Rock 'n' no Roll

From Naxos and Mount Etna on the east coast of Sicily we sailed down to the large city of Catana to meet Tim who was coming out for the weekend – and oh what a weekend! Tim was hoping for a last bit of sunshine; what he got was a belly full of rain – but sailing is never without its dose of excitement! The rain started just as we reached Catana on Friday and dropped anchor. Unhappy with the exposure of the anchorage we found a place against a rather ragged but well protected piece of unused sea wall in the harbour. Tim arrived at 11.30 pm after a long drive from Palermo. After an excellent Sicilian lunch out on Saturday the weather perked up and the wind was blowing. We set off south to give Tim a sail – and caught our first   fish since the Atlantic coast of France – and this time we landed it! It was a Bonito, from the tuna/mackeral family and half way between in size. Our stop for the night was in the little river at Brucoli, an interesting little place which serve...

leaving Stromboli and the work of Vulcan the Roman god of fire behind us, we headed south to Lipari (the main island of the group) and Volcano, the other active volcano - not a very original name for a volcano! On the way we passed some pretty wacky rock pillars rising 100' or so above the sea. The ragged 'islands' are the volcanic cores of ancient volcanoes, born aeons before the current volcanoes. Over time the soft volcanic islands have eroded away leaving only the super hard solidified volcanoes core as evidence that they were ever there. We anchored in the lee of Volcano - it was a bit smelly! Quite different from Stromboli, Volcano did not belch fire instead pouring out sulphurous gas which then left trails of yellow sulphur in its wake. Melanie is stood in front of sulphur deposits. Only a few hundred meters from where we were anchored gas bubbles to the surface; sadly the wind came in and we had to leave before we got the chance to swim in the nicely warmed w...

The boat has spend the summer on the hard in Naples to escape the colossal marina fees over the summer period. I arrived back at the boat a day ahead of Melanie to get her back in the water and get some jobs done. Melanie followed me the next day doing the rather torturous route via Paris that we have to do with Woody because air France will fly him in the cabin thus avoiding the huge dog cargo fees. Melanie needed a few days R and R so we holed up on the small island of Ischia, 15 miles west of Naples. The wind was due to pick up after 4 days so we planned to jump on the back of that to do the 140 mile trip to Sicily. The wind forecast however soon crept up to be 30 to 40 knots, too much for a pleasant crossing. We chose an anchorage to weather the storm, due in at 10 o’clock in the evening. Unfortunately, it proved to be rather rolly. With the wind rising but still a sensible 20 knots we lifted the anchor and headed further round the protected south side of the island. Sailing ...