65 - Don't worry!

Well, it should come as no surprise to us but the boat wasn't exactly ready when we got back. We did go back into the water and everything seemed almost perfect.  The varnish on the exterior teak wasn't finished  but that was no problem as between the boat yard and Pedro that could be done in a few days while in the slip.  The top decks still needed to be waxed - again no problem, we could do that anywhere and anytime.  But, our first night aboard, we heard the bilge pumps kicking on - ugh, somewhere water is getting into the boat!!!  We quickly discovered that we had a teeny leak where the drive shaft (we'd had it serviced) was re-inserted.  While it's not a big deal, it is something that needs to be addressed. So, we made plans to have her pulled again and have the cutlass bearing (it holds the shaft to the boat) re-sealed!   Well, this (as we should by now expect) took longer than expected with the combination of Easter holiday, Santa Semana (Holy week) and the standard Spanish response of "Don't worry" to our questions of "When will it be done?".  We now had a couple of weeks before everything would be finished - plus the weather was still a little too cool for our thin blooded taste.  So, we needed another adventure.  We rented a car to further explore the Catalonia area and we also booked another pet sit in Glasgow, Scotland just for a change of pace.  Our boat neighbor's response to my statement that we were flying to Glasgow because it was still too cold here was "Did you hear yourself?".  I meant that it was too cold to sail and we were just filling our time with fun adventures but it was pretty funny at the time.

Our Catalonian road strip started with the World Heritage city of Tarragona.  This adorable town was about an hour’s drive from the boat.  The town is famous for its beautifully preserved Roman Era ruins most notably its colosseum and aqueduct.  Another claim to fame is an annual Castells (human towers) competition in which human towers of up to ten tiers are built. Sadly (or maybe not after looking at the pictures of the crowds), we weren’t there to see the actual towers but we thoroughly enjoyed seeing the rest of the town.

The next day, we realized was Sant Jordi day.  This feast day is called the Catalan equivalent to Valentine’s Day.  The feast day celebrates Sant Jordi (Saint George) who nobly rescued a princess who was about to devoured by the dragon and subsequently rode away refusing any reward.  Today, it's custom for couples to exchange gifts with the men recipients of books and the women a rose.  In our search for places nearby to join the celebrations, we found the town of Reus.  This adorable town's main claim to fame is being the home town of famed architect Antonio Gaudi.  In honor of Sant Jordi day, the main areas of town were heavily decorated with roses and market stalls in several places around town selling roses and books - many with authors available for book signings.  They even brought in a few dragons for the celebration.  We thoroughly enjoyed walking around town and likened it to a small Barcelona - including an amazing indoor market.  Also, much like Barcelona, the architecture is beautiful.  

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When we told her it was our first visit to Reus, the tourism office lady suggested that we also visit the Insitut Pere Mata on our way out of town.  This amazing modernist architecture building was built between 1897 - 1912 and was the premier psychiatric hospital for the area.  The tour of the building's architecture (thankfully with an English audio guide) was fascinating and gave us information on everything from the furniture to the tile work. Even the patient room bathrooms were gorgeous porcelain.

Next, we drove to Montblanc.  This medieval older walled city annually celebrates Sant Jordi with a Renaissance Fair Week.  The legend of Sant Jordi slaying the dragon was said to have taken place just outside the walls of Montblanc and roses now grow where the dragon's blood was spilled.  This town was amazing!  We truly felt like we'd been transported back in time.  The bakers were baking bread using wood ovens, the restaurants were all cooking over open flames, the carousel was foot power driven, a lady was working a foot powered loom, they had an amazing falconry exhibit and many people were walking around dressed in period costumes.  While, I am reminded that I say this often, Montblanc with this festival had to be one of my absolute favorite cities and this festival is a must visit!

A couple of days later, we drove beautiful winding roads up into the mountains to the town of Siurana.  This very small but absolutely fairytale like city of only 50 residents was the last Arab stronghold in Catalonia.  We even found the supposed hoof print of the princess's stallion at the edge of the cliff when he was unsuccessful in attempting to stop her.  Legend holds that the princess, rather than be captured by the Christian soldiers, chose to commit suicide by riding her horse off the cliff.  While we chose to stay safely on top of the cliffs, we did enjoy the absolutely stunning scenery.  We further wandered the small town admiring the church and the views from every corner of town.  Absolutely stunning.

We then drove to Miravet a sweet little town on the Ebro River (the largest river in Spain and the second largest river in the Mediterranean basin - after the Nile).  We wandered around town admiring the views of the river and then climbed up to see the castle - which unfortunately was closed on Monday's.  To get back home, my navigator gave me the choice of driving around town or taking the ferry across the river.  No contest!  We drove just outside of town and caught the centuries' old (technology anyways) ferry. This ferry uses only cables, the strength of the flowing river and the knowledge of the boatmen to move from one side of the river to the other without any engines.  We thought it fascinating!

Next on our Catalonian tour was the city of Valencia, the third largest city in Spain.  While smaller than Barcelona, was no less charming.  We meandered around for several hours amazed at the wonderful architecture, the beautiful churches and bell tower, the huge indoor market and gorgeous parks.  The city is very unique in that one minute you are walking through centuries old buildings marveling at the architecture, then you walk around an amusement park based on "Gulliver's Travels (currently under reconstruction so we couldn't go in) and you're in the very modern area of the Museums of Arts and Science and the Oceanographic Aquarium.  While we decided to forgo admission in favor of wandering the park area on a gorgeous day, it was worth the walk to just see the unique building.  Next on our agenda was finding a place to enjoy the perfect paella in the city of its birth.  We searched and found that one the top restaurants was "Roberto's."  It seemed like a good sign and we were not disappointed at all!  It was amazing as was Valencia.

In between our road trip pilgrimages, we also explored closer to home, enjoying the amazing Parc Natural del Delta de I'Ebre with the beautiful wildlife especially the flamingos.  We walked the Playa de Fangar (beach) about 2 miles to see the Far del Fangar (lighthouse).  We also hiked the Coco d'en Jordi trail of the Serra de Montsia.  This hike took us straight up the mountain that overlooks our marina.  We hiked about 6 miles and only managed to get about 1/2 way up the mountain.  It was beautiful however.  We also went up the Mirador de la Guardiaola which is the original lookout for the city of Sant Carles de la Rapita to warn of invaders.  While it's just a short distance from town, it affords amazing views both at sunset and sunrise.

Since we were also in town during Easter weekend, we got to witness a couple of parades through the streets.  The Good Friday parade as expected was pretty somber but the Easter morning parade was much larger and very celebratory.  Seeing the local customs in action was interesting. Pedro also whipped up a traditional Spanish Easter dish of Sopa de Ajo (garlic soup) to go with our Easter Bread.  It's a delicious and easy soup that will be added to our regular repertoire.

One last thing that we were able to do was to visit the commercial fish auction.  This goes on every week day (excluding a couple of months in the summer) and lasts about 3 hours.  The auction moves pretty quickly and from what we could tell, it looks like the restaurants and grocery stores all vie for the daily catch.  It was amazing to see how much seafood was brought in each day.  

So as not to give the impression that it's all play, we did manage to get a few other boat chores off our list too including getting a new anchor chain and since I have yet to find a new one that fits, re-painting our toilet seat.

Finally, it was time to return our rental car and hop on a flight to Glasgow for a long weekend pet sit we arranged.   With roundtrip flights running about $25, the trip was a no brainer.  We arrived pretty late on Saturday night and took what turned out to be the party train into the city center.  The partiers were very entertaining with lots of drinking and dancing the entire trip.  We finally arrived at our house for the weekend and met Miyu.  Our house was just outside of the Glasgow center so we spent most of our time touring downtown and the riverfront but we did make it to Pollok Park where we roamed around especially excited to see the Highland cows.  We managed to find some great breweries, we had pretty good (just a little rain) weather and just really enjoyed hanging out with Miyu. When our weekend was up, we laughed that our train ride back on Tuesday afternoon couldn't have been any more different.  Gone were all of the parties so ee grabbed some amazing Indian food and enjoyed a relaxing ride back to the airport.  

The rest of our pictures:

Spain and Scotland Pictures

Life is pretty perfect at the moment.  As I type this, we are sailing again for the first time in about 8 months! We met up with Dan and Alison aboard Equus in Mallorca, Spain and are now exploring the island a little more before sailing back towards mainland Spain and the French Riviera. But I'll fill you on that next time.

Until next post!