Espalmador - as close to perfection as you can get!
We left Cala San Vicente at 11.00 with very favourable winds and flat seas. With all sails pulling hard and the Autohelm doing all the boring stuff it was a day for odd chores on deck and, in Hazel's case, below decks. It was, some might claim, perhaps, an odd time to choose to clean the forward heads. Certainly, the decision to flush the sparklingly clean loo, without first removing the cleaning cloth was not the best idea and explained the shamefaced expression as Hazel emerged. Her opening remark "Err, David!" hinted of more to come!
Still, what else was to be done when arriving at the magical anchorage of Espalmador other than dismantle the heads? 'Nuff said, or a skippers privileges might be worth nothing!
We had a truly superb sail, sparkling seas, steady wind, hot sunshine - what we were there for after all!
Espalmador and Formentera are part of a small string of islands off the SE corner of Ibiza and as we approached the narrow channel between Espalmador and the mainland, the winds freshened as they funnelled through the gap and the seas became quite disturbed. We reefed down and we soon gybing to port, a very crowded anchorage opening up ahead.
There are, in fact, few opportunities to anchor as the authorities have provided many mooring buoys to protect the sea bed and a rare species of weed which grows there. We had quick scoot round, saw our friends Moody "Ipsos" already moored there, then saw what appeared to be the only vacant buoy in the bay - and another Brit boat saw it about the same time as us - the race was on!!! An impromptu crew briefing followed on how to get to the buoy first and how to pick it up first time - before the competition in their Sadler 34 leapt in if we missed!
We got there first, Hazel picked it up first time with the boathook and the crew of a local boat broke out into applause - we hadn't realised our "race" had been so obvious but we all had a good chuckle about it, well maybe not all; although the Sadler crew picked up a buoy themselves fairly soon.
So, the end of a good day! Not really, all this before 15.30hrs, so a quick leap over the side into crystal clear waters before yours truly immersed himself into the joys of blocked heads - a pleasure all sailors are well briefed on.
Meanwhile, Ken and Louise had returned to "Ipsos" and seeing "Sundancer" berthed Ken had rowed over - he declined the invite to come aboard when he saw the assorted plumbing and pipes being cleaned in the cockpit but invited us over for drinks later!
And so a super day continued late into the evening as we caught up on a summer's sailing over a glass or two.
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