29th October

Still in Cartagena. Today Abi left the boat as scheduled and Richard who joined on Sardinia to help with repairs and make up crew numbers left a little earlier than scheduled.

Prep the boat during the day to set sail avoiding today's headwind and ready for the southerly tomorrow. Plan to set sail 2100 or 2200 tonight non-stop to Gibraltar.

28th October

Still no favourable wind, so the fishing goes on and yesterday's is cooked to make a delicious lunch. Weather forecast is light winds until next monday now. At 0851 local time we crossed the Greenwich Meridian and later more excitement as 20+ dolphins come to play and swim under the bow of the boat. Not sure if the video will upload but here goes ...Arrive Cartagena at 1700 ish pretty tired now after the non-stop night watches. Amazing approach to the town and quite picturesque. Tapas and too much beer into the early hours..... oh dear....

27th October

Still no wind so motor on again to keep to the schedule for other crew.

'Biggles' the bird makes a brief stop for a rest on his way somewhere and in his excitement flies all the way into the boat and through an open hatch where we are stowing spare sails to disappear into the very back of the boat among the steering gear. A very hot half hour is spent chasing him back out again!

News from Louise about being checked out by the doctor and plans are laid for her to rejoin the boat on Gibraltar. :-)

Motor on through long night watches.

25, 26 October

Slip the lines at 0930 and start the 480 mile non-stop run to Cartagena in Spain. Mostly motor sailing in light or no-existent winds.

At last we caught a fish (a dolphin fish) so Barry a happy man & can't wait to get on and cook it.

Later on a school of dolphins 10 or more visits us amid lots of excitement, encouraging them by leaning over the side and banging on the hull of the boat.

Saturday 24th October

Probably the last post for a few days now. The plan is that Louise (better but still not right now the injections are wearing off) will fly home to her parents for some TLC and try to rejoin later (maybe Gib). Colin will rejoin Phoebe B at 1600 today as she has set sail from Porto Corallo for Cagliari to at least make some progess (40 miles) before sheltering from the next forecast gale (this is getting repetitive).

Not easy saying goodbye like this, hard not to miss out and hard to know Louise will be sad at not continuing, but it's for the best.

Friday 23rd October

A day in Cagliari for the two of us, trying to sort out arrangements for Louise to get home for some recovery at her parents, with the hope of coming back to joint the boat again for the later stages of the voyage.

Colin is reluctant to leave Louise to travel home alone after being so ill, but eventually we decide that he will stay here and rejoin the boat tomorrow when it is due to set sail for Cartagena. (The boat has fortunately had to hang around here too for the day due to storms to the south and west of Sardinia, so the option of rejoining it is still available to Colin.)

Thursday 22nd October

In the middle of Wednesday/Thursday night the wind again came round to an unfavourable westerly direction, making the boat slam and crash into the waves, and again the wind speed rose to 30-40 knots (Gale force 8) with a 5m swell. Skipper Matt decided to turn northwards for the sheltered eastern coast of Sardinia instead of continuing to head towards our intended destination of Cagliari.

Finally made it to a small, more easterly safe harbour called Porto Corallo, just to get some respite from the weather (and to give the now very sick Louise some rest).

Today we got news of the other Sail Ionian boat Tranquilizer (which on the original schedule would have set sail a week after us). They had already "lost" two crew to uncontrollable seasickness and had left the boat at the first opportunity in Messina. When they came out of the Messina straits and turned west, they were apparently caught out with too much sail for the wind and in the process of furling the headsail away they had ripped the sail and destroyed the furling gear, leaving the sail to be shredded by the wind. The process of cutting it free required someone to climb the mast in 40 knot gusts of wind to cut the damaged gear away. So maybe we aren't doing so badly after all.

Matt was now concerned about the safety of Louise staying on board and a doctor was called. After a stilted consultation with a doctor who only spoke Italian, an injection was administered - an interesting experience on a bouncing boat!

After some agonising decision making, we decided to leave the boat and head for a hotel and think what to do next.