Tom
October 10, 2008, Port d'Aiguadolç, Sitges

Excellent job by the mechanics of Nautica Emilio. The new Volvo Penta D1-30 is already installed! Looks nice. Now it only needs to be connected to the fuel tank , batteries and to the small electronic control panel that's being installed.
Iris being hauled out of the water, today I've been training my arms sanding the hull and giving it a first coat of bottom paint.

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Tom
October 8, 2008, Port d'Aiguadolç, Sitges

This afternoon I passed by the shipyard of the Aiguadolç marina in Sitges to see how the repowering job on Iris was going. Iris had been hauled out on Monday, the old, rusty Volvo Penta 2002 had been removed and the mechanics were just finishing the building of a new tailored fiberglass mount to accomodate the new D1-30.

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Tom
September 20, 2008, Port d'Aiguadolç, Sitges

Oops. A long time I didn´t write anything here.
At last I've decided to give Iris a new engine. The 20 year old rusty Volvo Penta 2002 will be replaced by a new D1-30. More power, less vibrations and less noise, but most important of all a lot more confidence at sea.
Moona and I sailed out of Port Ginesta for a short 5-mile trip to Sitges. There she will be repowered by the local Volvo Penta service of Náutica Emilio. Details will follow in future posts.
It was a sunny day, the last one of this year's summer. Nothing special to be told about the trip, except for the hundreds of jellyfish we encountered along the Garraf coast (Cotylorhiza tuberculata and Rhizostoma pulmo)

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Tom
August 24, 2007, Port Ginesta

Tuesday, August 14th:
Moona and I got up early, took the metro to the port, passed by Capitanía to hand in our access card and got on board of Iris to start the last 16 Nm trip to Port Ginesta. I started the engine, pulled in mooring lines and steered Iris backward out of her berth. In the middle of the channel, putting her in forward gear, I noticed ... nothing. Iris didn't advance. Instead we started drifting towards the back of the channel without propulsion. I immediatedly called for assistance on the port's channel 68. Marineros arrived in zodiac just in time to prevent Iris from banging into the port wall. We secured her to the first berth on the pontoon. What the hell was wrong? My first thought was something had got entangled into the prop. That was reasonable. The water in this part of the marina was full of dirt and debris pushed in by last days winds. So I put on my scuba mask and jumped into the dirty water. I could hardly see through the dirt but enough to assure nothing had got stuck into the prop, nor was the raw water intake obstructed.
I quickly took a shower and walked down the whole marina in search for a mechanic. I found a Volvo Penta official service and one of their mechanics promptly accompanied me to have a look at the engine. It took only 10 minutes to see that the engine turned perfectly, the transmission to the shaft was ok, but the propeller seemed to have got loose. So, what to do now? One option was to call up a team of divers and have them have a look at the prop, but that would be expensive and it was not sure they would be able to solve the problem underwater. At Capitanía they suggested towing Iris to the Reial Club Marítim de Barcelona (RCMB) at the other side of the port, where they have a crane and an own mechanic. I walked over there, explained the situation and they said it was ok to bring Iris over. The marineros at Port Vell offered me to tow her to the Club Marítim, but they were called back by Capitanía, because they lacked the necessary permits to do the towing and the Coastguard was patroling the harbour. So I had to wait until 4pm for a tow by the Club Marítim itself. They arrived on time, towed Iris to the other side of the port, got her into the crane and set her on the hard. Out of the water I touched the propeller, it spinned loose around the shaft. RCMB's mechanic unmounted the prop and showed me the prop key (a piece of metal sitting in a groove on the shaft and the prop and makes them turn jointly) had broken. He explained the key that was in there was fitted by an amateur and had the wrong size and wrong metal. It was doomed to break some day. We were very lucky this happened in the marina, and were very lucky to have found this very professional mechanic! He promptly started to machine me a tailored stainless steel prop key, since the one Iris needed wasn't a standard size. The groove size on the shaft wasn't even the same as the on on the prop. After a few hours the new prop key was ready and the prop could be mounted again. In the meanwhile I had the chance to pressure clean Iris's hull. Since it was getting late, Iris would be lowered into the water again the next morning. That evening we all went for dinner at the Persian restaurant 'El Rincón Persa' in Barcelona.
Wednesday, August 15th:
Again Moona and I got up early. Iris was put back into the water around 9am, and we motored out through the bridge of the 'Rambla del Mar' at 9:30am. With a clean hull Iris went much faster. When we had motored all the way to the end of Barcelona's commercial harbour, we encountered a very rough sea with strong winds from the South. In view of what was in front of us, we decided to turn back to Port Vell and try again the next day. So we spent the rest of the day with our friends visiting the Parc Guell and the Tibidabo. In the evening Moona and I were invited for dinner at my aunt's who was on holiday in Barcelona.
Thursday, August 16th:
This day we got up very early at 6am in the hope to find a flat sea. But no luck. Again when we reached the end of the harbour a very strong wind started blowing and we even had to shelter behind the huge cruising ships moored there. An hour later, again we were back at our berth in Port Vell. Since from this day I had rented a place in Cala Canyelles to spend a rest week and teach Moona to dive, we decided to leave Iris in Port Vell and enjoy that promised week of holidays. Niko accompanied me to get my car at Port Ginesta, we got our stuff from Iris and drove back to the Costa Brava in the afternoon.
Friday, August 24th
Yesterday Moona went back home to Valencia, so I called op my friend and colleague Pablo to help me sail Iris back to her home. This time the weather was ok. In just over 3 hours we got Iris back to Port Ginesta, just in time because later that day and the following days there was such a bad sea that even the ferries to Balearics couldn't leave port. When we arrived at the entrance of Port Ginesta we spotted a Sunseeker powerboat that had collided with the breakwater and was about to sink. This time we weren't the unlucky ones.

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Tom
August 13, 2007, Marina Port Vell, Barcelona

Tuesday, August 7th:
In the morning Mahsa and Chema left us to catch their bus to Barcelona and plane to Madrid. Moona and I sailed out from Sant Feliu de Guíxols towards a next harbour: Palamós. The weather has become completely unstable, unlike any other month of August. Climate change? Anyway, anchoring in a little cala with turquoise clear waters, seems difficult this summer. In a few hours we reached Palamós. Palamós has two ports: an important commercial and fishing harbour and at the north side a modern marina. We entered the latter and where assigned a quite unprotected berth against the breakwater. In view of the cloudy weather, Palamós is the ideal stopover to do some tourism. We went for lunch at 'La Vostra Llar', and had some delicious black rice. After a siesta on Iris, we went walking through the little shopping streets of the village.
Wednesday, August 8th:
We got up late, went for breakfast in a bar in the marina, and spent the rest of the morning in Palamós. At noon, the weather seemed to start improving and it got sunny again. We decided to do a long walk along the beaches and calas to the north of the village: la fosca, cala s'Alguer, and the beach of Castell. Back in the marina the boats at our berthing place were moving and shaking a lot on the waves that entered the marina directly onto our pier. I had to call some marineros to secure the abandoned boat next to us, which was banging constantly into Iris. Luckily, a few hours later when the sun set, the wind lowered, the sea calmed down, and we could have a quite night's sleep.
Thursday, August 9th:
The weather being so unpredictable, I didn't feel much for sailing further northward. So we paid our stay at the capitanía of Marina Palamós, and started our descend back towards Barcelona. It was a cloudy morning with not much wind, so we motored all the way back to Sant Feliu de Guíxols, where we spent another day.
Friday, August 10th:
Moona had got news from our friends Katy, Niko and son Nikan, who were on their way by car from Belgium. We decided to meet them in an easy to reach point: Blanes, the southmost starting point of the Costa Brava. We sailed again by Cala Canyelles and an hour later reached the harbour of Blanes. We got the last available berth. At around 6pm, our friends arrived, loaded with food, drinks and presents. After driving for so many hours, Niko and son Nikan really enjoyed a swim in the warm mediterranean waves. At night we had dinner on board of Iris, I took my guitar out and we had a splendid time.

Saturday, August 11th:
Of course we had to show the Costa Brava to our friends, so we left Iris in Blanes, took the car and drove back up to Cala Canyelles, where Nikan spent most of the day in the water. We had a fantastic paella at the club, where I used to work as a divemaster. In the afternoon we visited the medieval village of Tossa de Mar and on the way back we stopped in Girona to buy some camping equipment for our friends who had decided to give the adventurous life a try. That night all five of us slept on the boat.

Sunday, August 12th:
There was a swimming competition announced in the harbour of Blanes and at 10am the harbour entrance would be closed- So we hurried up, temporarily said goodbye to our friends, and sailed out southward. We proceeded well and reached the marina of El Balís after 5 hours. El Balís is a very big and cheap marina. Unfortunately there is not much to do in the surroundings. Moona and I took a long walk and ended up finding a nice Mexican restaurant where we had dinner. On the walk back, we noticed how the sky was getting very dark and thunder and lightning was approaching. We got back to Iris, got ready to go to sleep but half an hour later the thunderstorm was right on top of us. The wind started to blow at over 40 knots and the firmly moored Iris heeled over dangerously under the force of the wind. Lightning struck all around us. This was one of the scariest moments I've experienced on Iris. One hour later, all was calm.
Monday, August 13th:
When we sailed out of El Balís in the morning, we found a mirror flat sea, for the first time in two weeks. There was almost no wind and Iris motored rapidly over this flat sea. After 5 hours of motoring, I considered it would be better to let the engine rest a bit and enter Marina Port Vell in Barcelona, the last marina before Iris's hailing port Port Ginesta.
In Barcelona we met again with our friends who had camped the night before in Canyelles and had now also descended towards Barcelona. While we were waiting on board of Iris we got the visit of a kitten that seemed to be perfectly used to boat life.
In the afternoon, we showed our friends around the Ramblas, had dinner in 'Les Quinze Nits' on the Plaça Reial, and being so close to home, we all went to sleep at my place.

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