Mediterranean 2020

Mallorca and Menorca

Posted by admin on October 2, 2020

Apologies for falling behind so disgracefully with our record keeping!  The Ship's Log is up to date; our web blog less so.

We last left you as we set out from Port St Antoni and the unpleasantness of draining the diesel tank to eradicate the strange crude oil like deposits that have been found in our main engine fuel supply.  Goodness knows where it has come from - it is not organic diesel bug which is the usual source of fuel contamination.  This is clumpy, oily and impenetrable to fuel filters!  Anyway, it is now gone.

Our route headed clockwise around Ibiza to the lovely little bays of Cala Compte, Port de St Miguel (and a chance meeting with the beautiful classic schooner Vixen - below - ask us the story of their dinghy hunt sometime!) before ending up in Portinatx at the north east tip of the island.

We'd intended to stay a night or two until an email from Palma de Mallorca interrupted our preparations for a dinner and a relaxing evening. Quite by chance, Andy's Watch Leader from the Whitbread Round the World Race circumnavigation he'd completed in 1989-90 got in touch to say that he was in Palma but, having concluded his most recent skipper contract, he would only be there for a few days more before returning to France.  A quick check of the weather forecast confirmed that there was no time like the present so, by mutual agreement, heavily influenced by the persuasive powers of the skipper, we weighed anchor and set off for Mallorca.

It should be pointed out that Serge Guilhamou is probably the man whose seamanship and general boat awareness and knowledge are greater than any sailor I've met before or since.  He is a previous skipper of multiple mega yachts including overseeing the refit of, and then skippering the magnificent 178' three masted 1902 gaff tops'l schooner Shenandoah twice more around the world.  

Serge's quiet competence and the anticipation, sense of weather and wind and general practical skills are those I have sought, badly, to emulate throughout my own subsequent sailing career.  I hadn't seen him for 30 years since saying our farewells at the end of the Whitbread.  It was an opportunity not to be missed. 

As it happened it was also a lovely night for a sail and we made good time - ending up in the picturesque Cathedral anchorage next to the esplanade in Palma.

We spent the day filling up fuel and then, for practical reasons, booked into the exorbitant marina.  Later in the evening it was if we'd not seen each other for a week or two when, at last, Serge and I met each other again after 30 years!  Neither of us had changed at all.

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