshake. Naughty but nice given the heat. Split was interesting and had an amazing fortified old quarter with underground shops and markets.

Statue of Gregorius of Nin in Split (10th century Slavic religious cleric leaderwho fought for the right to perform mass in Croatian!)

After touring around we ended up collapsing at a quayside bar for food, where by chance the women’s final was on. Fantastic. We haven’t watched any Wimbledon this year and it was great to make our meal last and catch some tennis. Unfortunately it was a long match and we had to leave for our 2 hour cycle ride back to the boat before the end. Anyway, we knew Williams would win!

Superyacht

Adrian — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 07:53:00 +0100

Today whilst sailing we noticed a large yacht coming towards us down the channel. The AIS received showed us that it was Drumbeat, a 173ft (53m) superyacht from New Zealand. This picture shows the size. Look very closely at the bow to see a man standing there to get a full appreciation of the scale – its huge!

The yacht has 11 crew and up to 10 guests. Its fuel tanks give it a range of 8000miles and have a capacity of 49000 litres. That’s about £50000 per fill up!

More details here for you avid yacht spotters here…

http://www.yachtspotter.com/ysp2_ycard.php?foo=20060323

Hvar

Adrian — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 07:48:00 +0100

Hvar is Croatia’s self appointed party town and it didn’t disappoint. We arrived early and just about managed to force our way in to a quayside berth right in the centre of the action. The town is situated at the end of one of Croatia’s largest islands and dates back to Roman times with a large castle on top of the hill, large marble paved courtyards and walkways and tall sided narrow streets.

The town was also packed with large tourist tripper boats carrying generally Australian backpackers. This had the potential for a messy evening with hundreds of students drinking and enjoying the warm evening. After looking around the town and hiking in sweltering heat up to the castle (at Jacqui’s insistence and despite Tony and my whinging) where we found some great views of the town, the harbour and the nearby Pakleni islands where we have anchored a number of times. Obviously there was a charge of £5 each to look around the deserted castle, but that is normal for Croatia.

We went to a couple of cocktail bars later in the evening and enjoyed a couple of beverages. Carpe Diem is the most famous and best situated, overlooking the harbour. We finally retired around 2am, but the aforementioned Aussie backpackers took the party through to the morning with noise, shouting and general drunkenness.

Tourist tripper boats in the background...

I was up at 7 for a run, a little shaky and dehydrated but generally ok. Only a couple more days for Tony, so we set off for our favourite anchorage at the nearby Pakleni islands for a chill out day in the sun and sea.