La Maddalena et le sud de la Corse

San Pantaleo

 A languid day in the very familiar setting of Porto San Paolo very soon turned into a week before we felt it was time to set off again. Just before we did though, the crews of Sirena and Rocko One went on a little excursion to the impossibly charming village of San Pantaleo. Home to about a thousand people in the summer and only scores in the winter, it positively bursts at the seams on a Thursday during the season, when the market comes to town and the population seems gain an order of magnitude. Atelier after Atelier sell wonderfully flowing and very individual dresses that catch the eye to the extent that the coffee shops and wine boutiques are heaving with spouses biding their time and managing their hydration levels. Even the street musicians are choreographed, being positioned just far enough apart from each other so as not to clash as well as catering to just about every taste. Impromptu dancing broke out when Tom followed by Susan and Catherine were inspired to take to the floor and engage with a local ‘personality’ whose undertaker garb belied an impish demeanour, all conspiring to create a memorable occasion.

Coltrane's cousin on holiday	Charlie and Tom
De rigueur dress for sailors and others	Bougainvillea everywhere
Comrades in arms	Blossom cloud

The sublime that followed was a visit to the Surrau winery, the setting of which rivals many a fine winery. The discreet architecture blends the buildings into the lush surroundings with natural materials creating an atmosphere reminiscent of wineries near Cape Town. We decided, this once, to follow experience and enjoyed their wines in situ rather than stocking up and risking spoiling the recollection. Sometimes memories travel better than bottles. I exaggerate slightly of course as we did buy some red Passito, which I am sure I will report upon in due course.

Buying wine in style

Tasting with a view

Storage solutions

The north east coast of Sardinia is home to more square metres of superyacht than you can possibly shake a stick at - or boat hook, if you prefer. Yet, the charm and beauty of the landscape remains only marginally diminished. We are pretty certain that it riles the owners of said Gin Palaces that we humble yachties share the same water and views and are able to sneak into some nooks and crannies where we find hardly any company other than fellow sailors. Last season we had decided to leave a visit of the Maddalena islands nature reserve for this year. It is a special place and has a veritable rule book that accompanies one’s entrance into it. Zero tolerance of waste of any form is one of the things and the turquoise water is a glorious testament to the success of what should be an obvious discipline. Even mildly soapy dishwater is not allowed, which is a good thing. One learns new habits on board a boat and one is how to deal with waste. There are tomes written about the blindingly obvious, but don’t create any is about the best advice one can receive or give.

Dead Man's Passage

Turquoise lagoon

We spent three days in the nature reserve and, while it is obviously a special place, I can’t help but feel that its image is ever so slightly oversold. As a consequence every square meter of usable anchorage is occupied until at least dusk when some semblance of calm prevails with the Cento Cavalli (the generic term for 100 or more horsepower speedboat things) and superyachts return from whence they came and mainly like-minded sailing types are left to enjoy the peaceful setting. Evocative names such as Dead Man’s passage describe lagoon-like areas next to gorgeous islands, one of which belonged to Garibaldi. There is probably some deeper meaning to the prevalence of past leaders and dictators owning and hailing from islands here, but our wine budget precludes too much speculation.

DIY Stonehenge on Lavezzi	Whose beach is this?
Tucked into Lazarina	Not too much chain out

A mere hour or so away to the west lies the familiar Lavezzi, which was home to us for a night last season. We managed to get into a small enclosed cove, Lazarina, where more than 5 yachts leads to permanent consternation. The water is pristine and the beach and paths into the rocky outcrops immaculately clean. It offers such protection from the elements that a sound night’s sleep is guaranteed.

Lunch stop sans tourists

Just before the swell

This was in rather sharp contrast to the following day when we decided to make some headway and, after a pleasant stop for Pastis to celebrate arriving in France, we anchored in Anse Fornellu. The backdrop of the wooded shore against mountains climbing to over 2500 meters is spectacular. The tranquility was quickly dispelled in the early evening though when a big rolling swell came in from the southwest, while the light wind kept us pointing exactly perpendicular to it. For once I got up and did something about it, attaching a line to the anchor chain and midship cleat and pointing us into the swell by locking off the rudder. The sideways rocking really will drive you nuts but the porpoising is fine. The original intention of staying a while was rather spoiled by the experience and we started to wend our way up the west coast finding a pretty, if busy, anchorage at Campomoro. There is a little, quite obvious truth here, if it is deserted, it is probably for a very good reason and if it is busy the exact same holds true. It feels like such a blend of Italy and France here that I totally forgot to hoist the French courtesy flag until the next morning. We are officially in France now..

Evidence of Elephants on Lavezzi....

Alghero to Porto San Paolo

After Bosa we travelled north towards Alghero. This town is remarkable in that Catalan has equal legal status with Italian and a quarter of the population have Algherese Catalan as a mother tongue. My musician friends will probably find it more interesting that Claudio Abbado had a home here and his neighbours were Luigi Nono and Maurizio Pollini. We decided to anchor at Porto Conte though, as it is an excellent spot and ideal for visiting Alghero by bus, leaving the boat safely in the bay and the dinghy at the local pontoon near the bus stop. Alghero is reminiscent of Gallipoli in the bay of Taranto, aside from the fact that Paella is on all the menus and it is heaving with tourists, of course.

The cliffs at Capo Caccia with Neptune's Cave

We enjoyed the sights, sounds and food of the town, but were glad to avoid the hustle and bustle of the harbour at night and be able to return to our anchorage where the water was lovely for swimming and there was only one disco to contend with.

Catapult for warding off Superyachts

Caltagirone tiles again

Bicycle wheels in Alghero

We saw that some weather was coming in, in a number of days and headed on to the north western tip of Sardinia and the island of Asinara. Once a quarantine station for cholera patients and later a maximum security prison island for the Sicilian mafia, it is now a pristine nature reserve. While the exhaustive regulations about anchoring and motoring are not universally adhered to, we are in Italy after all, the result is nevertheless a practically untouched natural setting.

Optimal tourist to beach ratio on Asinara

Our peaceful spot - North Asinara

Deciding that the weather was not best sat out on a buoy though, we made our way to Stintino and found a place in a quaint marina, at the mouth of a river, within delivery distance of a supermarket and with potable water that didn't smell of chlorine. This is another one of those towns that survives to an extent on the Tunny business and all the local delis carry eyewateringly expensive tinned tuna.

No, really! It is that colour.

We had seen an anchorage on our way down to Stintino and we returned to its turquoise carribean-like water for an afternoon and night before we left the west and rounded the top of Sardinia into the Strait of Bonifacio.

An ominous welcome to the Strait of Bonifacio awaited

The name of the Strait of 'Bonifacio' is after Boniface II, Margrave of Tuscany who supressed the Saracens of north Africa in 828 - one notes he did not manage to suppress the confused seas in the straits in any sort of lasting fashion, that would have been more impressive I think.  A very visible memorial on the island of Lavezzi to the 750 sailors who lost their lives when the French frigate La Semillante sank in the Strait in 1855 is a gentle reminder that these waters are not to be messed with and more than a little care is needed. Just before we rounded the northeastern tip and headed toward superyacht central, we sailed to the Isle de Piana at the south coast of Corsica to spend a very nice afternoon and evening with our friends Mark and Amanda from Panacea who had just crossed from Rome.

The next day Porto Liscia gave us a taste of the summer frenzy with the expansive beach playing host to such diverse activities as kite/wind-surfers and a band with an electric violin.  I think the women found him more electric than I did. At sunset it returned to calm and we sat down with chart and pizza and plotted our way along the Costa Smeralda past Palau and Liscia di Vacca to Olbia.

School of wind-surfers

Electric Violinist?

Back to calm

In this narrow waterway between France and Italy the only noticeable presence of officialdom is on the VHF Radio when one overhears the French Coast Guard hailing various superyachts and asking for their last port, destination, ETA and number of crew and guests on board. The best we heard was, in response to that last two points, "12 Crew, 2 guests, Over".

Some must work...while some

try to stand on their heads

Our next main stop and my base for the next several weeks as Catherine went to play in the Salzburg Summer Festival and a quick detour to Lyon with Sir John Eliot Gardiner's band, before she returned, was Mark’s golden tip, Porto San Paolo. It is not really a port as such but rather a glorious bay protected by shallow waters north and south, the mainland on the west and the rocky island of Tavolara to the East. Just a short trip by bus to Olbia airport it proved a very convenient stop for the stream of comings and goings the following weeks. I anchored in barely 4 Meters of crystal clear water providing me with my own private swimming pool. Well, not exactly private given all the locals racing to Tavolara on their 'Cento Cavalli'  (100 horsepower RIBs). Anyway who am I to complain, as I casually furled my red ensign, polished my Italian and pretended at least I was still very much part of Europe.

Porto San Paolo near Olbia

Villasimius to Bosa

This was our first experience of Sardinia and you can't help but be taken aback by the natural beauty of the island. It is a gentler, greener and calmer place than Sicily with its complex and multifaceted history not reflected in the architecture to the same extent that Sicily's is. The Nuraghi, the ancient towers, are just about the only signs of antiquity. Well, from the vantage point of the sea in any event. The water really is as clean as it looks and if it wasn't for the fact that it is salty you would certainly want to drink it. The beautiful estuary at Villasimius with its flamingoes and white beaches are seemingly immune from tourist saturation and we got lost in time here for several days before we had to move on to Capitana, which is on the outskirts of Cagliari.

As coincidence would have it my oldest friend, Gerard Korsten, was in Cagliari conducting concerts and an opera at the Teatro Lirico at the same time, so in and around his schedule we spent many hours reviewing Sardinian wines and cuisine. I am happy to report that both are in the best of health. It was also his opportunity to buy me a birthday dinner, which was memorable. The waiter marvelled at the fact that we have been friends for 43 years, not believing for one minute either of us had even reached that, let alone our actual ages. Usually waiters don't make a play for tips here - I knew something fishy was going on.

My birthday dinner in May

When Catherine got back from a short concert tour we left Capitana and headed south west to Porto Malfantano where we anchored peacefully for a few nights. Peacefully, aside from a visit from the Guardia di Finanza in a growling, grey speedboat. They asked for our documents which we handed over into a fishing net and all being ok, they moved on very cheerfully. Obviously carrying Sicilian wine in Sardinia is not an offence, irrespective of the quantity. It struck me that we were becoming luckier with anchoring. Whether we were becoming better at reading the swell, weather and bays or whatever, I decided not to dwell on it and thus not mess with the formula.

Carloforte was our next stop and while it is a tiny place, you do feel like the country bumpkins when you venture back on land after having been at anchor for days. There is a familiar routine too, much of it will be common among other yachties, which involves tanking with water (unless you have a water-maker  - mmm), finding a supermarket close by with sensibly priced beer and, depending on the state of things, a laundry.

Provisioning in Carloforte

Yes, one of those please!

At €20 a tin, not to be found in Tesco

Our sail to the large bay of Oristano was not very memorable although on the plus side none of the large sea for which the west coast is notorious manifest itself. We found a good spot and stayed for a few days, visiting a little village on the western side of the isthmus from where we were anchored by dinghy, where a medieval and somewhat mouldy and abandoned church seemed to struggle for recognition in amongst the kite surfing and sun worshipping activities .

Oristano beach

Oristano anchorage

Again time was drawing near for Catherine to fly to Zurich and we moored up in Bosa halfway up the west coast in a marina situated at the mouth of the river Temo. I set myself a project for this period and that was to install solar panels on Rocko. It has been something we have wanted to do for ages, but the feeling of being fleeced after seeing the quotes in Turkey put this on the back-burner for a time. Steve on Amalia had installed a really good solution and after picking his brains about it I ordered the kit from the UK. It arrived amazingly quickly allowing me plenty of time to do the installation. To say it is life-changing is a little melodramatic, but the feeling of having power via something that makes no noise and that is freely available only enhances the whole feeling of independence. Oh, yes and the sun really does shine all the time.

Two of my pontoon neighbours

Bosa on the Fiume Temo

Pastel is always in stock

Bosa is not the centre of the world but it is a delightful place and the river connects the town to the sea providing the motorboat-loving locals with endless enjoyment and yachties with endless tut-tutting opportunity. I was some months into studying Italian and, Catherine not being around to provide a simultaneous translation service, I was able to give my broken Italian more of an outing. My neighbour on the pontoon, a local resident, is an avid sailor and went out most days. We got talking, in Italian, and he gave me a fulsome explanation of the ramifications of the sinking of the Costa Concordia upon the maritime insurance business and what a cretin Schettino is. I had hoped to participate a little more in the conversation, but the subject matter’s vocabulary was in a chapter I had yet to discover. Again, the friendliness of the Sardinians is fantastic. After commenting on the exorbitant price of diesel at the marina, as is invariably the case, he, Alessandro, drove me a good half an hour with his car to a petrol station that he knew so I could fill my jerry cans with diesel saving me 28 cents a litre, yet costing him, I don’t know how much in petrol, a contribution to which he declined.

I made the trip from Bosa to Olbia via bus and train to meet Catherine upon her return from Zurich and took the time to check out the possibilities of stationing myself there in August. The imperative to maximise earnings in the tourist trade during summer here is quite crass. July or September cost half of August and about half that again for June and October. This makes planning for August rather important, obviously. The town quay seemed like a good solution when I saw it , but Mark from Panacea was in a similar position picking up crew in Olbia and gave me a golden tip. More of that next time.

Bread is hell on the gas

Zucchini flowers in tempura batter

Pastry is easier in a house

We do try keep up the culinary standards on board, but it is not always easy with a cranky oven and a fridge that seems to be monopolised by the need for ice and chilled white wine.

Mazara del Vallo to Sardegna

The sailing season started in early May for us this year as we set off from Marina di Ragusa (MdR) and

Last minute preparations - laundry mostly

made our way west along the now familiar coastline of the south of Sicily and anchored outside Licata. While we found the marina a pleasant enough place on our visit at the end of the season last year, we started out determined to spend more time at anchor this season, something with which we would have varying degrees of success, but that story will unfold on its own. Day two saw us motor sailing to Mazara del Vallo and we thought to ourselves we could really do with less engine time too.

Mazara del Vallo

Mazara lies a little to the south east of Marsala and its unassuming port masks the entrance to a town with a rich and colourful history. There is a strong Arabic influence, which is visible in the architecture, fragrances of the spice shops and restaurants. You could be in Marrakesh with the streets decorated with colourful tiles embedded in walls and died fabric suspended in mid air for no apparent reason other than to make a bohemian statement.


An unassuming entrance hides a gem of a theatre, which has all the characteristics of its grand cousin in Milan, but on a miniature scale. Despite seating barely one hundred it has three tiers ornately clad with reclaimed wood from old fishing vessels. The largest fishing fleet in Italy is supposedly based here, but there was little evidence of that. Maybe they were out poaching in Tunisian waters as they are supposedly wont to do, or perhaps that it is just a tale of a bye-gone era. The connection to Tunisia, which is just 80 nautical miles to the south west, is strong and a migrant population that enriches the local culture here sends its children to schools supported and run by Tunis, to further Arab language and cultural education. A hot potato subject just about anywhere else today, this seems to bring no visible signs of tension. Perhaps the challenge of carving out a living and just getting along with each other focuses the mind away from issues that cause friction for the sake of it.

Teatro Garibaldi

Are we in Tunis?

or Marrakesh?

Just near the port there is a small museum that houses a remarkable bronze statue, the Dancing Satyr of Mazara, from 400 B.C. It was found by fishermen some twenty years ago between Sicily and Tunisia and, after a four year restoration and a tour of Italy, it returned to Mazara and is carefully preserved and beautifully displayed in a converted church. I am not an expert on bronzes, nevertheless I can't quite imagine how the art has improved much in the intervening years. Upon reflection we spent too little time here but we were looking for a good weather window to cross to Sardinia as Catherine's first patch of work was only a couple of weeks away. So, we set off for the Egadi Islands off the western tip of Sicily.

Greek Bronze Satyr

We headed for Favignana which this early in the season looked deserted and forlorn. A very unsuccessful attempt at finding a beautiful anchorage saw me damage the rudder and have to make a very ungraceful and hasty exit. After calling Tony at Vento di Maestrale in Trapani for help on an inevitable repair we spent a night at anchor in the next bay, Cala Azzura, which was more like frozen black ink than Azzura. None of the buoys were set yet and I had visions of the anchor becoming fouled between concrete buoy blocks to add to our woes. The wisdom of the Pilot books and their view on the protection for the swell was less than accurate and we spent an extremely rolly night on the hook. This idea of spending more time at anchor seemed like a foolhardy and unachievable one at best.

Pragmatism only just overtaking me being furious with myself, we set off early on Sunday back to the by now familiar Trapani. Our last visit here was in a violent Scirocco with 62 knot winds raging for days. This time the only thing raging was me at my own idiocy. A generalisation I know, but a hallmark of people you get to meet in these parts, is that they are ever friendly and helpful. We were soon in very good hands and Rocko was lifted at a boat yard in the harbour to reveal a damaged rudder albeit not as damaged as my ego.	Familiar views north of the Trapani peninsular
Like new again	We were assured that the repair would be done by the end of the week and allowing for some scepticism around that timing, I thought we would be back on track to get to Sardinia on time. Well, true to their word we were back in the water on Friday and ready to leave on Saturday. I don't know of many boatyards where the owner produces his own olive oil and gives you a complimentary bottle with the bill.  It is a very effective way of taking your mind of the damage for a minute or two.
Instead of trying to be all smarty pants about the crossing and get 12 miles closer by anchoring off one of the other Egadi islands, we decided enough of that and set off from Trapani at a civilised 7 am. For the first eight hours we had a nice 20 knot North Easterly and that, together with the current, meant we were screaming along at 9.6 knots over ground. After that died down the dolphins came out to play along with a large turtle just visible in the dusk.	Sailling into the night towards Villasimius

We got to the south eastern tip of Sardinia after 28 hours and anchored in one of the idyllic bays at Villasimius. The rocking was ridiculous though so we decided to capitulate and go into the marina for a few nights before we headed closer to Cagliari where Catherine had a flight to catch.

First glimpse of Sardegna with its pristine waters and beaches