This morning we woke to winds screaming at 22 26 knots an hour. The marina was lumpy. The ocean was full of whitecaps. We attached a second mooring line to the bow, even though it didn’t really fit right, figuring something holding us to a second concrete block under the water was better than nothing. We guess we aren’t moving Kosmos today, after all.
We decided to go for the four hour hike along the coast that was supposed to be absolutely beautiful. But after Continue reading
As soon as we got up, we started working on getting ready to go to sea. We were only making a short day hop, so getting ready went fairly quickly. When we checked out with the marina, we found out there was a 20% VAT (sales tax) on top of what we had been quoted. We wish they had mentioned the VAT before the moment we pulled out our wallet to pay.
We pulled out at 1100. We are sad to report that the fenders were all covered with a thick black slime that managed to get all over the entire exterior of the boat. It is pretty gross.
The ride over to San Tropez was Continue reading
By 0300 this morning, the wind had picked up to 9 10 knots on our beam. The waves picked up, too, of course. It still was not a bad ride. Despite it being wavier, our speed increased, and we were flying along at 6.5 knots with only 1600 RPM. We had a current with us.
By 0800, we could clearly see Monaco in the distance. It is a cluster of tall and midrange buildings, which start along the shore and creep up the green mountain. But the major development only seems to go part way up the mountain — there is almost a clear line where it changes to a scattering of small buildings. That must be the northern border of France. The top of the mountain was covered by a cloud, so we couldn’t tell what was near the top.
Off to the right, in France, it is mostly smaller buildings, both along the coast and creeping up the hill. To the left, also in France, the tall buildings creep down the coast, but above the shoreline there are a few smaller buildings and not much more.
We approached the Hercules Harbor entrance. We imagined how the call on the radio would go. “Do you Continue reading
Yesterday we had a low key day. Since we were leaving later in the day, we took our time with our get ready to go routine. We pulled out of port at 1600.
For those of you that asked about marina specifics, we have found that the front of the boat moves an awful lot being secured only to one mooring line instead of two. The marina is also not super flat. Rolly may be too strong of a word, but the side to side movement combined with the gentle swell activity is certainly noticeable enough to make someone sensitive to motion not feel good.
Anyway, when we pulled out, the winds were moderate. Seas were Continue reading
By 0100, the wind had picked up to about 7 knots real, but the seas were still smooth and nice. At 0800, we pulled into the marina. We were greeted by two crew to help us tie up. Christi found the new ropes to be heavy and unwieldy, and the initial tie up was especially clumsy. This marina only has a single mooring line, and we found getting the mooring line situated properly to be quite tricky. The workers needed to come and help us. Tomorrow there is supposed to be high winds, so after the workers left, Eric re-did all the lines to make sure that Kosmos was perfectly situated for the wind. All in all, it took well over an hour between initially pulling into the spot and Eric finally deciding we were situated well enough.
Eric put out the passarelle. The passarelle has been nice to have in all the other places we have been, but it certainly wasn’t a necessity. We could have managed with jumping on and off, which would have been inconvenient, but doable. But not here. The concrete quay is Continue reading