La Tuna

Posted on June 24, 2014 by yachtlyra

After a week of early starts we woke before eight too alert for our planned lie in, so we set to and cleaned Lyra inside and out. Even the inspirational plant had a face wash. It took most of the day, with just a short break for a scratch lunch. Supplies were running low. After our evening shower we decided to treat ourselves to a posh meal out and set off into town.

Cartagena is said to have been built on five hills. In fact steep sandstone outcrops erupt into the town at irregular intervals, so one minute you are walking down a normal street and the next you turn a corner and are met with a bald mound of dusty rock, fenced off with industrial metal panels. Each of these piles looks much the same, so it is hard to distinguish them at first. Some of the houses backing on to the hills are just facades, propped up by a framework of girders from behind, like a film set, bringing the rocky intrusions closer than you are expecting them to be. None of this makes it easy to navigate, especially if, as we did, you forget to bring the street map. Prudently we started by heading down the main thoroughfare.

It was Friday night and the place was thronged. The usual promenading was in full swing, though not at the breakneck pace they set in Cadiz. We walked along with the crush and came to a narrower turn in the street, where people were perversely lined up in plastic chairs facing in and talking. Above on a balcony a throng stood, some leaning over entering into the conversations below. At the corner with the street, where we had turned off and found our tapas bar the previous night, stood a band of middle-aged troubadours, chatting to one another. They were dressed to the hilt in black mediaeval garb; tights, breeches, belted tunics with leg of mutton sleeves (slashed to reveal red inserts), cloaks and slouchy velvet hats. Across their chests each sported a red sash with an embroidered badge. A few younger men, self conscious in their costumes stood on the fringes. Suddenly came the sound of guitars and singing ahead. The promenaders parted and a group of similarly attired men with purple sashes were marching towards us. We hastened to one side as they swept by and came to a halt opposite the balcony, facing which they ranged themselves into a half circle and struck up a ballad. They strummed and harmonised, working their way up to a big finish, at which the crowd broke into enthusiastic applause. After a couple of numbers some of them wandered over and struck up conversations with the red lot. There was an aura of a Morris meet about the whole thing.

We moved on, wandered about a lot, kept coming across barren hillsides and failed to find a restaurant posher than a tapas bar. Dispirited we pushed our way back through the crowds and arrived at the performance area in time for another big finish, this one with a soloist arms wide holding a Three Tenors note. He threw is head back to rapturous applause. We sneaked by them and finally up a side street spotted La Tagliatella, definitely a restaurante, with its Arte Deco interior and Italian menu. We shared a salad and ordered bread, then I had pasta with pesto and John had lasagne, though we probably should have shared one pasta dish as the portions were huge and the bread turned out to be sticky fingers of different flavoured focaccia. It all tasted delicious, we hope to take Lara back there when she arrives. A waitress explained that the troubadours are groups called Tuna, which form in University and meet up afterwards to perform together. Each group represents one University town, with its name embroidered on the beca, or sash. She knew nothing about the nights revels; they may have been connected to the coronation of the new Spanish king, we were just lucky to run across them.

Posted in Roman remains, sight seeing | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Viva Biodramina

Posted on June 24, 2014 by yachtlyra

We have left the Costa del Sol behind and have embarked on the Costa Blanca, where so far there has been less high-rise tourist development. It is named for its’ light grey coastal rock, glowing white in the bright sunlight, but this brilliance has now been upstaged by what look like fields of snow, lying in terraces climbing the foothills. These slabs of white are actually sheets of very heavy-duty plastic used as greenhouses to grow salad crops hydroponically. The pilot book warns gales can blow them into the sea and they should be watched out for. About what to do on encountering a hundred metre sheet of polythene it does not say. So far they all look pretty secure.

Costa Blanca

Our plan for the week was to make short hops every day, rather than long hauls with rests in between. Our first step from Almerimar to Agua Dulce, was indeed a mere twenty miles, but after that the plan was scuppered by the weather and we made two long passages under engine, travelling forty eight miles to Garrucha and then forty three from there to Cartagena. All of this passed off admirably well thanks to my new find, Biodramina tablets, bought from a pharmacy in Almerimar. The chemist solemnly asked if we wanted tablets with or without caffeine. He spoke in Spanish, but at the word caffeine the gist became clear to me and seemed an excellent idea. I am now cured. I do not feel sick and neither do I fall asleep all over the place. Although two drugs are battling for control inside me, I feel normal.

Granted, on the first passage to Garrucha the sea was like a millpond, with no wind at all. It was why we decided to do a long trip and make some progress under engine. The engine ended up running for longer than we had bargained for, because when we arrived at the marina in Garrucha, the reception pontoon and the fuel point were both full. John idled round the tiny harbour waiting for one of the four boats to move on, but none did. He radioed the control tower in front of us twice; there was no response. As we made a second pass a marinera came out and called across asking if we wanted fuel and I was able to explain we had reserved a berth for the night. He disappeared. Too clever by half, I should have just said yes. On our third slow turn around a Scot from a nearby boat hailed us and told us the boats on the reception pontoon had been there for hours. John called the marina from his mobile phone and someone answered straight away. They professed not to know where we were; John suggested they look out of the window and confirmed we had reserved a berth. They would look into it. A man came out of the building with the marinera and stood pointing at us. We were called up on the radio, “Boat in the harbour, come in please”, and a man directed us to look on our left for his colleague, who was waiting for us to go stern to. John spotted him and started reversing; I threaded the lines round the stern ready. The first lazy line business went much better than our previous effort, as John came and took it from me walked it down the starboard side and tied it on tight. After that matters descended into farce as the marinera passed us a second lazy line only for John discover, after threading it all the way along Lyra, that it was already fastened to the boat on our port side. The rope was disgusting and stank, John was only too glad to drop it and borrow my gloves. The marinera passed a different line along the starboard side; John worked it hand over gruesome hand to find it was attached to our starboard neighbour. The marinera pulled up yet another line, which somehow turned out to be the other end of the rope tied to the same boat. At this we both grimaced, said we would be fine overnight with just one line on and thankfully turned the engine off. John was filthy and not at all happy about what with. Before setting off with the documents he had a shower and I washed his clothes, twice.

Later we went out for a pre dinner drink and had the most magnificent gin and tonic in the world. The bar not only offered a wide range of gins, it had a list of over eight different tonic waters. Unthinkingly we had just ordered gin and tonic. On taking our order the barman brought out a tall round table and set it next to where we sat, then he disappeared for ages. He returned with a tray on which rattled a bottle of London Gin, two bottles of Schweppes tonic and two very large wine glasses and placed it on the table. In each of the fogged glasses a long twist of lemon wound its way through huge ice cubes, a separate slice of lemon angled away from it and juniper berries were scattered artistically throughout. He poured in a hefty measure of gin and then sent the tonic down the twisted stem of a long silver spoon. It smoked as it hit the ice. I should have taken a photograph. Peanut LoverWe were distracted by the simultaneous arrival of a very sweet little white dog, which sat quietly letting John tickle its ears until our bowl of peanuts was empty. It seemed to divine this by strange means, because we did not feed it, but just as the last nut was gone the dog trotted back inside.

The journey from Garrucha to Cartagena was a different kettle of fish altogether and proved the worth of my new tablets. The pilot book had advised that our intended intermediary port, Aguilas, was uncomfortable in strong north easterlies, which exactly what had been forecast. Having had our fill of tossing about in rocky harbours, we decided to make straight across the bay for Cartagena. Although this time plenty of wind was predicted it was due to be on our nose and, as it was already going to be a long days sail without tacking back and forth through the wind, we decided to motor again. What we had not anticipated, after such a calm sea the day before, was the amount of steep chop we would encounter. John went to put the mainsail out to steady us, only to find it jammed inside the mast. Not good news, but nothing to be done unless we wanted to turn back, so we were definitely motoring all day. Up and down we crashed for seven hours, but for once I was able to agree with John that it was unpleasant, rather than staring back at him glassy eyed, thinking it was barely to be endured. When the nose dived into the sea, sending foam churning up the foredeck as it reared back up, I was able to think ‘that was a big one’, rather than breaking into a mental chorus of Abide With Me.

On our arrival at Cartagena we had ropes ready for any possible form of mooring, as it is a big marina with various options. This time our radio call was answered and a marinera stood waving us in. We were going stern to, not easy to do in a crosswind. This time I took one lazy line and John the other, but mine was the windward line and I did not manage to tighten it enough, so we ended up too near the quay and a bit skewed. The mariners shrugged and suggested we could tighten the line when the wind died down, we decided to agree with him and sort ourselves out after he had gone. This cheered him up immensely and his English became much more fluent, though distractingly reminiscent of the gendarme in Allo Allo. He handed over some paperwork and bounded away. After puzzling the problem over John came up with the idea of using the bow thruster. This is a push button device that sucks water of through a hole on one side of the bows to send it as a jet out of a hole on the other side. This pushes the front firmly in the opposite direction. I pushed the appropriate button, John pulled on the lazy line and after a few thrusts we were all squared up and a good distance from the pontoon. We celebrated our arrival by going out and finding a tapas bar to watch the big England match. The tapas was excellent and the waiters very

Posted in Sailing | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Almerimar

Posted on June 17, 2014 by yachtlyra

Despite its huge size the visitor berths of the marina at Benalmadena are open to weather from the west. All the time we stayed there the wind was in the west. Moving to the Marina del Este we therefore breathed a sigh of relief. Marina del Este is open to weather from the East. Even in a slight sea sends a Mexican wave of surge sweeping round the North shore, along under the restaurant. Of course as soon as we moved there the wind turned round and we had a week of easterlies. Worse still, for ourselves and everyone round about, our mast developed an intermittent creak as Lyra swayed from side to side in this swell. John tried tightening and loosening lines, greasing bearings and swearing at it, but nothing worked for more than a few sways. At night we moved from laying awake in the stern, where the rocking was worse and the slosh of water louder, to the bow, where it was hotter and we had the mast to listen to and back again. Of course on our overnight jaunts ashore we enjoyed an excellent nights sleep, which was just as well. Any hope that the night before we moved on would be a calm one proved false. We set off to Almerimar bleary eyed and jaded.

Dawn light

Just out of harbour John spotted a dolphin slowly grazing the surface a couple of times up ahead, but we think it was still asleep, just coming up for air, then back down to the land of nod. We could both have joined it. There were a few lobster pots to slalom and then we were out into a very choppy sea with no wind and what there was right on the nose. John put the mainsail out to steady us, but I began to feel queasy. He put the sails out to see if the easier motion would help. This made us travel more slowly, which was easier, but I still felt grim. I had taken our last Stugeron tablet and it proved not enough to make me feel better in the chop, but in my tired state still made me sleepy. I lay down on deck as lying down brings instant relief, but then could not stay awake.

When I woke up we were behind a smaller yacht, this one under engine. John said it had come up on our inside and decided to take in the headsail and put the engine on to make some progress. This was good news. We soon passed the other boat and thrashed through the sea. At some point the wind came up and we started sailing again, which was more peaceful than having the engine throbbing. I think John enjoyed the sail, but even he could not face anything to eat. I just wanted it to be over. We arrived at Almerimar glad to be out of the tossing waves. It is another big marina and we were allocated a berth well inside it, thoughtfully near the services. It is about a third the price of the places we have stayed recently.

Our stern to mooring was bewildering. We were probably not taking things in very well as we were tired. I passed the marinera our stern lines one at a time and he gave me the lazy line. A lazy line is nothing of the sort. It is designed to be used instead of dropping anchour to hold the bow, when going stern to. Basically it is a length of rope tied at one end to a whacking great lump of concrete, sunk in the water opposite the berth and at the other to a thinner line fastened to the quay. When you are handed the narrow line you have run along the side of your boat drawing it up, till you can take hold of the thick rope, you then carry on hand over hand with this to the bows. It is usually covered in slime and molluscs, but eventually you reach a clearer section that has been tied to other boats and you wrap this round your own cleat at the bow. It is important to pull hard, so the line between concrete and boat is taut, so the boat is held firmly. I had done all this, but the marinera was not happy it was tight enough, so John went to have a pull. This is normal. Then came the confusion, he seemed to be saying we were too far from the quay, so John let out the lazy line a bit. No that was not it “Forte, Forte” he insisted, so John pulled it tight again. Still no good. We were lying at an angle. They tied up the stern lines and he came on board. He tried to tighten John’s line and could not move it. He was not happy. He caught up another lazy line and worked it to the front of the boat, but it was on the wrong side, so he tried a third. John and he wound it round the bow and fastened it to the other front cleat, we now had two lines crossed beneath us and were going nowhere. I thanked him and we enjoyed an excellent nights sleep.

 

 

Posted in Sailing | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Nessun Dorma but Us

Posted on June 15, 2014 by yachtlyra

We are now much in sympathy with one another, the Spanish and ourselves. They assert that they always lose the first match and then come good, citing the Swiss. We could say that we usually enter the final match needing an algorithm capable of solving the riddles of String Theory, in order to work out all the permutations by which we might still qualify. We all know both teams could on the way home early. The Captain is very bleak about it all.

When we arrived back yesterday, David’s Restaurant was festooned in a multitude of flags and with red bunting, featuring the Spanish team, hands on hearts, promoting beer. A big Union Jack was flying in front of our berth. We commiserated with them on their result and ate in the restaurant watching Uruguay go down to Costa Rica, not great news either. David came round giving out red hats with yellow sashes and a waiter took our photo, threatening FaceBook. Apparently the Dutch had all sported the hats the previous evening. None of the staff had the stomach to stay open till twelve for the England match, so we retired. The match was not broadcast on normal Spanish TV and our own BBC would not let us even listen to the commentary online, a scandalous treatment of the license payer. We called home on Facetime and they were wearing an assortment of old England shirts, all set for a late night. The Captain was distraught. I started to relay comments from Twitter, but he found that too stressful to bear, so we went to bed and slept through it all. Probably for the best given how it turned out.

We woke to the dismal news of our defeat and it rather put the cob on Father’s Day, though John cheered up talking to the girls and opening his present long distance. This afternoon we went to the beach for a swim, but the water was icy and suddenly the surf was up. A man of our age and natural agility came back from a swim, to be caught by a wave, go down and roll around for some time floundering to stand back up again. Retiring to the bar seemed the better part of valour.

PS For anyone interested, with the hotel broadband I was able to load up photos from before Gibraltar and insert a post about the monkeys that must have failed to load fully before.

Posted in Family | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

The Alhambra

Posted on June 15, 2014 by yachtlyra

We had been unable to reserve tickets online for our visit, so cautioned by stories of them not always being available on the day, we booked to go on a morning tour. An open topped bus collected us from the hotel. We had to wait for the inevitable latecomers before being driven up the hill to the palace. In the car park we joined a chaos of other punters, being separated into groups according to language. We found ourselves with an Australian couple from Adelaide and one from California and were all given radio receivers and earpieces. Pooling our efforts we managed to turn them on, but each had a different channel, which could not be changed. None of them seemed to work. The Australian lady led us all to join a larger group of English speakers. We could see individuals buying tickets at the office and began to think we had made a big mistake. Then our guide, a slight dark haired man called Antonio, explained how to change the channels and we were up and running on channel 16. He spoke quietly in my ear in a strangely familiar accented English, not always easy to follow, but pleasant to listen to. Some way round the tour I realised his speech had the exact rhythm, emphasis and phrasing as that of Francesco da Mosto. In the end the tour was probably a good idea, our guide manoeuvred us gently around the various palaces and towers keeping to the entrance timings and making sure we missed nothing. The nature of the radio system allowed me to wander off taking photographs, while still listening to him, I just had to keep an eye out for John, who hung back for me if I drifted too far behind. The sweep of people moving through grew greater as the day progressed, so I think on our own we would have still been carried through by the tide and would certainly have lost our orientation. The Alhambra is a complex of palaces and archaeological sites spanning centuries and abrupt changes in ideology. I particularly enjoyed the gardens with their brimming pools, arcing fountains, and the jewelled planting set off by shaped hedges, low edging myrtles, and tall, sculpted conifers, modern additions representing the walls of buildings now lost. Existing low walls were clothed in a narrowly clipped jasmine and the fragrance poured down the hill, mingled with the even more heady scent of gigantic waxy magnolias.

There was a bewildering amount to see and surprises within every structure. The plain fortress exteriors hid sumptuous inner courts, where an extravagance of water was displayed to epitomised wealth the of one time desert people. Elaborate filigree patterns and Arab script embellish the interior walls and looking up, the stylised stalagmites encrusting the domed ceilings, are like gazing up into the obsessive work of insects. The display of wealth was tactfully hidden away from the gaze of the taxpayers on the plain below, but designed to overwhelm visiting dignitaries, according to our guide. Perhaps it inspired the renaissance architects, as the middle of the square Catholic palace is a surprising double-tiered cylinder of columns, wide open to the sky, with echoes of the Pantheon in Rome. A perfect acoustic circle, the space reverberated with the sight and sounds of myriads of swallows swooping around the void and diving up into the plaster ceilings.

This building literally bit into the early Moorish Palace, which we visited near the end of our tour. The vast reflecting pool of the Court of Myrtles still exuded its’ aura of calm, but the splendour of the Lion Courtyard was lost in a dazzling glare of light and hoards of people taking ‘Selfies’ in front of the fountain. On our visit all of the twelve Lions were spouting water, hiding the genius of the original engineering, where each would pour for an hour, rendering the fountain a water clock to those who took note. Inside a newly opened pavilion at one end of the courtyard a lady on a scaffold was busy holding forth about the restoration work she was on with, at the rate she was going this looks set to be prolonged.

Our tour came to an end with a look inside a couple of towers, tall, red and plain with militaristic window slits from the outside, elaborate decoration domed ceilings and multiple archways within. The last even contained a fountain, “ A whole palace within a simple tower,” intoned Antonio in his best Francesco. He told us the tour was at an end, the workout had been an extra, for free; for those in need of revival he recommended a local beer, called Alhambra, brewed specially for the purpose. We opted to walk back, rather than take the bus, and soon tracked some down and I can confirm his claim. That evening we ate out in the courtyard of a onetime convent. We sat in the cloisters looking out on a pebbled square with orange trees in pots and a bubbling fountain. Tastefully hidden in one corner, under the cloisters, but fortuitously directly opposite John, was a television tuned into the football. Spain was to play the Netherlands. The waiters cut their eyes to the screen each time they passed by. At first all was well, a clenched fist of subdued celebration as Spain scored first and sadly, for them, only once. An equaliser just before half time was, as it often is, the prophet of doom. We thought about them all sat outside David’s Restaurant watching the unfolding nightmare on their new big screen and felt for them. As it turned out the restaurant had been packed with increasingly happy Dutch.

Posted in sight seeing | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Granada

Posted on June 14, 2014 by yachtlyra

There are still pockets of snow clinging to the shadows of the Sierra Nevada Mountains; below in Granada the palm trees sway and jasmine perfumes the air. I have wanted to go to Granada ever since my Grandma used to play Frankie Laine, singing about falling under its spell. Admittedly at the time I thought it as somewhere along the Mexico – Texas border. John and I travelled there by bus, through a rugged landscape with boiling green rivers crossed by high bridges, and arrived in time to sit watching the late sun draw shadows on the Alhambra Palace, also feted in song and now part of my own memories.

It was another mini break away from Lyra. This time our hotel was up a grade and included a TV in the room. At the reception desk the girl checking us in gave us a map and showed us where the Alhambra was and also the Albaicin area from which to view it. “ You will need to take a taxi or a bus” she said, “It is very steep”. I could have told her that, given enough time and a couple of ibuprofen, I had been known to manage steep and the Captain was a veteran of the Coast to Coast path, one of the famed Magnificent Seven Snow Whites. Fearing not enough would be lost in translation I refrained and we set out along the flat and toured the environs of the Cathedral. There were many shops and stalls selling teas and spices in fragrant, arrayed open baskets. Wandering accordionists were rife. When we finally found the front door to the Cathedral it was shut for siesta, so we retired to a café in the square, spraying a fine mist of water from narrow tubing installed over the heads of the customers. Occasionally big drips would fall. The waitress wore a hat. The broad beans and ham tapas was excellent though.

Refreshed we headed for the hill. My unpaid tour guide had recommended sitting with a drink in the Albaicin, looking out over to the Alhambra with the mountains behind. Up we climbed, though an impressive red brick arch and up some intriguing steps. We soon had magnificent views over the town and could see the Cathedral far below. We entered a network of small streets, still climbing and finally came to a main road, round the next corner there was the Alhambra spread out below us. Magnificent. In our eagerness we had actually climbed higher then we needed, but it was well worth it for the spectacle.

We wound back down following signs for the monument, went through more arched gateways, past a colourful market and into a square with cafes. Along a low wall, before what looked like the edge of a precipice, sat a trio of young men one playing guitar, one clapping out a rhythm and all three singing. They drew us forward and there was the palace again, over on the opposite hill. The low wall actually ran alongside a road and opposite were restaurants and bars with terraces overlooking the view. We wound quickly through the hippy market on the square, down and across the road and into one of them. All the sofas were occupied, but we found a table and had Moroccan mint tea and pastries overlooking the view. The tea was poured from a height into glasses from bulbous in silver teapots with tiny feet and long spouts. The pastries were small biscuits and cubes of brownie too rich and gooey to bite. It was everything I had imagined, watching the low sun was catching the terracotta walls and making them glow.

All along the battlements tiny bright specs of people walked in a beaded line. Tomorrow that would be us.

 

Posted in sight seeing | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Under and Up

Posted on June 13, 2014 by yachtlyra

As we came in to moor John had a nasty moment when reverse gear would not engage. Rapid working of the lever while revving hard sorted it out, but he was concerned something was round the propeller shaft. The beautiful clear water of the harbour here persuaded him it would be a good idea to dive down to have a look. Neither of us relished the idea, so both vied to be the one to do it. Then John spotted the dive school offices at the side of the restaurant and wandered over to have a word with them. The upshot being, yes they could carry out a survey, provided we booked through the marina office. A man would be along between diving trips. We sat on the restaurant terrace overlooking Lyra with a coffee and a frogman arrived ten minutes later. In he jumped, spat in his mask and disappeared with a flick of his odd coloured flippers. Moments later he resurfaced holding an astonishingly long snake of black and white rope and a smaller piece of leather chord. He suggested we could take them home for our Christmas tree, but John gratefully dumped them straight in the bin. Relieved of the need to exert ourselves in the water, we decided to walk up to the lighthouse we could see at the top of the cliffs.

On family days out a special treat was to go to Lincoln market. As we wound past the racetrack part of the fun was to spot the Cathedral move from one side of the road to the other. The lighthouse employed similar trickery on our walk there. At first it seemed easy, we walked to the end of the harbour, along the road to the beach and up a steep concrete path, leading through the scrub to some steps climbing the hill below the lighthouse. Just as the sloped eased into road past a development of apartments there was a locked gate and a high metal fence. Back down the hill we trudged, past the beach again to tackle the same hill using the winding road. There was only a narrow pavement on one side, so we went in single file climbing back up the steep hairpins, this time without the shade of the scrubby trees. John walked in front, thoughtfully pointing out excrement to me as he went. Eventually we reached a sharp right hand bend, there was a dead end signposted to the left, but the mast from the lighthouse seemed to be to the right, so we followed the main road. We began to level off. At the summit sat the Best Alcazar Hotel, which boasted all one could wish for including its own skittle alley. Heading down from this we could see the sea at the other side of the point starting to open up before us. We had missed the lighthouse. Back we went, past the hotel and to the dead end we had ignored earlier. Up through the trees we hiked until we reached another big gate, also locked. Beside the gate a rough dirt track scrambled upwards in an unofficial looking manner. We debated following it, but given that we knew the lighthouse stood on the edge of a precipice, decided against it. Back down the hill, feeling like the Grand Old Duke of York and his men. There was the sodding lighthouse, much further over to the left than we thought and on a different hill. Back at the beach we stopped under the umbrellas for a beer.

Oddly there were sparrows and pigeons on the beech. One pigeon was walking about with all its feathers fluffed out, turning tight circles and generally preening, like a teenager practicing dance moves in front of a mirror. Eventually it spotted a couple of females and ran over to go through its routine, which they studiously chose to ignore, turning pointedly away. They were still patrolling up and down as we left.

That evening we walked to the far end of the restaurant for a change of scenery. David and all of his waiting staff were stood around as two of them wrestled to hand a gigantic flat screen TV on a bracket outside the restaurant. David, who is a stocky individual, slightly shorter than myself with a shock of silver hair and an impressive moustache, came over to us. He informed us he was Andalusian, his team, Spain, were in Brazil, we all nodded solemnly at each other. John and I sat and watched proceedings. One of them broke off to take our order and bring us complimentary tapas. Once the set was hung to the satisfaction of David, a dangling arrangement of flex was installed to link it with the power inside and on it came. All five waiters stood looking up at the TV, taking turns to point the remote control at the screen and press buttons. A cooking program came on to much groaning and swapping of the remote. I guess if you work in a restaurant day and night it’s not much of a thrill to see cooking on the telly. One chap seemed to know what he was doing, but kept being hampered by the others, for whom things were not happening fast enough. Time and again one of them would take over the controller and interrupt the tuning process, setting it all back to the beginning. Suddenly, beside me, John shouted, “English, English!” as the screen gave a choice of language. They all turned, laughed and turned back, stepping closer together. Then came a moment of fleeting excitement, the auto-tune was finally cycling through the stations and the desired channel appeared to much cheering, rapidly curtailed as the tuning moved on. Finally it was working to everyone’s satisfaction, at which point they turned it off, lifted it from the bracket and took it back inside.

Posted in Boat problems, sight seeing, Walking | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Moving On

Posted on June 11, 2014 by yachtlyra

Although the marina development at Benalmadena is huge and although we were tucked in round the back of a solid pontoon, the effect of swell from the west sets the boats rocking there. For most of our stay the wind was from the west and it is the natural direction of the swell coming through from Gibraltar. The masts opposite us on the seaward side swayed together alarmingly, we were glad we had motor boats either side, even though they wallowed around more than Lyra and kept jostling us. We grew fed up with the constant protest from squashed fenders. One night in particular was like sleeping in a washing machine, or rather trying to. Finally the wind has dropped and we have been able to set off for our next port of call, the Marina del Este outside Almunecar. There is a reef right outside the marina here, with a tiny post marking it ambiguously. Consequently boats leaving the marina either pass it close to shore or turn sharply to port to avoid it. We had grown used to the sight of masts travelling along behind the marina wall, like scenery in an old fashioned theatre. When our turn to leave came, we seemed to strike out for open sea, because we headed straight across the bay and the opposite side was lost in mist. It proved to be an odd day for weather.

First the wind was behind us and strong enough to sail with just the jib, which John planned to let out once we were clear of the reef. At this point the wind dropped to nothing, so we carried on under engine. At first we rolled with the swell, but once clear of the coastline the sea smoothed off, nearly to the point of being glassy. The early morning mist did not burn off, but hung around far enough away for us to have not realized the effect on visibility had it not been for the targets on the AIS screen, we could not see. We did spot a small fishing boat without a signal and just ahead of it dolphin circling, rounding up all the fish. Apart from our engine all was quiet. We had a glancing visit from a couple of big dolphin and John put the music on until visibility worsened, so we turned the music off and the radar on. The screen was crazed with pink scratches to port, rain. Then big plops of rain began to pit the sea around us and splatter on the deck. We huddled under the spray hood, leaving the autopilot to it, as the sporadic drops turned into a steady thrum. Then the rain cleared and we sat waiting for the deck to dry in the wind, which was now right on our nose and was blowing the sea up into chop. We could now make out majestic shadows of mountains in the mist and hoped there would be enough shelter as we rounded the cape to put out ropes and fenders. There was and we nosed into through the harbour wall and entered paradise, bathed in sunshine, with the birds singing.

Puerto Este Marina

The Marina del Este is expensive, but the setting is beautiful. We are moored looking at a cliff of rock with red hibiscus scrambling up the face and palm trees fringing the edges. The marina has been formed by building a seawall either side of this dramatic intrusion, with a narrow entrance at the top eastern edge. We can step off the boat and straight into  David’s Restaurant and did so as soon as we had cleaned ourselves up. We ordered beer, small and large, which they brought along with a plate of complimentary ham sandwiches garnished with olives and wedges of tomato. This was particularly generous as David’s is the only restaurant here. We sat drinking in the lovely view and watching sparrows hop about our rigging. We chatted to the owner of the berth next to ours, who runs a business taking trips out on a catamaran, Optimist of London. He reckons this is the most beautiful stretch of the Spanish coastline and it has certainly been in our experience so far.

People are also as kind as they were in the Rias. We ate in the restaurant that evening and were given a complimentary starter, after which we shared a very fresh bream and were given a couple of Magnum Moments with our coffees. I am afraid they are the kind of moments that settle on the hips for a lifetime. Later we sat out on deck and the restaurant though close was reassuringly quiet. This is the best place we have stayed so far this year.

 

Posted in sight seeing | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Cordoba

Posted on June 11, 2014 by yachtlyra

We have to thank Michael Portillo and his railway journeys program for inspiring many of our excursions into the Spanish interior; we may otherwise never have realized Cordoba was within our scope. As it is, we set off on the fast train from Malaga to Madrid and ours was the first stop after less than an hour. The train was amazingly smooth and quiet, with a movie showing on drop down screens for those going all the way. We hardly seemed to have settled down before we were arriving.

The old part of Cordoba nestles beside the Guadalquivir River amongst the newer high rise, but with sufficient leafy greenery to screen it. The river is wide and dirty green. The lower reaches are heavily silted, as the water has at one time been drawn off to power a mill on one side and a now derelict waterwheel on the other. Long islands have formed between the old culverts, lush with long grass, bushes and a feathery medley of trees. The warm sandstones of the cathedral and fortified walls rise from the verdure. Apparently the name Cordoba means river or hill in Old Iberian, which seem contradictory terms until you have seen the city. From the foot of the cathedral the many arched Roman bridge, strong as a dam, stretches majestically across into the modern highway, where coaches are beginning to disgorge. In the early morning light, the scene has aspects of a Manet painting.

Our taxi from the station took us right to the foot of the cathedral wall, where the usual horse and carriages queued in the shade. In pulling in the taxi cut up a very smart open top wedding car, to the obvious annoyance of a pretty blonde bride. It was a Saturday and later on the riverbanks were dotted with brides posing for photographs. We did not see our particular blonde, but her chauffeur was happily letting other groups of young women climb in and out of the car to have their pictures taken. That was after we had been to the cathedral, our first port of call. Entrance was first into a large courtyard planted with orange trees and heady with the smell of their blossom. At one time the courtyard was planted with palms, echoing the structure of the candy striped forest of stone arches within. At this time the cathedral was a mosque and I think the orange trees have been planted where fountains once flowed, using the rills between them as irrigation channels. There are still a few palms and several spires of narrow junipers and a large rectangular fountain by which was a relatively short queue for tickets. Armed with these we set off to the opposite corner and entered the remains of the mosque.

Catholic Center

It is spectacular, a fractal celebration of the strength and beauty of the round arch. Single, double and scalloped arches with stonework in elegant pink and cream riding on impossibly slender columns form a mesmerising lattice. It seems to go on and on, tempting one to take photo after photo, with its changing aspects and repeated motif. Sadly this is not the case. In the middle of all this style sits a shiny white thirteenth century Roman Catholic cathedral. It is a crying shame; even the person responsible apparently came to have doubts. There had been a cathedral predating the mosque, but in reinstating it by removing the dome of the mosque and installing alter, choir and all the paraphernalia of Catholic practice a thing of charm and grace has been muddied. Images of the cathedral interior make a concerted effort to not show the Christian architecture; in much the way I avoid having Hope Valley Cement Works intrude into my pictures of Derbyshire. Unfortunately in both instances the deed has been done. Had it still been a mosque I would not have been allowed inside to see.

After the cathedral we wandered over the bridge and back and toured another palace, the Alcazar de los Reyes Cristiano along the riverbank. The Christian Rulers lived in more Spartan elegance than their place of worship, with white walls and arched ceilings of exposed stonework. The gardens were extensive, starting with Moorish water gardens and extending to a mini Versailles, with some Lord of the Rings statuary.

After that we wandered through the Jewish quarter, where narrow streets draped in geraniums offer views into intimate flower filled courtyards often with a splashing fountain. We ate lunch in one. The waiters seemed strangely aloof and rather clumsy, banging plates down as though the table had jumped towards them. Dinner in a tapas bar in the Jewish quarter was the same, but the manner was not intended to be at all unfriendly. At the end of our meal, our waiter asked where we came from and presented us with a plate piped with jam, and broke into a smile.

photo 5

Posted in sight seeing | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Green Parrots

Posted on June 9, 2014 by yachtlyra

Today was a rest from railway tourism. We set about our chores, boat cleaning and laundrey. All the time we have been here we have seen no sign of the advertised laundrey room, neither was it marked on our site map. It seemed prudent to go unburdened to the marina office to ask for directions. On our way there we spotted a small flock of green parrots bathing in a puddle, left by the sprinkler system.

photo 1

They looked very young, all fluffed up preening. I had not brought the camera, but John was able to take a couple of shots with his phone, before they darted off, up to the top of the palm trees with flashes of fluorescent wing. There they cawed about us in protest. Now we keep an eye out for them, and though they are well camouflaged in the palm trees, where we realise they have sprawling grass nests. They are so noisy we usually spot them.

photo 3

The laundrette turned out to be about as far away from the boat as possible in this huge marina. We marched past the ranks of restaurant callers with our dirty washing big bags, one or two still tried to persuade us to stop for a drink all the same. We walked all the way round, across the car park on the other side and finally to the laundrey room, filled three big machines and went to the diving bar next door for a coffee. Divers like very strong coffee. Buzzing, we decided to use up some of our accumulating shrapnel on the tumble dryers, thus enabling the boat cleaning to commence straight away on our return. I went to transfer the goods and John ordered us lunch and we sat amongst the old guys eating salad and small fried fish.

Posted in Wild life | Tagged | Leave a comment