Sicily!

Having sadly, but wisely decided to give the Aolian Islans a swerve this trip, we decided to leave Tropea on Thursday heading for the Messina Straits and Sicily.

Before doing so, some repairs, namely the mooring light which had decided to give out on us, clearly from over use!. Thankfully David pulled the short straw and got to winch me up the mast. not that it was really a straw thing, as he felt I would not have the strength to winch him. I didn’t argue!!!  However, having got me all the way there, only to find that we had the wrong bulb, I am sure he had wished he hadn’t taken that option. Anyway, a new and correct bulb in hand, he got to the winch again and in no time I was atop the mast again, resulting in a now bright as anything new mooring light.

We departed Tropea at the back end of the Mistral, so the seas were still ever present at 2-3 metres high. Glad the dingy was on the davits and not being towed! It wasn’t the most pleasant sail to begin with but a few hours into it  and the closer we got to the Straits of Messina, the seas started to settle and we had ourselves a fantastic sail.

The Straits of Messina

“And all this time, in travail, sobbing, gaining on the current, we rowed into the strait – Skylla to port and on our starboard beam Kharibdis, dire gorge of the salt sea tide. By heaven! when she vomited, all the sea was like a cauldron seething over intense fire, when the mixture suddenly heaves and rises”  THE ODYSSEY.

and according to the Admiralty Pilot, “The currents and whirlpools, famous from antiquity, are such as to necessitate some caution in the navigation of the Strait, moreover in the vicinity of the highland, on either side, vessels are exposed to violent squalls which descend through the valleys with such strength as, at times, to inconvenience vessels”.

Well, they didnt disappoint… it was a great sail, but challenging and if you can see our track on Marinetraffic.com, I am sure it will show how we coped with the differing winds, in terms of angle and strength, going from 4knots to 24knots in a nano-second, from close haul to broadreaching in the same time frame. Last time we  experienced this was in the Straights of Gibralta. We loved it, reaching 9 knots over ground at times,  and will go and do it all over again.. well next year.

However, even with the tide with us, we felt we didnt have enough time to get to Taormina, a further 24 miles, before dusk so opted to stay in Messina. For the yachties who are reading this, dont make the same mistake. It was a horrible marina, where they stick visitors on a floating pontoon on the outer edges of the marina and into the current, so needless to say, not a good night.

The morning wasn’t much better as our toilet stopped taking in water. Having disconnected the tube, we found a jellyfish, much like the sardine in our air-conditioning tube, had decided to swim up it. As you can imagine, we didnt feel sorry for the little bugger!

However Messina itself….was better than expected, despite being described as “devastated and levelled in the 1908 earthquake which caused the shores of Messina to subside by 2 feet, drowned hundreds in huge tidal waves and caused the death of some 64,000 souls, to once again be devastated by Allied bombing in the Second World War”

My photos below show the best of the architecture…taken whilst aboard a noddy train of all things..

Messina

After some provisioning, we set sail for Taormina.. and having got the sails out, then in, as the wind dropped, for about the 10th time in an hour, we gave up, and motored on. We have now dropped anchor in the bay between Taormina and Naxos for a day of rest and will go ashore tomorrow to explore!. Thankfully we have found some calm seas, albeit rain amid the sunshine!