View from Aponivi at Palma de Mallorca

We left Gibralter at 3:00 pm on the seventh of September, bound for Al Merimar, a Spanish port 130 miles to the east. Throughout the afternoon and night we had strong westerly winds, propelling us at an average speed in excess of eight knots. We had Al Merimar off the beam well before daylight and decided to press on. By 1:30 in the afternoon we had rounded Cabo de Gata, one of the major headlands on the coast, and dropped anchor in Puerto Genoves, a small bay ringed by trees and fields in the foreground, mountains in the background, and little else. Somehow, this beautiful spot managed to avoid any development other than a few private homes on a nearby hillside. Having covered 166 miles in about 22 hours, and anchored in a bit of paradise, we were well pleased.

After an afternoon and evening in Peurto Genoves we raised anchor at 4:00 am on the ninth in order to reach our next destination, Cartagena, by mid-afternoon. The 75 miles to Cartagena went smoothly, and we tied up at a prime berth along the town's sea wall at 3:45. Cartagena has a long history, having been an important port for the Phonecians, Cartheginians, Romans, and so on. The port is entered through a narrow slit in the mountains that run along the coast, and each conqueror left fortifications that appear, one above another, as you pass through the slit into the broad harbor that lies beyond it. Cartagena's centuries as a Roman port are evidenced by a Roman theater, excavaqted over the last two decades, that was constructed more than 2000 years ago. Today, it is very much intact and easily accessible, only a ten minute walk from where we were tied up. There will be more about this beautiful little city in a future blog. The major event during the period of this report happened on the next leg, a 147 mile passage from Cartagena to Ibiza.

We set out for Ibiza in the afternoon of 9/11. By midnight we had covered 82.5 miles and were proceeding, under power, in a light breeze and light chop. As daylight neared, the trip was progressing smoothly. With single digit winds, we continued to motor and the autopilot was doing most of the steering. The main function of the person on watch was to look out for other traffic -- cruise ships and cargo vessels regularly criss-crossed our path -- and adjust our course when needed to avoid close encounters at sea. Avoiding other vessels was no problem; the problem was developing, imvisibly, on our own boat.

Scanning for traffic in the conditions prevailing on that passage is generally done standing up at the trailing edge of the hard dodger. I was on watch in the early hours of the twelth, spending long periods in that position. As I ducked under the dodger for a short break the boom -- a 22 foot long metal beam holding the furled mailsail -- came crashing down on the dodger, its aft end plummeting through the space that my head had occupied seconds earlier.

The boom is held up by two devices: a line (the topping lift) runs from the top of the mast to a 1/4 inch diameter steel rod bolted at both sides to the end of the boom, and a heavy metal strut (the boom vang) that runs at an angle from the base of the mast to a point on the underside of the boom. The quarter inch steel rod fractured first, sending the topping lift flying. As the full weight of the boom came down on the vang it immediately buckled and broke in half. A moment earler, the boom would have landed on me at the same instant as the boom, and I would have fared no better. As it was, the hard dodger withstood the impact, and I was unhurt. Lorraine, asleep in the cabin, was out of harm's way at the critical moment, but she had spent an equal share of the night in the danger zone.

With 25 miles still to go, we lashed down the boom, to prevent it from sliding around and causing further damage, and motored on to Ibiza -- the nearest port as well as the intended destination. Once in Ibiza we unbolted the remnants of the failed parts and put new lashings on the boom to raise it from the dodger and keep it immobile. In that fashion, we motored to Mallorca, a few days later, and began work with a rigging engineer on a more permanant cure for our problems.

Between work sessions and time spent on board waiting for workers we have managed to see some of Palma. Fortunately, some of its most beautiful structures -- notable the Cathedral La Sue on which work began in 1230 -- are visible from the marina and only a few minutes away on foot. Bellver Castle, a 13th century fortress, can be seen on a hill overlooking the bay. And the shoreline around the marina has other delights, ranging from tapas bars in narrow alleyways to a royal palace that was built by the moors and that has been occupied by Spanish Kings since the moors were evicted some 800 years ago.

With tejmporary fixes in place, and a go-ahead that we received from our rigging engineer after an inspection yesterday, we plan to leave Palma today and head to an anchorage on the other side of the island. From there, we will take the 57 mile hop to the port of Mahon on Minorca -- the third of the Ballearics and the only one we have not yet seen. After that, it is back to Palma for more permanant repairs.