David's Diary: July 14 to July 17, 2002

Three Days and Three Nights On the Water

Lipari, Italy to Dubrovnik, Croatia

We have enjoyed the West coast of Italy, but we are ready to see Croatia. To get to Croatia from Lipari, north of Sicily where we are now, we need to travel for three days and three nights, stopping only for fuel if there is not enough wind. We pack up and leave Lipari in the morning and settle into our shifts, Jocelyn with Karalee, Kevin with me, and Allen with whomever he wants.

Watching Dolphins

We passed through the Straight of Messina, that narrow body of water between the toe of Italy and the island of Sicily. Known since ancient times, the straight is the stuff of legends, whirlpools, squalls, and waterspouts. Odysseus avoided Scylla -- the female monster -- lurking on the eastern side of the straight by going through Charybdis, the feared whirlpool on the other side. For Dragonsinger, there were clear skies, no monsters, and a favourable current that hurried us through the straight. There were a few tide rips, but no whirlpools that we could see. The only sea creatures that we saw were dolphins that came by to have a friendly swim in our bow wave.

South of Italy

By sunset, we were around the toe of Italy and heading northeast. All through the night we continued on. With hardly any wind we motored as every three hours one watch went off and another one came on.

Allen Sleeps Through Sunrise

For the watch keepers the night was busy as freighter after freighter passed us by. But Allen slept through the night, cuddled under the dodger in his special bed. On a map of the Mediterranean, the "boot of Italy" looks small indeed. We are finding that in a sailboat doing seven knots it is a big place instead. All through the day and all through another night we plug along until we finally round the heel of Italy a day and a half after leaving Lipari.

Karalee and Allen Relax on Passage

In only two days, we have passed through three seas. We left the Tyrrhenian when we entered the Straight of Messina, cruised the Ionian as we passed by the boot of Italy, and now we are in the Adriatic Sea.

Jocelyn Sailing

At lunch time the wind came up from from behind, 20 knots in a southeast direction. We put up the sails, thankfully turned off the engine and started our way north towards Dubrovnik. It was great to be sailing as hour after hour we enjoyed the quiet as the miles slipped under our keel.

Thunderstorm

After dinner the wind switches to the southwest, so we gybe Dragonsinger and continue through the night. At 01:00 Karalee and Jocelyn wake me up. An enormous Thunderstorm is ahead of us on the horizon. Every second or two bolts of sheet lightning light up the sky and often bolts strike the sea. We alter course to avoid the storm and I go back to bed for a little more sleep. At 02:00 Kevin and I are back on watch. As 03:00 approaches, we get closer, and closer to the storm. At 03:00, Kevin and I tack the boat and heave to (adjust the sails so that boat stays in place or sails forward very slowly). We sit in the cockpit and enjoy nature's firework show as we work out which way the storm is going. The boat rides easily in the twenty knot wind and by 04:00 we know which way the storm is going. We tack again and head around the storm in the opposite direction to what we had been doing earlier in the night. If we had kept going we certainly would have been in the middle of the storm.

Dubrovnik, Croatia

At 05:00, Karalee and Jocelyn come back on watch. The sky is lightening in the east, but the storm continues. Until the sun was fully up at 08:00, the storm continued to rage, but we were far away and safely continued on our way to Dubrovnik. At noon we arrived at the dock and checked in to a new country. We spent three days and two hours making our passage. We spent eighteen hours sailing the Adriatic a new record for both Dragonsinger and all of her crew. And for the first time since we left Switzerland last October, we are out of the European Union and into a part of the world that we have never seen before.