Sea Change

We had an easier trip into Croatia and dutifully tied up at the Cavtat customs wharf. Our crew, Jenny, Vicky, Anne, Angela and Kate had now reached top form as they were due to depart the next day, and were complimented again by the person taking the ropes on shore. They were all confined to the boat while I did the formalities but they did get off briefly to help a boat flailing around wildly after the staff had left the flailing boat in disgust. They found out why when Vicky had caught their rope and asked the chap what he wanted done. He stopped and looked skyward for some time as if pondering an unanswerable philosophical problem, and said let me think about that. She came to the conclusion there really was danger on the high seas.

Perhaps as a hangover from communist times the officials were some of the worst. It is not permitted to have more than one person in the air-conditioned office despite it being very spacious, the next person has to stand outside in the heat. There was never a seat for the visitor inside either and you have to stand while the forms were produced. The only surprise was that Croatia has computerised systems, as different from Greece, Albania and Montenegro where it was all handwritten and photocopies. That did make it even slower though for the aged harbour master official. From there I had to go to the Port Police, who weren't really even pretending as they had the Croatian soaps on TV as they grumpily checked us in. I also saw the Rarotongan passport scandal in action as a dubious looking non-Polynesian, non-English speaker turned up with his Cook Islands passport. The Cook Islands obvious doesn't figure in Croatian soaps though as despite very obviously being a bit nervous there was just the same bored unquestioning processing of paperwork for its own purpose.

We left the crew on the boat the next morning recovering from a big final night, threatening mutiny of sailing off instead of packing and leaving, while we bussed into Dubrovnik dragging carts of laundry and camping gas tanks. Three hours later we had had quite an aerobic workout on the hills but still hadn't had any success with either and had discovered Croatia was a very Catholic country with many things closed on Sunday. Eventually we flagged a taxi and sorted both and returned to Cavtat to meet Sarah, Clare and the kids ready for their adventure.

The twins are 6 now and Kate 10. They had had an extended holiday in Perth for my sister Paulette's 60th with lots of second cousins their age, rarely out of the pool so are now accomplished confident swimmers. We went out to Lopud, an island just north of Dubrovnik where there was good swimming and kayaking. We had just got clear of the bay the next morning when the starboard engine alarms went of and we limped back in to the bay to check what was wrong. After checking fan belts were ok and Ange diving over the sea water inlet which seemed clear we called a mechanic hoping to get someone out but the only answer was to come into Dubrovnik marina. The boat can travel quite well at speed on one engine but it is difficult to manoeuvre at slow speeds so we were very pleased to find the marina staff had men on shore as well as in a dingy to help us in. The sea water pump as well as a couple of other problems were very efficiently fixed and there was a really nice swimming pool for the kids. After an extra night to avoid a storm we headed out again for a brief look at Sipan we overnighted again on Lopud and the next day Sarah and Clare hired a sun lounger an umbrella on the beach and they and the kids had a big beach day. Both Georgie and Alex (and of course Kate) can now kayak by themselves the 500 metres to shore and Kate can easily swim it.

The kids were very excited by the two-day crossover with Rebecca, Bridget and Patrick and Rebecca's boyfriend Jamie. When told Patrick got up at lunchtime, Alex in particular wanted to know "Was it the beginning of lunchtime? the middle? or the end of lunchtime?". The big cousins and the younger cousins had a great time together swimming and the younger kids followed the older ones in jumping into the water from higher places on the boat. All 11 of us were on board for three dinners but Rebecca and Jamie stayed ashore and it didn't seem too crowded. We anchored beside an island outside the old town but were chased off by a thunderstorm, a bit of a foreteller of things to come. After Sarah and Clare and the kids left Sunday night we were held up by the weather Monday so we were keen to go on Tuesday when the forecast looked ok but an hour out we started seeing black clouds then lightening so turned tail only to have the storm overtake us with driving rain and 40 knots- Spewsday the kids called it. The next afternoon the wind turned, the skies cleared and the sun came out and we were off to Lopud for the night and Rebecca created a new cocktail,"Cavtat's Revenge". From there we went to Polace, on Mljet, a national park with fiord like entrance and a beautiful bay. We went to the inland saltwater lakes to an old monastery on an island with crystal clear water and Jamie and Rebecca did a swim, walk, swim walk to circumnavigate the lake. Then it was back to Cavtat, via Lopud for a lunch and swim. On the last night Rebecca and Patrick's friends, Nadine and Dave came on board for dinner so it was a surprise everybody was in reasonable form to leave in the early hours of the morning. Sad to see them go but they we will all be together for Isabelle's 21st in November.

The next crew, Johnny, Richard, Angus, Robynne and Diana we picked up at Dubrovnik marina. Having made several trips on our folding bikes, cycling one-handed hauling a cart, collecting laundry, shopping, 1km to the camping gas filling station, we were amused to see a new exercycle being loaded onto the superyacht beside us. I suppose if you employ enough staff to meet your every whim your biggest problem is then exercise. Something of a growing problem in the western world. We headed out again to Lopud as a first easy trip and a lovely overnight stop. From there we were off back to Polace and then on to Badija, an island monastery off Korcula. The monastery was being repaired but unlike the Mljet one it had an eerie feel to it. We left some of Richard's friend's ashes as we departed so Richard was part of the ceremony in Wellington. We remembered Philip being very sad on the boat the year before when this friend had died.

Korcula is an impressive walled town, made much prettier by trees around the ramparts. With a solid tourist trade we were able to find a couple of good restaurants. Robynne and Diana left before 6am one morning, and Nicky and Jean joined us, and a couple of days later the Jonny, Richard and Angus left us. We spent an extra night in Korcula as a more pleasant place to wait out rain then we sheltered for a few days on Polace from the next bout of thunderstorms. Even Ange and I hired bikes on day and cycled over the hill and around the inland lake. It was Ange's first experience of a bike with gears you can cycle up hill, and we were both very impressed with our newfound sportiness. We sailed out of a sunny calm Polace and wound around the channel into a very rough sea that immediately had glasses breaking and things falling everywhere but we persevered until we saw Lastavo covered in cloud possibly waterspouts and headed back into Polace to have a much smoother crossing the next day.

Lastavo was a military post until the 1990s with very restricted entry and is now a national park The first anchorage in the southeast corner was an almost totally encircled bay, Skrivena Luka. It very barren but good for waiting out more thunder and lightening. The restaurant had very friendly and light hearted staff which we really hadn't seen in anyone over 25 in Croatia. It has been very difficult to personally engage with anyone as they seem unaware of any concept of customer service and thoroughly sick of tourists. The only time was when after Spewsday Tuesday we had got water into the carb of the outboard motor, I kayaked in and asked a chap backing a boat trailer where I could find a serviceman. He rang the brother of a chap, Evo, who he said was old but very good. Evo turned out to be over 80, with an outboard stand and a few tools on a kitchen chair. Rather alarmingly he smoked as he cleaned out the carb but he painstakingly dismantled and cleaned and rebuilt it. When he slowly limped inside to get anything I was worried he would forget what he was doing and not return but he always did. Disappointedly it didn't start and we agreed he would try again the next day as he was clearly exhausted. We were walking away when we heard it fire and very excitedly came back.

We are now at the other end of Lastavo, having travelled down the south then wound our way through very pretty tree clad islands and fiords to Mali Lago. It is very sheltered but full of new holiday house building. The storms seem to be passing north of us and the sun has come out so we will leave tomorrow heading back to Dubrovnik stopping somewhere for a couple of days depending what the weather brings.

We are hauling the boat out in Bar Montenegro, after much research and negotiation by Ange. We head towards Montenegro on Saturday, haul the boat on Tuesday and fly to England Wednesday, arriving back in Wellington 1 October. It has been a good summer, we have been more confident this time and travelled shorter distances. We'll be coming back next year and possibly even the year after that......