Smells like toilet cleaner! (Majorca - Ibiza)

 

24 Aug 2021

We’ve spent the last few days tucked away in Santa Ponça.

Other than a few carelessly driven jet skis, and despite it being a tourist town, it’s been a generally quiet place. There’s enough people on land to nearly fill the bars and restaurants, which must be great for the locals, who will have no doubt missed out over the last two years from Covid.

There’s a fair variety of nationalities here, but most surprisingly for us was the number of lilting Irish accents heard as we strolled along behind the beach. I’m not sure if this is a feature of the Irish staying in the EU, a lack of lockdown rules or simply a well advertised Ryanair campaign.

On our last day, Chez was messaging with a nice Australian lady, Soni, who we’d met back in Greece. Soni mentioned some friends of hers were in the same anchorage. In the afternoon, as I was swapping out our faded and weather worn British flag in my undies, a couple paddle up in their canoe to say 'Hi' - sure enough, it’s Soni’s mates, who invite us to join them for a drink at a bar behind the small local’s beach. After putting a few more clothes on, we headed in and enjoyed a refreshing afternoon with them. They’re a semi-retired easygoing couple who own and run a boatyard in Wales when not sailing. We had a few beers, lots of laughs, and really hit it off.

Too soon we had to leave to finish off our provisioning before the shops shut. It’s possible, but unlikely that our paths will cross again - which is sadly the way with sailing buddies.

Next morning awoken by Chez: “it’s 4am and it’s windy”

Sweet music to my ears: both up and at ‘em and began the 48nm sail West to Ibiza. Big seas, and some quite high side on swell (2-3m) makes for a rocky ride, and sadly a less than on top form Cheryl.

On the crossing we had the first sprinkles of rain that we’ve seen for... well truly, since I don’t know when!

We came across what I thought was a flock of house martins, swooping along the waves about 10cm above the waters surface, perhaps 50 birds together over a mile or so - having later Googled they are in fact European Storm Petrels..another one I hadn’t seen before to add to the list.

Arrived at Ibiza early afternoon, our first stop - for a late lunch - is a high sided cliff lined bay with rock interspersed with pine trees, deserted except for a few houses high on the cliffs. As we came in, I shouted to Chez from the bow:

‘There’s an amazing smell of pine’

to which she replied:

‘Smells like toilet cleaner!’ ...which it does I suppose :)

After a toasted sandwich lunch, we headed the short jump around the headland to another wide bay. There’s a few yachts dotted around, but so much space, we choose a good spot in sand, drop, swim to check it, then off to bed for a nice long siesta.