12th August
The pretty anchorage next to the sandbar and our excursion ashore to visit the the town of Pollença were fabulous. While ashore we found a wonderful bar that sprayed cold mist over us from jets under the olive trees and bar canopy. What a find ! Although the sting was, Ricky's Diet Coke was the same price as my ice cold San Miguel - 4 euros 80 cents - how I laughed !

As we left the rather overpriced Pollença we had just one planned short stop over in Mallorca before heading to the party Island of Ibiza - Calla Illeta. We decided to sail along the north coast of the island. The scenery was stunning. Dramatic cliffs along a rocky craggy shore towered above us. The majority barren and gnarly, with deep inviting caves to explore, interspersed with lush green forests. It was a long hot motor sail with very little wind, so we were glad when we finally reached our destination Cala Illetta. It was early evening and the bay was quite crowded. We pootled around a bit trying to find a space, anxious but chuckling to ourselves as crews jumped up and stood like Meer cats on their decks with a 'Don't you dare anchor too near me' look on their faces. Finally we found a spot, dropped the anchor and dived in the clear water to cool off.

As we had just dropped off to sleep we were woken by severe rocking from nowhere as there was no wind. We wondered if it was an earth tremor, but no reports. In my imagination it was perhaps a military submarine that was passing by and decided to pop up for air which kick started a mini tsunami into our bay? Who knows?
Either way neither of us could get back to sleep, so we laid on deck and watched the tail end of the meteor shower, which was rather exciting.

We left for Ibiza at 6.30 the following morning and arrived at an amazing bay called Xarracg (pronounced Characca) 10 hours later. I know I did rather go on about the posidonia meadows under the sea last blog but I do need to mention them just once more - well celebrate them really as when we arrived on Ibiza we spent 2 and a half hours snorkelling above the grasses , witnessing first hand the impact the protection the Balearic Islands is having . The sea bed was alive with generations of local fish . Hiding timidly behind and underneath individual blades of the sea grass were the baby fish, darting in and out when they dare. Inquisitive tiddler fish were exploring the seagrass in shoals, while venturing further afield were the slightly older ones hanging out with the bigger fish. Three lengths behind were the adolescent fish, chasing each other into deeper caves and finally gliding confidently around their sanctuary were the adult fish - The big guys . As we snorkelled through the Chrystal Clear water (another factor attributed to the Posidonia meadows, by the way) the suns rays sent shards of light that sparkled on the fish scales below, which shimmered silver, gold and metallic blue. For those of you who are fish spotters - The silver fish were 'Oblada Melanura' - distinctive as they have a black spot in their tail, the gold and turquoise blue striped were 'Salpa' and the metallic blue with black stripes were 'Sargo' To our delight we also spotted a baby octopus, that crept along the sand and disappeared under the grass and ray the size of a tea plate. It was awesome.