Exploits of Captain Ginger (14-27 June 2018)

Egada Marina is situated at the head of a bay with a small town and several good supermarkets. Close enough to Split airport for crew change so an ideal spot,; this was also the rendezvous to meet up with other Cruising Association members in the area. Seventeen boats turned up and it was good to catch up with old friends and meet new. In the evening we gathered for drinks on the pontoon followed by a buffet meal in the Marina Restaurant.

Agana

Here also we said goodbye to Joycie, Andy and Kevin and welcomed Pete, Andrew and Sheryl for the next leg from Agana (Croatia) to Bari (Italy). The next day re-provisioned, waited for a torrential rain storm to pass and left in the afternoon for an anchorage in a small cove on the island of Solta, glad to be away from the heat of the harbour and spent the night in a peaceful setting with only one other boat. Another anchorage on Solta the following night where the seabed was thick weed and difficult to set the anchor then across to Hvar. Here we moored to a small jetty just big enough for two boats in a small bay about a twenty minute walk into the town of Hvar. A very pleasant tourist town with a lot of younger people partying. We walked along the town quay and round to the next bay, had a beer in a terrace bar overlooking the bay, visited St Stephens Cathedral in the town square, the largest piazza in Dalmatia. The fort on the hill known locally as the Spanjola was built in the 16th century during Venetian rule, reconstructed in 1579 and offers great views over the city. (see picture below) The wind was negligible when we left the next morning for a twenty mile crossing to Korcula where we moored to a buoy along with a number of other boats. Purely by chance we found Alyssa was also here when we arrived and had drinks and a meal ashore with Dave and Anne. There had been little wind in recent days but Tuesday with a North Easterly wind forecast looked like a good day to make the 55 nautical mile crossing to Italy, so the next day (Monday) we set sail for Ubli on the island of Lastovo. A twenty mile passage mostly under engine although the wind got up for a spell and we sailed for a couple of hours

Looking down on Hvar Town and the Pakleni Islands from the Fort

Lastovo is an outlying Croatian island, a large part of which is National Park and the nearest point of land to Italy so here at Ubli we checked out of Croatia with the Harbour Master and Port Police. We wanted to leave early the next day for the 60 nautical mile passage to Vieste so anchored overnight and at first light weighed anchor and made our way to the Border Control Quay. Fifteen minutes after making a telephone control a charming Police Lady turned up and stamped our exit permit – all very efficient and at 05.55am we headed off for Italy. After motor sailing for part of the way we had an excellent wind for the last part and arrived at Vieste early evening, a long day but a satisfying one. We spent two days here before going on to Trani where we had arranged for the Port Police to check us in, all very officious and we got a check in stamp on our exit permit from Croatia. A few years ago no-one bothered checking into Italy but times have changed. Trani is a pleasant town, not so touristy as Vieste and we spent a pleasant few of days there apart from the second night when we had a thunderstorm with strong winds and torrential rain. It did clear the air though and it has been cooler and less oppressive since. The strong winds kept us there an extra day before moving on to Bisceglie a little further down the coast. The coast line along the eastern seaboard of Italy is shallow with few places to anchor and harbours some distance apart so we were lucky to get into this small marina run by a Yacht Club. We arrived early afternoon on a Sunday and the seafront restaurants were full of families having an extended Sunday lunch. We stayed there one night before leaving the next morning for Bari, a day earlier than planned but ahead of a weather front passing through. That night we had strong winds with thunder lightening and torrential rain, a pattern that was to continue for the following few days so we were glad to have arrived Bari early ready for the next crew change. Plan of this leg below: