End of Part 1 Summer 2010, resuming 26 August 2010

Badalona, Spain, Monday, 26th July 2010

We never made it to Formentor. The wind got up in the wrong direction and we could see breaking waves and white water at the harbour entrance and beyond. The various weather forecasts were giving us news of 2-3 metres of swell and gale warnings to the north and east into the Golfe de Leon and NE of Menorca. The corridor Mallorca to Barcelona was out of that, but swell was still a problem.

Met up again with Silent Wings who joined us on Myrica for a barbecue - we may well see them later in the season in Sardinia, as we have similar plans.

We saw a window between bouts of swell and left Soller at 2pm Saturday. It was initially a bit lumpy but the further out to sea we got the flatter it became. Had to motorsail a good bit, but R got the genoa flying sometime in the night and the engine could thankfully be switched off. It felt quite a long journey - true to form I did not sleep at all, and this time R only managed the odd catnap, so we both were feeling quite jet-lagged on Sunday.

Badalona Marina staff are really friendly and helpful, the facilities here are superb. The showers are actually individual bathrooms easily twice the size of home bathrooms (about 8 of them in one block alone). They have done us a very good deal putting us in the "up to 10m" bracket although we are a bit over that - makes a change from being put into the "up to 12m" slot. We have sussed out the local supermarket, the tram to Barcelona and the airport, And have made a start at cleaning up the boat and putting it to bed for a bit. Shame about the gasometers and derelict power stations!

Will finish off tucking boat up tomorrow and look forward to getting back to cool British weather! Hope all well with everyone.

To be continued from the end August until October by which time we should be in Sardinia. Or maybe Tunisia. Not sure. xx