Hello again, France

We left our little piece of paradise, (shared with a million other boats!), to sail across the Bonifacio Straight to reach the southern coastline of Corsica.  There is a very popular and famous port town on that coastline, called Bonifacio.  The town is built up on the hill above a narrow entrance to a natural harbour.  I guess the more difficult a place is to get to, the more renowned it becomes and therefore more exclusive/expensive.  

We couldn’t afford to stay in the marina, but we could afford the time it took to motor into the entrance to get half way through before we had to get out of the way of a big ferry, then a big powerboat and before anything else BIG, came along, we turned around and left. We came, we saw, we turned tail and got the heck out of that place. 

The wind prediction for that day was for mildish wind of around 10-12 knots.  As we left Bonifacio and headed west then north, the wind had other plans and built up to around 22-24 knots and the waves joined in on the party.  This was not champagne sailing, this was a sit down, hold on and keep your head down so it won’t get splashed kind of a day.  The captain was having fun, tacking with three other monohulls that were heading in the same general direction, but me not so much. 

The landscapes on Corsica are BIG! Big rocky monoliths and red in colour like our northwest and I just kept wanting to take photos of them. Whether or not I did them justice with my little iPhone, who can tell.  We found some great anchorages on our 2-night, 3 day stay around the French Island.  

We departed Corsica at 6.30pm for our fourth overnight crossing of the season.  We were heading to the French Riviera, around St Tropez, a trip we had taken on our first season on the boat.  We had left Port Saint Louis de Rhone and past Marseille and towards the French Riviera, marvelling at all the big boats and marvelling at our courage to be amongst all that on our own little boat. Now here we are, three years later and three years wiser……...I hope. 

One place we hadn’t stopped at on the first year was an island called the Porquerolles.  We arrived at a very crowded bay towards the end of the day so we just anchored on the outer limits of the bay.  As the evening wore on, the day boats started heading home and then we had the opportunity to move into the middle of the bay right near the buoys that designate the swimming area.  The water was so clear and clean and we had jagged the perfect spot. 

If you ask Tony, what is the thing he worries about most on the boat he will say anchoring and the anchor not dragging. If we are anchored in sand, he is happy and fully confident in our anchor and although he will always set an anchor alarm, he can sleep easy.  For some strange reason about an hour after we had gone to bed, we were awoken by the anchor alarm. There’s no thinking, you just jump straight up and see what’s going on. In this case, it was a false alarm. 

The other thing to worry about after the anchor dragging is someone else’s boat dragging into you. We were awoken about another hour later to some strange noises and got up to find a mono hull bumping into the bow sprit at the front of the boat.  The bow sprit was poking into their cockpit as the wind was pushing their boat onto ours.  The captain of the other boat had to be woken and in the mad panic of trying to work out what had happened, finding fenders to stop any contact, dealing with the language barrier and attempts of the captain to drive forward but being unable as our anchor chain was caught on his rudder, it was a bit hectic. 

Everyone kept their cool and the French captain was looking to Tony for solutions.  It became apparent that on an attempt to move apart, the French boat had hooked our anchor with theirs so there was the chance of Phantomas dragging anchor with the other boat attached if any more attempts to untangle the anchors happened.  It was decided in the end to tie their yacht alongside Phantomas and deal with the anchor situation in the light of day.  Fortunately, there wasn’t much wind that night so both boats stayed still enough to not cause an issue. 

In the morning light, things always look better, and it was an easy fix to dive down and unhook their anchor from our chain.  The French couple kept saying “thank you for not being mad” but there was really no point, it wasn’t planned it just happened.  Was there any damage to our boat I hear you ask?  One tiny mark on the front was all there was to show for the night’s adventures. 

We spent a very relaxing day swimming and kayaking before we got the dinghy down and went into the main town on the Porquolles.  The little town was lovely and consisted of heaps of bike hire shops as cycling around the island is a main draw card for the tourists.  We had lunch in a café before going back to the bay and relaxing some more.  This is the life.