Photo: Messina Strait swordfish boat
We stayed in Siracusa for a week, enjoying the time on the anchor after too long in various marinas. We met up with Madie and Tony “Ripple Effect” who arrived the following day and Lynn and Dick “Wind Pony” who arrived 2 days later resulting in dinners ashore, drinks and nibbles each afternoon. Very social and pleasant. Having visited Siracusa last year on our way to Licata, we soon found the wonderful fruit, vegetable and fish market along with the Vodaphone shop, all essentials when cruising. The main difference between this stay and the last one was the super yachts in the bay, there were several over 160m long complete with helicopters on the back deck. Whilst sitting on anchor, Gail spent several days upgrading the firmware on the Iridium phone in an attempt to try the option of sending weather requests to Predict Wind offshore. This is still work in progress. Brian spent a couple of days assisting Dick get his watermaker working.
Friday we motor sailed 41nm, picking up a mooring buoy at Taormina Roads. The trip was uneventful, we saw an oil rig getting towed by an 85m tug and almost sailed right over a very large turtle, which was either sleeping or sick as he never attempted to dive below the surface as we went very close to him. The mooring buoys at Taormina Roads are run by George, a very friendly Maltese guy who speaks English and will run you ashore and also organise trips to Etna. We did not take him up on the offer as a weather window had opened for the Aeolian Islands so we would be moving on early the next day. To visit the Aeolians it appears you need very settled, calm weather which was predicted for the next week, so we were going to take it.
Early, Saturday 4th June, we dropped the lines to the mooring buoy and headed off toward the Strait of Messina. This is the narrow channel which separates Sicily from mainland Italy. Messina Strait has high hills on the Sicily side, with the wide entrance to the south and the narrow exit into the Tyrrhenian Sea to the north. This dictates the strong current flow and katabatic winds we encountered as we travelled north, luckily we had timed it almost right and had the current with us for most of the way, only losing it for the last hour. As we entered what is known as the Messina Traffic Control area, we radioed the control tower on the VHF and told them who we were and are intention to go north up the east coast of Sicily, keeping out of the control lanes, which are used by shipping and large pleasure craft. As we motored along we commented on the large number of viaducts carrying cars and trains along the hilly terrain, and through the hillside towns, very picturesque. The Strait of Messina is also known for its swordfish and swordfish boats, we were lucky enough to see both. The swordfish boats have high towers with men “spotting” the fish from the nest at the top, they also have extremely long bow sprits which we assumed meant they speared or harpooned the fish.
Once through the Strait, we motored the rest of the way to Vulcano Island, anchoring in Porto di Ponente. We almost ran over another very large turtle and decided they are lazy here, as once again he made no attempt to dive or get out of our way, and he just looked at us.
The Aeolian Islands are volcanic, Vulcano Island is the most southern and has a couple of inactive craters and one active crater (1888/90). The most active in The Aeolian’s is Stromboli Island, however we do not plan on visiting it, anchoring is limited and maybe the best way to see it will be via a tour boat. Vulcano Island also had mud pools where people coat themselves in mud, which is apparently good for your skin, then wash off in the sea. Some parts of the town have a sulphur smell, similar to Rotorua in the North Island of NZ. As expected being a volcanic island the beaches are all black sand, which are busy during the day with the many day trippers, but in the evenings are very peaceful. Our guess is that in the peak of the season, this is a very busy and popular place. One of the main attractions is the walk up Gran Cratere, which has great views over the Aeolian Islands from the top. We walked up to the crater rim on a morning that was overcast and therefore cool, it is relatively easy with good views into the smoking crater once at the top. The town, although touristy, has good, small supermarkets, butchers and vegetable markets. It also has the advantage of a second anchorage “round the other side”, (Porto di Levante) approx. a mile away, which offers protection if the wind turns and comes from the west. Friends who anchored there said it did get very rolly due to the ferries.
On Monday, we took advantage of the light wind conditions and motored across to Lipari Island to refuel and anchor in a lovely sandy bay to run the water maker and refill our water tanks. That evening back in Porto di Ponente, we went ashore for dinner at a lovely restaurant. Brian had a chicken and prawn curry that was served on a wonderful ceramic plate. We joked with the waitress, Georgia, that he had also purchased the plate when paying for his meal. Georgia told us the plate was one of a set of four which depicted the seasons, Brian’s plate we decided was Spring. Back at the boats the following day, we bought fish from the local fishermen, who come around the anchorage selling their catch. The fish are already scaled and gutted, so all we had to do was cook it. Wonderful, wrapped in foil with lemon and cooked on the barbeque.
Thursday 9th June we left the anchorage for Isola Filicudi, 18nm away, as the weather is looking good for our crossing to Sardinia at the weekend. It was a motor in glassy seas, but we did see some dolphins, the first of the season and picked up a mooring buoy, the bay has a boulder bottom. We were joined later by Wind Pony and Ripple Effect, and decided to go ashore for a walk. A charter boat had told us of a Bronze Age archaeological site at the far end of the harbour, so we set off in search of it. It did not take us long to find the path, there were several large groups setting off for the site. We walked up the hill and had a look at the remains of a 1700BC Bronze Age village. It was then down for a drink at the local café, followed by drinks and nibbles on Ripple Effect, as this would be the last we will see of them this season.
The following morning at 05:00 we dropped the mooring lines and motored out of the bay, heading for Sardinia. It was 235 nm, an overnight trip, motoring all the way for 36 hours as there was very little wind. We had initially planned to stop at Isola di Ustica 66nm away, and sail the next day and night to Sardinia, but looking at the weather, we decided if we did not do the trip in one hit, we could get stuck in Ustica for a week due to a weather front due early the following week. The trip was uneventful, lumpy seas due to sea mounds and underwater volcanos, turtles and lots of dolphins. We finally dropped anchor at 16:15 Saturday 11th June in Porto Giunco, Sardinia.