Diesel refill a la Tunisie
29 August 2018
As I mentioned in another post, we desperately needed to fuel up to be able to move on. The fuel dock in the Bizerte marina was lacking any fuel pumps and is clearly not used, presumably due to lack of business. We arranged to have a delivery, the system being that a small truck comes with the specified quantity of diesel that you want. After a long wait, the pickup arrived but our golden juice that would propel us on our way could only be pumped into Al Shaheen once a few extension leads were found to power his pumps. Needless to say several leads failed to work but we succeeded in the end, filling our jerry cans first to check the diesel looked clean, before letting any of this dubious stuff into the main tank on board. Iâm not sure we actually got the full quota and my guess is that his truck now has a full tank courtesy of us but the chit he gave claimed to be the full 300L.
It was what we had by now learned to be a typically rather random arrangement which sort of worked in the end so we felt we had plenty to get us across to Greece.
We had a good opportunity to see Lulworth, a 1920 Big Class Yacht which has been sitting in the marina for a year or so apparently. It is the victim of some paperwork issue so we were told. It is truly a beautiful yacht, which although uncompetitive when first built due to a steel mast and inadequate ballast, was transformed into a very successful racer, winning loads prior to the introduction of the much faster and famous âJ Classâ for the Americas cup. Itâs varnish is suffering in the sun but overall she looked wonderful and just needs to be back in regular use.
Having filled up we then had a major issue getting off the quay as the wind was blowing us on at 10-15 knots across the beam. I had feared this problem but the marina insisted this was the only place we could receive our diesel. After abortive attempts to use spring lines to get either the bow or stern off the dock it was clear we were going to need help. Once the marina manager returned from prayers we got a pull on our bow from his RIB and we were free to leave for Greece.
Not sure how this will all work as and when the marina gets busy with visiting yachts and superyachts.