10th to 12th June - Attack of the killer squid

When we left Cagliari all was calm and pleasant.  Little did we know what would be thrown at us in the hours ahead, it would put any worries about orca attacks into perspective.  There was perhaps a bit of an omen when Emma woke up in the morning absolutely covered in mosquito bites (I was untouched but Emma is undoubtedly the more tasty one!)

Leaving Cagliari

The weather was fine with a bit of a breeze but unfortunately not in the right direction, so we put the mainsail up and motor-sailed. This was to be a long journey of 385 miles and after leaving the tip of Sardinia the first sight of land would be when we reached Ibiza. 

The first thing that went wrong was that the GPS stopped working and so we unable to use the boat’s navigation system.  While we have back-ups, none of them integrate with the boat systems and this would make navigation rather more tricky.  We also found that the AIS was not working and after some investigation discovered that the people who had installed the new unit had somehow replaced he boat GPS with the AIS GPS and there was no way to turn the boat GPS back on.  Eventually I worked out that by removing the sofa in the saloon, the AIS unit could obtain a sufficiently strong GPS signal to get a fix.  The AIS also started working again, or rather it received transmissions from other vessels but had stopped transmitting our location; which meant that no-one could track our progress. However, it did at least mean that we could resume our journey.

To add to this rather stressful situation, at the same time, Emma was making dinner and reheating some parmigiana in the microwave when the recently serviced generator packed up with an overheating problem.

Fortunately, all settled down eventually (the parmigiana was reheated in the oven) and we were able to start our night watches.  It was a stunning cloudless night with the sky free of night pollution and absolutely full of stars. 

I had returned to bed at 4am after my watch and a couple of hours later I lent over to pick up my phone when my hand fell onto something wet and slimy.  It was a squid!  In the cabin! Next to the bed!  It appeared that somehow this squid had launched itself from the sea up and through the small window into my and Emma's cabin.  Fortunately missing us both but, if it wasn’t for my quick reactions, we may have been suckered to death.

Squid attack

Unbelievable leap through this window

Later, having recovered from the shock and realising that squid are not naturally one of the world’s greatest athletes, I concluded that it was highly unlikely that this one managed to jump unaided the six feet or so from the ocean and though the window.  Suspicion soon fell on certain crew members who must have colluded with the squid in the attack.  Unfortunately, they both denied everything and Richard then proceeded to eat the evidence for breakfast.  So, we may never know. 

Destroying evidence

The sad follow up to this story is that Emma is now highly traumatised and lives in fear of what other dastardly deeds her fellow crew members may attempt in the future.  So, to take her mind of the trauma, I asked Emma to change the courtesy flags as we had now crossed the border into Spanish territory

Into Spanish territory

The following day and night passed relatively uneventfully, the only excitement being when Greg hooked what he claimed was a 50kg tuna which again managed to get away.  There were no other vessels about for most of the time and the watch routines became a little tedious.

Some people might think that the skipper is not pulling his weight during watches

On the final morning, we knew we were approaching land when a small attractive red coloured finch landed on the boat.  Despite her obvious kinship, Emma, who had previously identified a swift as a bat, was not called upon to identify which type of finch it was but Richard thought it was a rosefinch.

Fisherman at work

Then, whilst on watch, Richard spotted a tender floating a few hundred metres away.  We motored over to it fearful of what we might find inside but it turned out that the boat was empty and it looked like it has just come free from a yacht when being towed.  So, the crew performed a perfect man-overboard drill and we attached the tender to a line and towed it to the marina.

The marina staff take the recovered tender away

We eventually arrived at Marina Santa Eulalia on Ibiza at 4:30 in the afternoon.  The marina is quite big and modern with lots of shops and restaurants and looks like a good place to spend a couple of days as a base to explore Ibiza.  Somewhere that no-one on board has been to before.  I also managed to fix the AIS and so it now transmits again.