Arrival in Cavtat

Cavtat
May 17, 2016

Despite our best laid plans to check in to Lastovo and avoid Cavtat, here we are. We left Otranto with a tail wind and ended up sailing the whole way. We got into some squally weather half way. Most of them missed us and we saw them pass by in the distance, but we were hove-to and ready for the one that hit us in the evening before dark. We don't have an anemometer, so I can't tell you the wind speed, but they were pretty high. We were heeled over to 45 degrees with just our cutter sail up and the sea was all foam and spindrift. Ten minutes of that, followed by some heavy rain, and it was over.

We didn't want to speculate on or experience getting hit with one of those squalls with a lot of sail up and, since the forecast contained gale warnings for the seas ahead, we kept moving along at 4 knots under reduced jib and cutter with our trusted Cape Horn wind pilot steering a downwind course under a half moon. The winds were light until morning when the breeze freshened and carried us towards Croatia at a quicker pace.

Twenty miles away, we started the engine because we needed to run the watermaker and refill our tanks. We would arrive in the evening in Cavtat on the Sunday and would have two options to check in since the customs office would be closed: go to Gruz where the office is open twenty four hours or anchor under a Q flag and check in to Cavtat in the morning.  Gruz was a further ten miles and the same again to the nearest anchorage, which was back in Cavtat, so we decided to make for Cavtat. I had taken the precaution of making a radio call to the Croatian coast guard to obtain permission to execute our plan and received it.

Once in Cavtat we nosed into the small cove where the customs office is to look at the possibility of staying on the customs dock since we were checking in in the morning. It was open, but were warned by some dude with a Port Authority badge who said we would likely be chased off by the police, so we went around to Tiha Bay and anchored. My instinct was to ignore him and do it anyway, but I was just too tired to follow through.

The forecast had us anticipating a Bura that night, one of the strong north easterly winds that prevail all along the coast, so I laid out the appropriate scope on our anchor. We were in 15 feet of water, so 5 times 15 is .... 45! (Did I mention that I was tired?). When the winds came at 04:00, amazingly, our anchor held in what I reckon were winds in the 30 knot range, and we rode them like that for about an hour or so. But when the winds increased again our poor 33 kg. Rocna unplugged and we found ourselves dragging across the bay. Now comes the kind of mistake that can sink your ship.

The night before, Wylie and Rosy made a pee on their poop mat, as is their nightly routine. This poop mat is a piece of artificial grass on a 10 foot tether so that we can just throw it over-board when it is soiled. Normally I leave it tied to the center cleat where it is harmlessly rinsed by the sea overnight. This night, however, feeling tired and lazy, I left it hanging off the stern cleat. As you may have guessed, when we started to drag, the engine was started and the poop mat fouled (no pun intended) the prop. Fortunately, we were still barely able to make headway into the high winds and reset our anchor - this time with a hundred feet of rode. While we sat with the engine running waiting to see if we would drag again, I reversed the prop a few times to clear it, confident that our line cutter would handle the mess.

Well, we were fine after that and the Bura died out suddenly as though it was simply switched off. We weighed anchor for by now the customs office was open and we headed out for the cove. We realised that the prop had cleared as we steamed to the customs dock. Once there, we dropped anchor for a med mooring and threw a line to one of those badge wearing dudes who passed it through a Kevlar loop in the cement. This is a nefarious plan to ensure that crew on incoming vessels don't have a cleat they can lasso and, therefore, require assistance from said dudes. Once ashore, I was informed that the fee for service rendered was 100 kunas, or about 20 Canadian dollars. I forcefully replied that it was ludicrous that I should have to pay to tie up to a dock so that I could then pay again to enter the country. And I proceeded to the customs office, where everything went swimmingly.

Upon my return to H2obo, I was greeted by two more badged dudes who not impolitely wondered at my reticence to pay their fee. For my part, I listened to their arguments concerning the need to follow Croatian laws once in Croatia and read their Port Authority signs and their badges, and asked some pertinent questions. I restated my position, in Croatian, as to the absurdity of their enterprise and that I still refused to pay. I had also tried to give a twenty kuna note to the badge man that initially took our lines as a tip, but he refused it, so back into my pocket it went. At that point, the head badge man made the grandiose gesture of offering to pay my fee for me, which I accepted, printed himself a receipt, reached into his cash purse and handed over 100 kunas to the badge man that originally took our lines. I thanked him heartily, shared a joke with another one of the 'staff', boarded H2obo and cast off.

Later Maggie and I pondered the absurdity of this incident. Imagine walking into a butcher shop, ordering a piece of meat, indignantly decrying the high price, refusing to pay and walking off with the goods.  I am pretty sure the butcher wouldn't pay my bill. So what happened and why did I get away with it at the customs dock? We are not sure and don't really care. It's all part of the game of 'fleece the tourists' and you need to know the rules.

Notwithstanding all the above here we are and we love it.

Branko