ARC Preparations

Since Caroline (nee Fatty), Jamie and Sophie left Palma I have been working through all the big items on the List that I want to attend to in Palma before we leave for the Canaries and it's been a very busy two weeks. This blog is about all the technical matters that I have been immersed in and therefore you may find me wallowing self-indulgently in subjects such as forestay tension, life rafts and oil pressure senders, without apology or brevity.

Formentera

We have returned to Espalmador, the island we first visited almost exactly a year ago on our passage from Ipswich. It is still as we remember: a low spit of sand running north to south, turning west around the bay, almost meeting the reef and creating the perfect protected anchorage with just a narrow gap that allows us in, with only a meter under the keel. Once inside the bay, the water deepens and turns aquamarine as it washes over the white sand and rolls onto the beach and beyond, the dunes covered with pampas grass sway in the warm air.

Palma at 39 degrees

Palma is hot and busy. The shopkeepers and bar owners who were so friendly and attentive over the winter are losing their cool. It has been over 30 degrees now for the past few months and the Mallorcans are calling it the hottest summer for over ten years. My taxi driver taking me to the airport fans herself and points to the temperature gauge on her dashboard which reads 39 degrees. I remind her that in February I woke up to find snow on my decks and she laughs and tells me that it was also the hardest winter in 50 years.