Last weekend we travelled east by car for a little sightseeing. Lunara is in a boat yard and after many 12 hour work days in the yard, we were ready for a little rest and relaxing. On Saturday we drove a short distance to the east and Sunday to the west (separate blog entry coming up later)
East of Cartagena
A very interesting drive along the port on a winding road uphill, later on a high cliff with great views of the port and the coast line on the other side of the bay, all in-between passing through short tunnels.
Then we entered Escombreras, a huge industrial area and port with refineries, cement factories and left over buildings from mining centuries ago. The landscape is barren and plastered with huge ball shaped gas tanks dotting the hillside for miles mixed with silvery shining pipes in front of a brownish landscape. It’s sci-fi looking, exactly how I would imagine a doomsday settlement on Mars. It was difficult to photograph, wanting to say below does not reflect properly the view.
We off-roaded our Fiat Panda rental car through a silver and lead mining area from the last century. Ruins of an industrial era gone by. We were heading for the beach ‘Playa El Gorguel’.
Dirt road to El GorguelYes, a Fiat Panda can pass through the middle arch. the Admiral closed the eyes :-), just kidding.Old silver mineOpen pit mining
The beach and bay was scenic. Along the east side of the cliff were shacks. No running water or electricity and most residences seemed to be modest vacation spots. Nearly the whole bay’s entrance was blocked by a fish farm set some hundred meters from the beach. The sand was blackish.
El Gorguel
Nevertheless it is scenic, interesting and weirdly fascinating.
Cave El GorguelEl GorguelBeautiful flowers. I don’t know what they are. The green stem of the plant and the leaves are very firm.
Portmán
After El Gorguel we followed the dirt road further east. Portmán was initially a first century roman enclave used mostly for mining. Mining continued into the 1980s. Many hundred millions of tons of mining residuals and chemicals were dumped into the bay. The fishing port, because of all the deposits, disappeared and a new, smaller port was built on the east side of the bay. However, this port is small and the entrance so silted and narrow we could nearly walk over the port entrance.
The prime real estate of the bay and beach area have become catch basins for the open mining deposits and waste which still wash out from up the valley 40 years later. The french mining company disappeared after mining became unprofitable and left without cleaning up the area which they were contractually required to do. The EU and Spain spent 80million Euros since 2011 in the cleanup effort. Still, the little hamlet looks destroyed for one or two more generations of Portmán citizens. As it is, Portmán could have lived of tourism probably better than mining, but not today.
The bay of Portmán. To the right at the bottom of the hills is the original coast line.
Side note:
Our boat is in repairs, but we are in better shape than below 🙂
Initially we planned to sail straight to Cartagena, Spain which is a 48hours+ trip. The weather forecast made it wise to to split the journey into two legs. Wind and waves for the second night were not what we consider nice.
I am writing part of this underway update during my night watch. It’s midnight right now (local time). By the time this blog update is published we will be in Denia.
The wind is variable from 2kts to 8kts. We have the port engine running.
It’s a very quiet watch with occasional commercial traffic. I prefer night watches with some action, as it is so much easier to stay awake.
At the moment one vessel is overtaking us. “Atlantic Island”, a small cargo vessel is catching us from behind with a 3.8kts relative speed. You can see him near the 3nm ring on the radar
But back to the beginning. In the last days before our departure we finally got some of the spare parts we needed. In the end we stayed 4 weeks in Roda de Bara and were very happy about the location, not so happy about the waiting.
Roda de Bara
The marina facility is in good shape. The people in the marina and Capitaneri are very friendly. We met some cool liveaboards on our dock. And Francis from the local chandlery is a gem. We will return one day.
We explored the nearby coastal town of Sitges, which we highly recommend, see our earlier post.
We also visited a large Cava winery. Now, for those who judge Cava by what they can buy outside Spain, please reconsider. Let me encourage you to try again when you visit Spain. We saw the cellars of ‘Freixenet’. The 1910 brickstone architecture of the vinery is set in a nice landscape and felt inviting.
Cava wine cellars. We visited Freixenet with our friends Angelika and Thomas.
Cava is the Spanish equivalent to Champagne. Beyond the budget product made for export they produce excellent brut sparkling Cavas of many varieties. Freixenet’s reception has wine tasting booths with sofas in a round setting for your group or family. Together with some plates of acorn fed Iberico ham and other tasty snacks you get a great combination to try.
Back to the boat and sailing. This morning, hours before leaving, I reinstalled the autopilot controller in the engine room. The generator is decommisioned at the moment and will not be used on this trip. Beyond the issues I found earlier, which help explain the constant overheating, I researched the problem further and believe now that we whole cooling/water supply installation is insufficient to run our genset in a healthy mode.
We epoxied yesterday the mounting plate in the engine room. Today we can mount the autopilot controller box in a solid fashion.
Epoxying the Mounting Plate, helped by our multi purpose boat hook.
And while being at it, I filled all the little holes in the hull, drilled for unknown reasons by unknown technicians.
Epoxy work space
Pictured above the epoxy shop on our outside dining table. The Admiral loves it when I use here kitchen gadgets like the electronic scale for work like this.
By now we are underway to Denia. After leaving the dock it typically takes an hour to clear the deck from fenders, lines and gangway, including making everything sea-safe and hoisting the sails.
Our heaviest docking line. The Admiral is not on friendly terms with the beast – understandably.
Then we further waterproof the boat from above. From an aerial view our boat looks a piece of art from a trailer park. Admiral Christo @ work!
Doubling up on duct tape. Just to be dry if the weather deteriorates.
The story is that one top window started leaking again. Duct Tape is our new friend. When I retrieved a new roll from the locker I realized that this was roll #3 which means we had already duct-taped 100meters on our boat. Later analysis in port showed that the window cutout in the deck is not 100% straight and even. When the boat flexes in waves the silicone glue must compensate the different movements by stretching. With an uneven thickness, ergo being thin in some areas, the thinner part of the silicon glue overstretches and detaches from the gelcoat and ….. we are leaking from top.
Afterwards the Admiral unfolded her favorite chair on the front deck and read a book in the sunshine.
Early morning the next day, we crossed the deepest part on this trip -1276m or 4200feet.
Deeper is better for us. It means less fishing vessels and typically calmer seas compared to what it would be in shallower waters.
Later in the morning a pod of dolphins visited us for 15minutes. They swam and played around under our bow. I am not sure, but it looked like they rubbed their belly and back on the soft roundings of the bow, all while we were cruising along at 6knots
Breathing out.Hi Flipper!
The Admiral was off watch and sleeping, so I did not want to wake her up. Last time I did this, she came out and the dolphins were gone. After a while looking at this beautyful scene under our bows I caved in and woke her up. The moment she came out – quite excited and in PJs- she could see only one dolphin far back in our wake. What shall I do next time?
As we approached Denia the ship traffic increased. See the radar from 10miles out
Denia is a ferry port and home to a small fishing fleet. The ferries go mostly to Ibiza and the Balearic Islands. Some are quite fast. When you see them on radar or get the AIS warning things happen fast. You can barely see them at 2mi away, but with a closing speed of 30kts you will be in their way in 4 minutes!
The port entrance of Denia is a narrow channel which is easy to navigate in good weather. When we left on the following day it looked quite different and more challenging.
We are already docked
Why we split the trip into two legs you can see here. The weather we wanted to avoid begins to roll in an hour after our arrival.
Weather coming from the Southeast
The marina is nice but pricey. The views are great, especially towards the fort. With sunshine it must be beautiful here.
In the evening we took a small free ferry across the port to go to the old town for dinner.
We found a nice grill restaurant. The food was freshly grilled in the center of the restaurant, protected by glass screens and equipped with good ventilation. Food was really tasty and the local Spanish Rose was excellent.
Everything got served perfectly fresh from the grill.
Tomorrow we’ll get up late and prepare to leave around 1400h heading to Cartagena. More about this in the next underway update.
PS: PS: Coke needs to be fresh too
