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| Tiha harbour, Cavtat |
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| Street in Cavtat |
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| Crisp apple strudel |
We were hanging around waiting for our friends Linda and Eveleen to join us for a few days of cruising. Neither of them have ever done that before, so they were looking forward to the experience. The first night they spent with us happened to be the first night of three that we would have Boras. These are katabatic winds that blow down from the mountains, at times with a determined ferocity. Farther north, Boras are known to reach hurricane force; however, we would only see winds in the 25 to 35 knot range. The wind piped up in the evening and after watching the boat track a regular arc on our chartplotter, I felt confident that our anchor was holding, and I went to sleep. Our cruising guide reports the holding in this anchorage (U Tiha) to be "unreliable", and so it proved to be.
At around 3 am I awoke. I have become attuned to sounds, specifically when sounds change, and I think what woke me up was the sound of waves breaking on the shore. We had dragged and were now much too close to land to be comfortable, so I woke up Maggie and we reanchored and everything went smoothly. Apart from the unreliable holding, the lesson to be learned from that experience is to occasionally reset your anchor because after a week of swinging the chain could foul the anchor and pop it out or weaken its set.
The next day we moved to another anchorage in front of Srebreno/Mlini, two little towns beside each other only a couple of miles from Cavtat that offered better shelter from Boras and pleasant scenery. Incidently, the Boras seem to come up at night and during the day they recede; strong Boras can blow continually, though, for a few days. The next night the Bora blew again but we held fast without incident. However, a nearby mountain was struck by lightning that started a fire. Over the next two days, water bombers worked to put out the fire. They put on quite a show a they buzzed us to scoop up seawater nearby. For them it's a race against sunset because they don't operate at night during which time the Bora winds fan the flames anew, which is what happened on the third night of the Boras.
After the second night we reanchored because we swung too close to some mooring buoys. I swam over to check the set but couldn't see the anchor in the thick weeds. We did set the anchor by reversing on it with 1/2 maximum revs of the engine, so I wasn't too worried about the Bora expected that night. But I had another lesson to learn. That third night, I awoke again in the middle of the night just before the anchor alarm went off and realised that we had dragged. Now because we have such a heavy anchor and all-chain rode, even in 30 knots of wind we don't drag that quickly, so we have time to react. We reanchored and held fast. The new lesson learned was to always set your anchor against the direction of the strongest expected winds, or check the set by backing down on it before going to sleep. This way, you don't have to rely on the anchor resetting itself - in our case in thick weeds - when the wind shifts. I suppose experienced cruisers know all this stuff, but I learn that fire is hot by sticking my hand in it.
On day four, we headed up to Trstenik, another small resort town 40 miles up the coast. On the way we stopped at the Orsan Yacht Club's fuel dock. This is the only one around for miles, so it gets really busy and you have to be prepared to wait and to muscle your way in if someone tries to get in ahead of their turn. We were early and didn't have to wait too long. We managed to sail for a couple of hours under head sail alone in following winds and made 5 knots - thanks to the hull scraping. We reached Trstenik in good time and dropped anchor in it's tiny harbour while my cousin and his wife and two children waved to us from shore.
Once the anchor was set, I swam to shore to be greeted warmly by my kin. This was the first time in four years that I had seen them and only the fourth time in my life, but it felt good. My girls had stayed on the boat because the day was long and we were too lazy to mount the outboard engine onto the dinghy. I had a couple of beers with Branko (there are a lot of us in Croatia), his wife Sonia, Dora and Domago, and we made plans to all meet for breakfast at their rental apartment.
The next morning we were served home-made smoked sausages and bacon, home-grown eggs and vegetables and delicious white wine made from grapes grown on my cousin's vineyard. We didn't need to eat again during the whole day that we spent on the beach. We spent a pleasant day getting better acquainted and Maggie got along particularly well with little Dora. They were teaching each other their own language and Dora wanted Maggie to go swimming at least once every hour. In the evening we had a barbecue (civapcici again) together and drank a lot of my cousin's excellent wine.
I have to give Maggie, Linda and Evelene a lot of credit for being so patient with my insufficient translations over the course of that day. I hope they had as much fun as I did nevertheless.
Today we will head back down the coast towards Cavtat taking a couple of days to get there. On Friday, Linda and Evelene leave and move on to visit Rome and we will miss them. Maggie and I made plans for a long visit with the family this winter in their hometown of Palesnik, which is also where my mother grew up.
All in all, it was a wonderful time, a fantastic milestone passed, and Croatia is easily surpassing our low expectations.
Branko
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